Mk1 Clio 1.8 16v AKA TOU

[COSTA_MK1]

New to this forum, so thought id share my ongoing project from clio16valver on here.

Ive had my Brooklands green 1.8 16v for probably 6 ish years maybe a bit longer. At the time I bought the car id only been driving a year, but it was a project for the time when my insurance came down. It ended up being stripped out with an F7R fitted to it.

Taken off the road probably about 3 years ago now after a garage f*cked my engine up attempting to put cams in it. At that time id hit some financial issues etc etc so it was put on the back burner.

So here are some images so what happened.

Picked it up from Blackpool 27th December 2009 i think it was. Lovely weather :shock: it was a part exchange at some scooby specialist place. It was advertised on Pistonheads for 1500 quid. I ended up paying 500. Which at the time i was very happy with, after all it was my dream clio!

when we got it home, dad took a sigh of relief after towing it back.

It was pretty standard-ish, full leather interior in very good condition black carpet and plastics. It was a ph1.5 so had odds and sods from both.


So after some digging around having it running for a bit etc etc found out the engine was pretty rubbish so set about to put an F7R in it


Big Brother Little Brother, the front one was my first car which set my love for clios especially Brooklands ones

Front end stripped back to get ready for removing the 1.8 16v engine

This rusty patch will prove to be the bane of this clios life

So because the 1.8 16v engine had ridiculously low oil pressure it was removed. And with it the rust on the drivers side wing/front corner

The cause of a f*cked 1.8 16v engine. Someone thought putting loads of sealant in the oil pickup pump was a good idea!

Subframe and lower brace fitted

The new heart at the time it was removed from a crashed Williams 2, it had about 80k on it from memory which 6 years or so ago was pretty good.

Id subframe mounted the engine but wanted to keep the PAS this was the start of the modification, it worked a treat too. but not pictures of the rest of it

Williams Dials i picked up when i was on holiday in cornwall 12k miles on them

Big Arse,

F7R Fitted, at this point there wasn't that much left to do before mot, notice the whole in the front corner still. That got patched up , ill call it patched up because the state the block left it in wast defiantly not a repair.

This is when I had an incident in my 172 exclusive and it was being stripped for parts

This replaced the 172 as a daily driver

This was when it was about road worthy, the blue parts got a coat of satin black

And that was that. I was on my merry way hooning about loved it modifications it had;
F7R Williams engine fitted
Avo Coilovers
Carbon Bonnet
Sparco Seat
Scorpion Exhaust- Decat - Supersprint S/Steel manifold
Carbon Grp A/N intake
Wilwoods
Ploy bushed ARB
Subframe mounted engine
Battery Relocated
Strut brace & Lower Brace
PAS Mod
Williams Wide Track
Half Cage (needs to be replaced with a full one)
Stripped out sound deadening etc, not really a modification imo
OMP wheel
Short shift gear leaver not box end
JC5 172 Box
Hill Power Hoses

Think that was about it.


Then i got the bug for a bit more poke. I found some kent cams and cat cam pullies come up pretty cheap so i snatched them up. Booked in to a local garage. What a mistake ruined the engine.

So took it back and set about fixing it. Valves for the F7R Williams engine are hard to come by and expensive from Renault. I found a bare engine for 100 quid so bought that. stripped it down for what i needed and rebuilt the head.

At this point i thought ill do a proper job on the repair panels on the front end. As i wasn't over the moon with the cowboy that did it the first time round. Stripped the car down and it got left up until recently.

Which brings us to these images;

The spares F7R I got the valves from

Engine built back up with the cams and timing done, they will need dialling in once its all up and running

Replacement panels

The front crossmember/slam panel. I wasn't happy with the crossmember wasn't that good of a copy but i found a decent one on eBay. So drilled out the spot welds holding the crossmember to the slam panel uprights.

Ive got my mate to do the welding as I've never really done any and he's done it since we were about 10 now building hotrods.

That then gave me something like this, before we cut the crappy metal away we made a jig for the front end with holes in it to aline the new crossmember up with the bolt locations used for the subframe

Front passenger corner needs a new panel, was told by Renault yeh yeh available, brilliant ill order one £21 be in the following friday. Await phone call nothing drive down oh yeh its no longer available. Brilliant so now I'm on the hunt for a scrap shell with both front corners in good condition

Thats pretty much where it is at the moment. More to follow slowly.

had some spare time this weekend so managed to get down there. Finally picked up 2 front legs of a kind chap in oxford. Set about picking the panels apart

Clean back the seam sealer to expose the joints and the spot weld positions, bit of a messy job. Thankfully the panel is looking good with little to no rot on it.

Drill out the spot welds to separate the corner section from the leg/inner wing panels

There she is. Not welding in yet the other side still needs doing then the trial with body panels and alinement.

The other side is a bit more tricky with the engine mount welded to that but the same process will be done.

Heading down again in a few mins hopefully have the other side done today!


got down to the garage again today. productive weekend, its all starting to take shape at long last.

Drivers side time now, same crack as the passenger side bit more tricky with the engine mount getting the panel out.

The repair section, the legs came from a car being broken and the shell was being scrapped. This side looked all good.

This one not so good. I thought this could be it what a waste of time looked to be rotten. Im sure they all go in the same places...

so i continued cleaning back the seam sealer drilling out the spots eventually after much swearing it came out and i was happy again!

It needs a new flange that would weld to the inner wing but other than that its a good solid panel.

and we now have a car that almost has a front end complete.

next will be getting the body panels and sort out alinement tacking it up & fully seam welding it all in place.

After that it will be sills and jacking points followed by rear arches. I hate body work!!!!


Some goodies have turned up

I'm going to to Mark Fish motorsports 12th December to talk about engine building etc.

Small update. Went to Mark Fish Motorsports to have a chat about my engine, so thats with him now. Heres some images of a couple of cars in his yard

and I've managed to get some time to start welding in the repair panels heres what it looks like so far

need to finish off fully welding in the panels and get my bonnet on to make sure it all lines up properly. Fingers Crossed!


a little update, removed the windscreen to attack to surface rust. Fingers cross that the shuttle area was solid, and it was!! very happy about that

back onto the panel welding, long process. passenger side suspension turret area behind the inner wing had some rot so that came out and in went some fresh material.

this morning i checked the body panels for how they will sit, with the subframe. The drivers side needs some tweaking to get the panel gaps better but the passenger side thats nearly fully welded is looking good so far. Need a new bumper as on of the fixing tabs to the subframe has broken

back at it tomorrow need some more gas and wire.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

So not had an update for a while.

More welding and body panel replacing. Also some more goodies for when it finally becomes road worth. Also moving down the car towards the back i find more rust, the joys!

So the front end is about there ish, couple of little loose ends to tidy up but all in all 90% done before paint anyway. leaving it looking like this

flicking through the internet i came across some bits & bobs for when its all back together. in the past I've left opportunities for getting a good deal on parts for then to be stung with a higher cost in the future when they come up again so now i just go for it.

Avanti LSD, which is being sent off to be fitted this weekend coming.

Fully flocked Dash from Black Sheep Flocking. Had a bit of trouble with them previous via eBay, BUT they redeemed themselves with this. Great customer communication, item was very well packaged, quick delivery & a very reasonable price!

Back to the car then. So as the front end is about there fabrication wise I thought id head down the drivers side and see what the score was. Previously this is what took it off the road for a whole at the back in the inner sill.

Thats the hole right next to the rear jacking point, looks as if its had a shoddy repair in the past.

Drivers side jacking area looking sorry for its self. A whack with the hammer and its all still solid so that was a good sign i guess.

Passenger side looking just as bad.

Rear passenger side looking pretty grotty.

And to add just a bit more a small hole in the floor near the exhaust tunnel, I say near it might as well be in it!

Whilst thats been going on I've been in talks with a company we use as work for graphics etc about reproducing some door pillar emblems, these particular ones are found on the mk1 cup racer cars way back when. Lucky if theres any original ones left about as id imagine them to have had replacement doors some point in their racing life.

There just samples at the moment, fortunately a chap thats local has some original ones so going to check with that to see how they fair up.

Anyway back on the car again. So i needed to replace one sill that was a give & thought the other one albeit no holes and was solid, the underside/rail? of it was pretty mashed up from people jacking it up on the wrong bits etc. Might as well do both!

I've ordered the ouster replacement sides for both, inners are no longer available or made so that will have to be fabricated up.Fun.

The dreaded hole after id bashed the rust out. Also you can just about see the rust on the arch, you guessed it, its gone through to the inner arch too!! the luck I'm having with this car and its solid body it unbelievable right?! Anyway press on.

Working my way back down to the front of the shell, Ive ground back the crap most of it is surface rust with patches or rot. The question is replace what is rotten and leave the solid in for ease or bight the bullet and cut all the old crap out and replace with new. Id say I'm more inclined with the second option i don't want to be doing this again in 3 years time for a patch that i didn't replace.

You can see a hole through i think this is where there is a drainage hole between the inner and outer skin pretty typical for it to have gone i guess.

the front part. The s**t bit is that the inner is pretty buckled from being jacked up on it etc so its hard to find the straight line it should travel down.

I haven't started on the other side yet. Hopefully this is the worst one.

More updates to come.

 

[terryc101]

Looking forward to more updates! Nice to see another valver getting some love on here.

 

[NorthloopCup]

Interesting project!! I've got one of those avanti diffs to fit!!

Welcome aboard Phil! :wink:

 

[Alastair.]

Fair play to you, love a mk1

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Thanks terry hopefully it will be road worthy before the bad worth comes back!

Haha I wonder where that diff came from Mark?!

Cheers Alastair. It's the colour that got me. Apparently only 28 came into the UK in Brooklands green, if that is the case it's pretty rare I only know of one other.

 

[firehorizon]

Looks like a good job mate another mk1 clio being saved from the crusher

 

[COSTA_MK1]

So not much of an update

I had my box rebuilt and the diff fitted Thanks to @NorthloopCup, it wasn't as straight forward as we'd have liked but he managed to get it all done. Excellent work by him really helpful guy!

Nothing too exciting there.

Also from @NorthloopCup, he makes a bump steer correction kit, so I also got that. This should give me a good starting point to adjust and iron most of if not all of it out. It allows you to drop it 40mm without any agro on the geometry of the suspension. I'll probably be doing the 172 stub axle mod at a later date.

So as its getting close to the time to get the professionals in for the remaining body work i.e rear arches I thought it would be good to get it on all 4s ready to move it.

Potentially it's going to have a roof skin swap. But I've not 100% made my mind up yet, I've bought this just on the off chance I do go for it

That's it for now. Hopefully the next update will be either some engine progress, or more importantly body work!!!

 

[midge]

I want a roof skin for mine as it has the normal dents around the sunroof, the only issue is i know it'll be a pain to fit.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

@midge i was going to do it myself, from the quick look i took at it last weekend its only the front bit before the rain rail trim thats welded & filled the rest is just spot welded and seam sealer in. As the body shop will be doing the arches I'm going to leave it to them to tackle, if i go with it.

 

[imprezaworks]

Brilliant thread

 

[rickyquicky]

Hi Costa

Going to town on the car :beers:

What did you do with the sills in the end? I want to get mine opened right up like yours so I can treat the inner sill.
Not sure whether to get it cut along the same line you did and get something fabricated, or buy the replacement sills for the standard mk1 clio? Not sure how involved it is to get them to fit.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Hi Costa

Going to town on the car :beers:

What did you do with the sills in the end? I want to get mine opened right up like yours so I can treat the inner sill.
Not sure whether to get it cut along the same line you did and get something fabricated, or buy the replacement sills for the standard mk1 clio? Not sure how involved it is to get them to fit.

I've not been on it for a while due to work being so busy it's taken over life & helping a friend with his mk2 build. But what I have found is that line I've cut along seems good unless you want to start taking out the spot welding in the door apature too which I might do as I've got some dents along my sill where the bottom of the door meets. Saves any body filler this way. Also the after market sills arnt quite the right radius/long enough around if that makes sense so these have to be cut and a piece infilled to match up to the flange off the floor. So if your handy and have the right stuff to do it I'd probably just fabricate my own putter sill up. Swings and roundabouts some might say.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

so not been doing much on the car lately as work has taken over life. still waiting for my head to be done. i acquired a cage but yet to fit it.

went on a little track day with club gti

My S3 learning in the background

Also grabbed a new bit of kit to help with some of the pulley bolts etc, I use makita kit for work so made sense just to buy the body as i have all the other stuff. Works a treat too for £65!

Bottom end, not much on it as it stands just the crank fitted, waiting to order rods & oil pump. then i can assemble the rest of it with the high comp pistons.

bought a roll cage too, but not had a chance to fit it. Its a bolt in jobby so should be fairly straight forward. Some pictures of when it was in its old car. I think its an OMP one from memory.

Thats it really. Need to pull my finger out!!

 

[COSTA_MK1]

So over the chrismtas period i had booked the car in for dipping to strip all the paint & rust/crud off of the car. Im a bit apprehensive over the whole thing as this is a no going back hello money pit situation, i just keep telling myself its my forever car which makes is all worth while, apart from when s**t doesn't go write when its being put back together. We will leave that until later.

To get it prepared for the dipping processes everything has to be stripped off the car that isn't steel as it won't be there when i get it back. pretty self explanatory i guess so i didn't really take many photos of what I've been up to. The rear axle wasn't all that bad, just the one bolt that was a b**ch & had to be ground out.

Also ibe been planning waaayyy ahead with engine bay bling/ i need this because race car ideology. Also found a french dude that makes up jacking points for a r5 which are the same part so that was a bonus.

Anyway here are a few pics, I've still got a bit of stripping to do but the majority is there the main things left are the sunroof as all the bolts are spinning & the rear hatch glass.

Pretty bare just bolted on panels left really



Both front jacking points, actual jacking part is made from 3mm steel so should be a lot stronger than the O.E stuff

id been serching for years to find either one second hand or a place that makes them finally found a company that reproduces them & to a very high standard.

Also picked up some seats which i haven't actually collected yet so i stole the photo

ill be back on it at the weekend hopefully get the rear screen out & the glass out of the doors.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

so bit of an update, i had the day off from work yesterday to finish off stripping my car down ready for chemical dipping. This is now the point of no return. Im very apprehensive of what it will come back like, I could end up with less than half the car who knows!

Anyway here are some images of how it went. Considering the car was 'Stripped' as I'm going for the 'race car' look, there was a s**t load of stuff that had to be removed. My main discovery was how light the hatch is when its got none of the glass or motors in there, also how heavy ph2 doors are even with all the crap removed the door bars in them must weigh a ton. As I've got no door bar braces i won't be cutting these out as I've watched the NCAP video for these cars its fair to say they're not safe, at all.

this is the situation id left it in the other week just crammed full of the bits & bobs id previously removed


i carried on take bits off removing glass, window motors, seals etc etc

Then this morning i took the car to potentially its final resting place, depending how much of it returns.

The company I'm using for dipping is called Pro Strip, they're a local fish company.

Also picked up some new second hand seat from a mate, if you've been in the clio world a while especially the mk1 side of things you'll know that most parts get recycled through the community and thats exactly whats happening with these seat.

Note one seat has dust on it, probably filler dust don't mistake it for Pablo's leftover sneeze residue.

And thats about where we are at the moment. Couple of things I've got to sort out next like hopefully a roll over jig to make my life easier & fingers cross the Coupe badges that are on page 2? get them into production a couple of people have asked about them now.

So yeh more updates soon, if the cars survived the dipping!

 

[Coops Mk1]

Hey up Phil hope the shell work goes well matey!

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Hey up Phil hope the shell work goes well matey!

Cheers mate so do I. Very nervous. I've seen cars that have came out of the bath but I've never seen them before it so I don't know how rough they looked in paint. I keep telling myself it's relatively solid it will be fine.

 

[White16valver]

Just seen this thread - f**king awesome, dude.

Wish I had your skills - extra kudos for doing all that work in a garage.

I dread to think what the state of mine is if yours looks like that. One day I'll get it resto'd, but as you say, it is not cheap when you want to do it properly...

 

[massiveCoRbyn]

Some real work going into this! Definitely one to watch. Love that airbox assembly!

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Just seen this thread - f**king awesome, dude.

Wish I had your skills - extra kudos for doing all that work in a garage.

I dread to think what the state of mine is if yours looks like that. One day I'll get it resto'd, but as you say, it is not cheap when you want to do it properly...

Thanks mate. I've just learnt it all by having a go watching a few videos etc etc. I have a trust issue where this car is concerned so I'd rather me have a go and take twice as long than give my hard earned cash up to someone I don't know that could just hide all their mistakes. If that makes sense. I'm not saying I've done a perfect job but I can live with that as it's cost me 0.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Some real work going into this! Definitely one to watch. Love that airbox assembly!

Cheers dude. Took me ages to find a place that makes them.

 

[NorthloopCup]

Cheers dude. Took me ages to find a place that makes them.

They do something similar, if not identical for the f4r engines as well mate. Fits under the slam panel and follows the contour.

 

[massiveCoRbyn]

They do something similar, if not identical for the f4r engines as well mate. Fits under the slam panel and follows the contour.

Don't say things like that, it sounds expensive lol. Got a link?

 

[NorthloopCup]

Don't say things like that, it sounds expensive lol. Got a link?

http://www.mcracingsa.com/4-pieces-...23-renault/396-clio-2/239-rs1-et-rs2-de-base/

 

[COSTA_MK1]

http://www.mcracingsa.com/4-pieces-...23-renault/396-clio-2/239-rs1-et-rs2-de-base/

yeh I already had the scoop and the v6 air box previous when it was running, this one is a larger air box & scoop with the tb box fitting under the standard slam panel & being able to use 120mm trumpets, as my bodies are very short.

https://www.boutique-bordanova-sport.com/clio-williams-gra-et-grn-et-f2000/admission/

 

[Akay]

Wow, how have I missed this so far? Work is a credit to you mate, top marks for persistance! Hope it comes out of the dipping ok.

@Coops Turbo I see what you mean about mk1 rust now!

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Wow, how have I missed this so far? Work is a credit to you mate, top marks for persistance! Hope it comes out of the dipping ok.

@Coops Turbo I see what you mean about mk1 rust now!

Cheers mate! So do I, very apprehensive of how it will turn out. If I have no holes or very little in the floor ill be winning.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Well since last time I've been collecting panels for areas i thought would be rotten through. So far I've not done too bad I've managed to get my hands on most of them. Ill upload photos of them later, but next up is something I've been very anxious about for a while.

THE BARE METAL MK1 CLIO SHELL!!!!!!!!

Id taken today off work as its my miss's birthday weekend, she hadn't got it off so i just spent the day dossing about. Check my phone to see i have a voice mail from Pro Strip. Your clio is ready for collection. So obviously I was buzzing! I couldn't go to my work for a van as we don't have one i can drive thats big enough anymore so i call my dad & he sorts it out.

3pm comes and were on our way to the clio shell. Hoping its still all attached.

And here it is

The bonnet doesn't seem to have anything out of the ordinary about it apart from one missing stud which had snapped off previous.

The passenger door, again pretty good. when they were in paint i didn't notice any rot so i was hoping the doors were ok.

As you can see they've came back pretty solid just around the drain holes needs addressing as there is some pitting & one has gone through.

Next up is the drivers door, again when in paint it seemed fine. Usually they rust along the bottom edge on the viewing face & along the underside but it was ok before.

Thankfully this one was also fine. A bit of pitting around the bottom gain but nothing too much to worry about.

Now here is the rear hatch. This was a known rusty s**t box before so to see what was left was the interesting bit.

So as you can see this is relatively bad. The rot as got into some hard to repair areas where there are a lot of different contours. Im in two minds to either take my time and repair this or sack it off and buy a fibre glass one. Time will tell. Ill probably end up repairing this if turns out crap ill just get the fibre glass one & be done with it.

Thats all the panels out the way with as the bumpers and front wings on a mk1 are plastic. Which leads onto the actual shell.

Now the shell had rot on the following areas that i knew off;
front end in general
sills
jacking points front & back
under the scuttle panel
the floor near the exhaust tunnel
the boot floor near the hatch area
drivers side rear arch

So other than them 'minor' rusty patches above it seems to be pretty 'solid' for a mk1

Lets see then;

you can see a small bit of rot that has came through near the mounting bracket

same deal on this side, must be how the panels lap into the corresponding ones causing a dirt trap over time.
I have a brand new full replacement panel for this, i doubt it will get used i think ill be cutting the damaged areas out and replacing them with fresh sheet metal as there isn't really any detail in those bits that have gone through. So not too bad here.

Working down the side a bit as we dragged the shell out the van, the drivers side rear arch. This was a known issue so nothing new here

I have a poverty spec replacement panel as you can't get the flared 16v/williams arches anymore. Should be able to use this to mach up these areas. Also a new inner 'tub' as you can see the larger hole has gone into this part.

Drivers rear chassis rail looking ok, needs a bit of a wire wheel in some areas.

Internal side of the rail

Passenger one is pretty much the same deal still solid which is nice.

Boot Floor looking good & the rear central chassis rail.

We move across to the rear passenger side arch. In paint this one was ok no bubbling or anything.

Surprisingly very good. Pretty happy with that side.

We move up into the rear boot floor.

As a whole this isn't that bad. I've defiantly seen a lot worse in these mk1's.

Around the rear windows is a very common area to go

Very happy with this these are solid.

Looking towards the rear of the car. Not much to pick out

Nice hole near the exhaust tunnel

Passenger rear footwell, these areas tend to go where the floor meets the inner sill section.

Drivers footwell seems to be all there

As does the passenger one!!

So far so good all things considered.

At the front of the bulkhead and windscreen area
Yet again another common place for them to go.

You can see the small spot on the underside. This could be a pain to sort.

Passenger front jacking point. Both sides front and rear will be getting replaced & both sills.

The front of the car

So yeh that's where it's at now. So time to get the panels all sorted and then the shell. It's moving in the right direction now!

 

[massiveCoRbyn]

I'd love to have a shell done like that. It's a totally blank canvas, love it. Looks pretty solid too, could have been an awful lot worse.

 

[Coops Mk1]

Not bad really Mr Costa, not bad at all!
Roll on the restoration!!

 

[RichValver]

this definitely looks like the way to go about restoring these! Can see exactly where needs replacing!

look forward to seeing updates with this

 

[COSTA_MK1]

this definitely looks like the way to go about restoring these! Can see exactly where needs replacing!

look forward to seeing updates with this

I don't know if I've fell lucky with it but it seems once all the craps gone it isn't that bad. My theory was the paint is going to cost the same regardless, but these cars are known for rotting inside out. Dipping seemed to be the best way to prevent the rust coming through again over a media blast that would have just done the outside.

 

[CZUCZU]

Hlw much time u have to paint it

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Hlw much time u have to paint it

As long as it takes really. As long as it doesn't get soaking wet or oils on it. It gets re dipped, a light media blast & then epoxy primer/e coat. so the surface rust it will get from being stud in the garage is irrelevant, unless it takes like 20 years.

 

[CZUCZU]

So youdont paint in in primer...strange

 

[Coops Mk1]

Remind me again Mr Costa what the overall project plan is?

 

[CZUCZU]

Hahaha ouch...

But that's one of my favorites topic here

 

[COSTA_MK1]

So youdont paint in in primer...strange

No otherwise it needs a full dip & strip again.

 

[COSTA_MK1]

Remind me again Mr Costa what the overall project plan is?

High comp bodies f7r with the jc5 lsd box. Remove sunroof. Bolt in cage. A bit of a 'modern' back road car a bit Track oriantated. Outside just o.e. Having said that. Going to all this effor makes me want to restore it to factory spec. So it's still a bit up in the air.