MK2 PH1 1.2 8v Clio Grande - Tidy up project

[Martin_172]

Guy was buying a Hyundai i30 at work that we had up for sale. He wondered if we would give him anything for his Clio to save him the hassle of scrapping it.... we gave him £350 off the Hyundai for it, after a brief look round it I gave my boss £300 and it was mine! Someone came in looking for a cheap runabout a few hours later and offered me £500 for it but where's the fun in that?...

V reg - 1999
2 previous owners
51,500 Miles
FULL Service history

Gave it a quick going over at work on the ramp and its seriously seriously mint underneath, all it required was a high level brake light (faulty - more on that later!), Sump (badly corroded), inner ARB Bushes (perished), a set of wiper blades (looked original!) and a rear exhaust mount (collapsed) So last Saturday I done all of that and a full service since I was doing the sump anyway. - Put it though its MOT and it sailed with no advisories.

Brought it home to join the fleet!

It needed a high level brake light so a nice cheap pearl black PH3 spoiler was sourced:

I managed to source a cheap set of ph3/Campus 15" alloys in decent condition on eBay. They were listed as all tyres needing replaced but I assume that was just the sellers get out of jail card as actually all 4 were ok, in fact 2x looked fairly new! but by the time they arrived I had already ordered a set of Hankook 195/50/15. No biggie as I knew they would look better on a lower profile tyre anyway and it meant having 4x matching new tyres.

I spent friday night on it since it looks like it hadn't been washed in years. It got the works!

• a scrub including blasting out any gaps, seals, seams, arches etc
• Tar removal using AutoSmart tar & glue removal
• Clay Bar
• Fallout removal using AutoSmart Red7
• a blast over with the machine polisher with meguiars ultimate compound
• a going over with AutoGlym trim restorer
• Fresh set of number plates

 

[Martin_172]

Saturday was time to fit the wheels. They got the tyres removed, a decent scrub then the new tyres fitted with some fresh valves.

It pissed with rain soon after doing the trim dressing on Friday night so it needs re done, but other than that I'm mega pleased with the results!

I've still to do the interior but started with a swap over to White dials from some other ph1 non RS. I stripped them all down, swapped the PCB from my dials into the white ones so the mileage stays correct

And how she sits tonight after a busy weekend, now with the trim restorer re applied.

Next weekend, onto the interior...

 

[Djw John]

Bargain that!

 

[Martin_172]

Bargain that!

probably still loose money on it when I sell by the time I go overboard!

 

[Djw John]

Well yeah but think of the fun you think you're having 😂

 

[McGherkin]

Awesome, I loved my 1.2 Grande.

It actually sounded unusually good for a 1.2 with a K&N 57i on it, all I can put it down to is being 8v as the 16vs sound crap in comparison.

 

[Martin_172]

Awesome, I loved my 1.2 Grande.

It actually sounded unusually good for a 1.2 with a K&N 57i on it, all I can put it down to is being 8v as the 16vs sound crap in comparison.

the airbox wasn't clipped on right when I picked it up and it sounded amazing!

its SLOW AS s**t though

 

[McGherkin]

1.0 Pandas are like that (1.0? 1.2? Can’t remember), the airbox looks like a dragster blower intake too.

They are not fast, but once you get them going and attack some corners they’re not bad at all tbh. Just no straight line ability.

 

[dawgtired]

Love it Martin

I've just got rid of everything bar the van, so a big empty drive now.
Miss the Ph1 but want to spend more time and money on the van 😁

 

[Martin_172]

Love it Martin

I've just got rid of everything bar the van, so a big empty drive now.
Miss the Ph1 but want to spend more time and money on the van 😁

They are just such a cool thing to cut about in! And the comedy factor makes it for me!

 

[Martin_172]

£20 for a cheap pair of ph1 S/172 dual optics headlights, would have been rude not to 😂

 

[Bluebeard]

Love this!! I miss blasting round in these.

 

[Martin_172]

Love this!! I miss blasting round in these.

I've been daily driving it almost every day, its a fantastic wee motor, there's one for sale in Glasgow with 10k on the clock for £1500!

 

[GavC]

Reminds me of mine... Dual optics overhaul the front so nicely. Might I suggest a Fabia splitter, clear side repeaters & ph2 rear lights - that'll be it perfect

Your driveway looks like it could be a renualt dealership forecourt

 

[Martin_172]

Reminds me of mine... Dual optics overhaul the front so nicely. Might I suggest a Fabia splitter, clear side repeaters & ph2 rear lights - that'll be it perfect

Your driveway looks like it could be a renualt dealership forecourt

haha yeah the comments from the neighbours have got a bit boring on the subject! I've tried a few other things but nothing ticks all the boxes as well, and cheaply!

 

[Martin_172]

Had to laugh at my Facebook memories from a year ago when I bought this, "its just a quick tidy up and shift on...."

Today I was removing a perfectly good pattern part exhaust (two piece thing - they always blow!) to fit a genuine one piece one from an 08 Campus Sport i pulled off at the scrappy.

 

[McGherkin]

Has it got a cone on it yet? If not, why not? 😛

 

[Martin_172]

Has it got a cone on it yet? If not, why not? 😛

haha it doesn't, but the airbox was broken when i got it so it used to fall off and it sounded mint, its comedy how slow it accelerates to the redline even in first though!

I'm eyeing up a TCE conversion for it....

 

[McGherkin]

Honestly leave it slow but making chunky induction noises. Will be far more fun.

 

[Martin_172]

When one Clio van just isn't enough, pulled a full van conversion kit out a van at the scrappies today to convert this to a van......

 

[Martin_172]

Well this grew arms and legs, picked up a high miles (170k!) Clio RSi cheap local today, shell has seen better days so its getting stripped and the 1600 16v converted over into this shell! - Engine runs sweet as a nut so ill just bore scope it and if all is good, stick it in, if not ill give it a refresh first.

 

[Bluebeard]

Ooooh I love an RSI. I remember when I first got my 172 and and a guy in an RSI caught me off guard and it took me a good 2 lengths of dual carriageway to catch him. 😂

 

[Martin_172]

Ooooh I love an RSI. I remember when I first got my 172 and and a guy in an RSI caught me off guard and it took me a good 2 lengths of dual carriageway to catch him. 😂

Im the same, total soft spot for one. My mate followed me home in my 197 and the exact same thing happened!!! it actually feels keen low down jumping in it from the lard ass 197!

 

[k_Leo]

Have a soft spot for the RSi it's such an underloved version of the clio 2!
Can't say much as i have one myself. Looking forward to watch the "restoration" looks good with the vega wheels!

 

[Martin_172]

Been plodding away with getting the donor car stripped, as soon as the shell is gone ill get the engine all prepped and then the 1.2 in and stripped!

Found the exhaust manifold was cracked, so that will need replaced (i had heard the blow and assumed it would be an exhaust flexi)

Funny enough the manifold has a cat on it, as well as a cat on the down pipe, ive never seen that before on a 1.6 clio, especially at ths age? ive found plenty on ebay for £20 odd that look the same minus the cat so that will be an upgrade for it!

parts are starting to arrive and get ready for the swap!

Been on a bargain shopping spree for it, i had priced up all the service bits for it and it was coming in quite expensive, given the low cost of everything for the car so far, but the benefit of a common engine that people are not overly interested in means loads of new old stock on ebay!
got:
genuine timing belt kit for £50 (£100 online)
genuine aux kit £40 (£90 online)
LUK clutch kit £25 (100 online)

 

[Martin_172]

All the parts were here so i got some time on this today. New manifold without a cat (or any cracks!!) good upgrade!

Fitted the bargain £25 clutch!

Got the block all cleaned up and painted, cambelt, water pump and aux belt changed, and everything got a good degrease and clean with a wire brush to freshen it up

Hoping to have it running tomorrow afternoon!!!

 

[Martin_172]

Flat out today, I start a new job tomorrow which is going to write off most of my free time so I set out this morning to get torn into this and get it to a point where I can do an hour here and there when I get time. Not many photos as I was just working away all day but finally the 1.6 is in!!

I ran out of light and energy so called it a day at that. The engine is on its mounts so I just need another couple of hours to get the wiring all routed properly, cooling system on, exhaust on and get the hubs and brakes on so it can go back on its wheels 😎

 

[k_Leo]

The 1.2 engine looks so "funny" when compared to the 1.6, so much smaller.

 

[Martin_172]

Not been a massive update for the last few weeks, Been plodding away when i get an hour here and there on days off! Its back on its wheels, everything's wired in, just got the fuel lines to swap, exhaust to fit and a final top up of the fluids and it should run!

Waiting on an autodoc delivery of some KYB shocks and ive got a cheap set of 40mm springs on route from Venom Motorsport

Curious to know if anyone has come across this, as I've not got a lot of PH1 experience... So, on a ph2 if you were doing this, you would swap the running gear, engine loom and then use the new engines ECU, UCH and key chip to get it to run. Currently, I don't have the fuel lines connected but with the 1.2 key and UCH and the 1.6 ECU, the immobiliser light is going out as it should and its turning over freely - and I assume would start if it had fuel! does this sound right? is the imob just in the UCH on a ph1?

 

[Martin_172]

Its been too cold on my days off to work on any of the cars, i did go out the other day to do some work but was met with this and quicky thought, naaaaa

few days later, its a bit milder and a few deliveries had arrived!!!

Sits quite well, hopefully it will settle a little more at the front over the coming weeks.

I was hoping to have it running today and fuel lines swapped but the 197 was broken AGAIN so i had most of the day wasted removing the wiper linkage then going to the scrappys to get another and fitting that! bloody mk3s!

 

[Clio172T]

great thread, love to see an engine swap

 

[Martin_172]

great thread, love to see an engine swap

even pointless engine swaps? haha

 

[Brigsy]

Looks good. Always like seeing the usually unloved clios getting attention. I always wanted a pov spec sunflower yellow ph1 but struggled to find one rust free.

 

[Martin_172]

Looks good. Always like seeing the usually unloved clios getting attention. I always wanted a pov spec sunflower yellow ph1 but struggled to find one rust free.

yeah not seen one for years! they usually got the 1.2 16v engine too rather than the 8v!

 

[Martin_172]

The Things seem to find me! Mate phoned me saying come and see me, bring £300

 

[k_Leo]

Is that a 1.6 ?

 

[Martin_172]

Is that a 1.6 ?

na 1.2 16v this one

 

[Martin_172]

Seen a set of old skool genuine Renault speedlines, I believe from a megane coupe MK1 advertised on eBay as 15" for £300, watched them for a few weeks as I had noticed in the closeup pics they were 16" and finally got an offer of £200 posted accepted!

Thoughts?

 

[k_Leo]

Didn't knew about those rims but does look good!

@Martin_172 Did you had to replace the 1.2 UCH ?

 

[dawgtired]

I've just picked up an 08 1.2 campus to use wile I get the van engine forged to turn the turbo up.
Steel wheels just don't do it for me, so looking for alloys