Matt's PH1 172 Restoration Project

[tomsteer]

Great work, hats off to you. I'd love a phase 1, one day!
How is it underneath? Have you pulled the arch liners yet? Do the sills look ok?

 

[BuCkLeY...]

We're the leather stuff from mate?

 

[andy_coops]

Excellent project. Wouldn't mind details of your painter as I need a few bits doing.

 

[DerbyDan]

Wow! What a transformation - great work!! The Phase1s are in my opinion (& I'm unashamedly biased) the best looking of all the RS Clios & the OEM+ look of yours enhances the car's already good looks, the 16" F1s really set it off!

A real inspiration for my own Titanium Ph1!!

 

[DerbyDan]

..... also just a thought - my (slightly later) Phase1 has a plain 'rubber' rimmed steering wheel - where as yours is leather, should mine have had a leather rimmed wheel too do you think?

 

[Mr R.]

A few of my old bus.

 

[Mr R.]

..... also just a thought - my (slightly later) Phase1 has a plain 'rubber' rimmed steering wheel - where as yours is leather, should mine have had a leather rimmed wheel too do you think?

PH1's didnt come with a leather steering wheel, it was fake leather so that is why it fell to bits. People fitted the rubber wheels from the base spec cars because it looks better than one that's fallen to bits.

I had mine covered in the leather/cloth from a PH1 rear seat.

033 by Scott Raven, on Flickr

 

[yeecup]

Credit for fantastic work on what looked like a lost cause. Any history of belts/dephaser?

 

[partybish]

Superb thread/project. Great to see one being rescued.

Thanks bud, I'd have loved a flamer like yours but they don't seem to come up for sale as much. Part of me wondered whether I should have spent more on something in better condition as a starting point but those will always be in demand so it is very satisfying having 'saved' one that could have easily ended up changing hands a few more times and being ragged then scrapped. Also there is quite a contrast from the starting point to now.

Great work, hats off to you. I'd love a phase 1, one day!
How is it underneath? Have you pulled the arch liners yet? Do the sills look ok?

I've remove the archliners and all was well, ended up spraying them titanium and then coating with a protective layer before putting the liners back but once I've finished cleaning the underside and engine bay it will probably stay in the garage and only come out on sunny days :tonguewink:
I've not yet removed the sills as I haven't sourced any black rivets and new fittings. The jacking points will get done last as they need a bit of work but the car is up and down like a bride's nightie so no point doing them until the end.

We're the leather stuff from mate?

Link here chap. You have to fill out the form with make, model and year but give them a call beforehand. As I said it's Renault DK Blue but worth checking with them first.

Excellent project. Wouldn't mind details of your painter as I need a few bits doing.

Sent you a PM. He's based in Farnham.

..... also just a thought - my (slightly later) Phase1 has a plain 'rubber' rimmed steering wheel - where as yours is leather, should mine have had a leather rimmed wheel too do you think?

I think I posted a pic of the wheel beforehand, it did seem rubbery as it had dents in it that leather wouldn't appear to wear like that.
As a quick fix some people strip the top/stitched layer off their wheel but snappy's re-trims are a work of art. He did have some alcantara seat material left over, it's grippier if you're going on track but it depends how much use the car will get as leather probably wears slower.

Credit for fantastic work on what looked like a lost cause. Any history of belts/dephaser?

They were done by Renault Bristol on 27k which was a concern given the mileage but the price took account of this and my first trip was to @Mike@Rentech in Portsmouth for cam/aux belts, dephaser and waterpump. I plan on overhauling the engine in time to get some power gains so I will have a chance to see whether things are holding up.

 

[Budgie]

What a beaut!
Only thing I'd change is the 16's for 15's, as they drive better and look better IMO...

If you need any parts, let me know, I'm only in Chertsey

 

[DerbyDan]

A few of my old bus.

This car gives me goosebumps!! Thanks for the info on the steering wheel - I must admit mine feels remarkably 'fresh' given its age & 74k mileage so it would figure that it's been changed at some point - it has no stitching, it's just a plain rubber wheel & does feel quite 'base-spec'.

Re; PartyBish's Clio - its good to see one being 'saved' & it must be quite satisfying seeing the fruits of your labour!

 

[Stay Puft]

Doing a great job on this. Really need to do my seats like you have. That scuff fixer stuff, would it work for ph2? Same colour?

Edit, £15!!

 

[BGEarles]

Doing a great job on this. Really need to do my seats like you have. That scuff fixer stuff, would it work for ph2? Same colour?

Edit, £15!!

Stop been a cheap skate.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[BREMBO]

Really nice project. Do you have any more details on the car mats? As they are a very close match

 

[Budgie]

Really nice project. Do you have any more details on the car mats? As they are a very close match

I have a set of Genuine Ph1 mats in good shape if you're interested. Tiny touch of wear on the drivers but nothing major £30 posted. Pics make them look 100x worse than they are.

 

[subarufreak]

stunning work!!

 

[Willliams]

Great work..!!

Following!

 

[Stefan.]

Great work

Love the ph1

 

[partybish]

What a beaut!
Only thing I'd change is the 16's for 15's, as they drive better and look better IMO...

If you need any parts, let me know, I'm only in Chertsey

Thanks Budgie, I will drop you a PM shortly as there are still a few bits and bobs and it's only a stone's throw away.

Really nice project. Do you have any more details on the car mats? As they are a very close match

I'm pretty sure I used Ambassador but having gone back to the website it looks a bit different now. I saw these then phoned them up and asked them for just the fronts with no Cup logos and to make sure the stitching was the same colour blue as the mat. They did two for £18 I think but I don't have an e-receipt as I paid over the phone so I can't be 100% sure that they were navy, probably best to give them a call - if you have a pic of your carpet you can send it to them and they will tell you which is the best match.

 

[partybish]

Thanks for all the kind words, I didn't get round to posting an update at the weekend but I have a few pictures of the work I've done on the engine bay to date.
The bay was very dirty and in need of a decent clean.

The car had an aftermarket K&N filter on, which, combined with the Magnex twin exhaust made quite a lot of noise. I sourced a standard airbox and fitted it but it was a massive pain and one of the cold air feeds gave up as I was trying to get it to fit.

New box fitted... with broken cold air feed! :angry:

After a bit of a spruce up it looked a tiny bit better...

My plan was/is to strip the entire bay of parts, powdercoat them, zinc plate the screws etc and then put it all back together. I made a start with the ECU cover and battery brace as this was fairly easy to remove and the ECU cover was rusting away.
Area before..

ECU removed and being stripped down...

ECU bracket and bolts ready to be sent for zinc plating..

 

[partybish]

Various parts back from the platers including the ECU bracket

ECU rebuilt

ECU put back together, battery brace powdercoated and reattached together with a new black battery in replace of the old one. I also sourced two cold air feeds and an airbox strap which got zinc plated. Everything else got cleaned and coated with Aerospace 303.

One more random bolt swap out just because I could. It looks a bit sad surrounded by the aged looking engine parts..

 

[partybish]

I also got three of the underside heat shields back from the powdercoaters, finished in a brilliant metallic silver.

 

[partybish]

That brings things just about up to date in terms of work done so far but I have quite a few parts sat around waiting to go on including powerflex black dogbone mount, inner/outer ARB and steering rack bushes, OEM inner track rods, OEM wishbones and a powdercoated ARB. Unfortunately I managed to crash my mountainbike and separate my shoulder and I started a new job which has taken up quite a lot of time so I haven't been able to get under the car the past couple of evenings/weekends.

It has allowed me to do a bit of thinking about what is next and my broad plan of attack for the rest of it is:

• CarPro CeriGlass treatment on the windows and general miscellaneous tidying up jobs
• Remove the final heatshield and the cat then fit the resprayed gearstick and tighten up the handbrake cable - I'm debating whether to fit a 182 manifold at this point as I hear mixed reviews and I'm not sure whether it would mean the rest of my exhaust would no longer fit?
• Strip out the aircon pipes, polish them up with the dremel and refit it all with new seals followed by a leak test (the aircon doesn't work currently so I'm hopeful that doing this might fix things)
• Remove the scuttle panel and bonnet lock assembly for painting (most Clios the scuttle panel seems to have hex bolts but mine has button screws which need a hex tool and they sheared almost as soon as I looked at them?!)
• Start stripping down the rest of the engine bay for powdercoating/zinc plating/general tidying up
• New oil/filter, fuel filter, plugs and engine seals
• Strip the rear beam and components and take it all to be powdercoated then refit
• Strip the subframe for powdercoating and refit it with new OEM running gear, zinc bolts and powerflex black bushes

Once I've done all that the car should be pretty well up to scratch and the idea is to take it for a rolling road so I can get a baseline to start making various performance upgrades against.

 

[partybish]

One more gratuitous shot of the alloy wheel nuts - really pleased with they way they look! :tonguewink:

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

 

[Clio_fool]

I've just read this from the beginning and wow what a transformation all the effort has achieved. Brilliant job to save one, we need to see less breaking threads and more like this one. [emoji106]

 

[20vKarlos]

Great little project this!

Look forward to updates

 

[joytodrive25]

Makes me feel lazy for sure. Looks great so far, can't wait to see the finished result. Won't be far off @Phase1sr 's which from his photos is one of the best in existence.

 

[Mr R.]

You need to remove the rear 1/4 interior trims to see if the inner sills are going rusty before you spend to much money on this.

 

[cat171]

Great project, it's coming together really well! The steering wheel, seats & plastic trims look much better now I like it on 16's but am not so keen on the spacers, they just push the wheels a little too far out. I can tell though that it's going to look really nice once finished.

With regards to the steering wheel, I can only speak for a V6, but believe they were neoprine (that's what I saw listed in the brochure) I still have a pretty mint wheel as I swapped it out for a leather one which is much better. As for the mats, they look great! Costco used to sell some that were perfect, but they've not had them in years. I still have my originals as I took them out for some cheap ones.

 

[cat171]

Makes me feel lazy for sure. Looks great so far, can't wait to see the finished result. Won't be far off @Phase1sr 's which from his photos is one of the best in existence.

Believe me, the pictures didn't do it justice, I thought it looked really nice, saw it for real and it was better! Completely immaculate!
The way this chap's going & with his eye for detail, he too will have a real peach of a car on his hands when he's finished

 

[Paul172sport]

Hey Matt. Car looks stunning and what a transformation.
Reading threads like this definitely give me a spur on to start tackling mine.

Keep the oem look it's the best for these Ph1 I think

 

[partybish]

@Ant1 not sure if you found the thread but here it is.

 

[partybish]

@W72 WAE