Sideshowfred's Clio 200

Sideshowfred · Oct 15, 2014

Hi all,
Just thought i'd share with you some pics of my new car. Got it last Thursday and covered over 500 miles so far. Loving every single minute of it! Come from the VW scene and after having a slammed Golf estate, slammed Polo and mk5 Golf GTI i thought it was about time i bought something a bit different.

2014-10-10 18.44.09 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

20141011_173113 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

20141013_114321 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

20141009_151522 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

No real plans right now other than getting a front RS grill badge and some mats but knowing what i'm like i'll probably find a load of other bits to do

Mr Plums · Oct 15, 2014

Cup spoiler, lowered and spacers :hearteyes:

Lovely car mate.

roryb · Oct 17, 2014

Lovely car. led's too inside and out. for interiour you can get bright red ones, just a thought

ScottL · Oct 17, 2014

Looks great mate

Best colour in these tbh

Gus · Oct 17, 2014

looks great! whats up with the black peeling on the middle pillar on the passenger side.

Sideshowfred · Oct 18, 2014

It's the vinyl wrap on the b pillar coming off after someone jetwashed it. That was there before i bought it but can't decide whether go re do it or just take it all off and have red pillars

roryb · Oct 19, 2014

Sideshowfred said:
It's the vinyl wrap on the b pillar coming off after someone jetwashed it. That was there before i bought it but can't decide whether go re do it or just take it all off and have red pillars

I have that on mine, the guy i got my car off said he would send a new strip over (4 months ago now) I hadn't even thought about just taking it off all together.

Sideshowfred · Nov 9, 2015

Well it@s been a year since i updated anything on here. Doesn't feel like a lot has changed with the car but in other ways it kind of has. First thing to happen was a cup spoiler which was quickly followed by a k-tec stainless exhaust.

20150606_131513 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

20150201_164658 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

I was fairly happy with the cr at this point. It was looking and sounding much better. Next thing on my list though was a bit of time on track. I booked a place on one of Evo magazines track evenings. I had the third least powerful car there but the response from the Evo staff when asked which car was mine was very positive. This was my first time and i really showed me what the car was capable of.

PR_150710_BAEVO_0279 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

PR_150710_BAEVO_0896 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

After the track evening i spent a week away with my other half in North Wales, some awesome roads and felt the Clio was really in it's element up there. Next on my list was a bit of an impulse buy off here. I know the boot brace does sod all but i thought it would look good if colour matched to the car. luckily a second hand on popped up on here which meant it was cheaper to buy and paint than it was to buy a brand new one.

IMAG0128 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

The latest mod was more out of necessity and wasn't the route i was really wanting to go down. I had decided that next year i would probably buy some coilovers, but the car failed it's MOT on a broken front spring. A quick call to Renault confirmed that new fronts were bloody expensive so a quick call to Euro Car Parts and i had a good deal on a set of H&R's 30/40's. Initial impressions are that it feel exactly the same as the original Cup springs.Not had a chance to properly push it yet with the new springs but i can' imagine they will feel much different. The other thing having let them settle down is that it still sits too high for my liking. I thought this would be the case so coilovers my still happen, just not as quickly as i was hoping.

the day after fitting

IMAG0393 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

settled down after a week

IMAG0403 by sideshowfred1990, on Flickr

Next thing for the car, other than surviving the winter, is a trackday at Bedford in February. The things i hope to change next year is the steering wheel as it's started peeling, maybe some bodywork mods (bigger diffuser), induction kit and anything else i impulse buy :smiley:

subarufreak · Nov 16, 2015

I think it looks good with them springs

colour is stunning!

Daz. · Nov 16, 2015

Any lower than that and it'll start look silly.

Sideshowfred · Nov 18, 2015

Maybe it just needs some spacers on the wheels to fill the arches out

Stay Puft · Nov 18, 2015

Looks lovely!

Daz. · Nov 18, 2015

It looked perfect to me at standard height but I've never been a fan of lowered mk3's.

Sideshowfred · Nov 18, 2015

Only reason it's not at standard height anymore is because I couldn't justify spending £200 on genuine springs over some h&r's at £145. The difference in labour was negligible and I wanted it a bit lower. Maybe the look will grow on me over time.

Sideshowfred · Feb 1, 2016

Not done a great deal happened other than fitting my fire extinguisher and getting my spare set of wheels painted ready for the Bedford trackday on the 27th of this month. Hopefully it should stand out a little bit on the day!

Sideshowfred · May 29, 2016

Thought I'd do a quick update as I havn't been on here lately. Had a great day at the Renault/Ford day back at the end of February with the car performing nearly faultlessly. Bit of brake wobble when about 2 laps into runs bit some heating and cooling seemed to sort it out and no problems since.

After a fantastic day it made me decide that I definitely want to spend more time out on track. Only problem I found over the day was that the standard Recaro CS's aren't particularly supportive when your really going for it. Also I was using some part worn continental/been tyres and they really did limit me on the day with there grip disappearing through the day.

Next on the list though was the cambelt as it was due so booked it in with Chris at Beaniesport. Such a nice guy and got it done in the same day for me so very i'm appreciative for that.

Got two more lots of track time booked up aswell, Evo track evening on 17th June and a day at Rockingham on the 11th July. This meant getting a seat and tyres sorted which I'm all in the process of. Seat is with me and everything else is due to arrive this week [emoji4]

Sent from my HTC One M9 using Tapatalk

Sideshowfred · Oct 27, 2016

Thought it was about time for an update. Since my last one I've had 1 track evening at Bedford and then a full day at Rockingham. Had a few ups and downs in how I've been feeling about the car but after a roadtrip around a good chunk of Scotland the love is back.

First some pics from the evening at Bedford

Then onto Rockingham a month later

After this I fell out with the car a bit. I just couldn't get into a rhythm on this track. Not helped by the fact that it ended up basically being a race car test day so I spent the day diving off the racing line so not to get taken out by radicals and the like.

Scotland really made the car feel special again though. Such an epic place with incredible roads. I'm going to head further up next year as well and do the North Coast 500.

I have been thinking about what to do with the car as I'm going to be keeping it for a bit longer. Plans for the next year or so are a matching passenger seat, rear cage, a different steering wheel and whatever else I find I like along the way. This should be fun [emoji2]

Sideshowfred · Nov 9, 2018

Been a long time since I have been on here but fancied doing an update. Since my last update the car has gone from being my daily, to being written off in January this year and onwards to its current state, my weekend toy. Pictures speak a thousand words so I'll let them explain! It was a very busy summer! Last pics are from a trackday at Bedford at the beginning of this week.