Keith185
ClioSport Club Member
Been meaning to put this thread up since last May xD
Front Dampers were due to be refurbished (had been weeping oil for a good few months from bottom of reservoir, which as I found out later I should have not ran on them) and had been collecting parts for that work, One day while fixing the exhaust sheilds noticed the rear damper was weeping some oil, so onto phone with Renault-Lookers to get 2 new ones ordered. What fun that was! Was expecting some issues with ordering the parts so Gareth had supplied me with the part numbers for the read dampers. The guy just wasn't going to accept the part numbers saying they weren't a Renault part . . . he ordered rear dampers for me, which once I went to pick up were the wrong ones, was bit pissed off. But they agreed following some more key bashing and finding right part number to get them ordered in asap and to honour the price of the wrong ones for the Sachs ones, saved me over £100
Week later noticed car just wasn't sitting right one day, put a jack underneath to see this. Quite scary considering day before I'd been driving back from a Chester Cliosport meet along the twisty old A5 and back roads through North Wales.
So took decision to completely refurbish and replace the springs aswell as planned damper setup front and rear to get the Trophy handling like new.
Monday morning was on phone to Renault-Lookers to get 2 new front spring and 2 new rear springs ordered on top of the current rear dampers on order which still hadn't arrived.
Week later called up to find out the status of them all, Front springs weren't actually in France, so had to be made and they had no idea on the rear dampers still :S at least rear springs, which I din't actually really need just for the price they are was going to change
This is my one and only car and had not used it since finding the broken spring, needed it to get to work so got onto here, cliotrophy.net, ebay and Clio spares to try to get a set of 182 cup dampers and and springs to keep car on road. Few days later I had this collection of parts to fit the following weekend.
Had to clear out all the crap my Dad had piled into garage but few hours later had enough space to get the Trophy in and start work
Sachs off
Can see the broken spring and pretty sure thanks to the rubber sleeve it must have pulled the two pieces in to the point that the car felt ok day to day to drive and prevented the coil from turning.
Trophy Sacks damper next to a 182 Cup damper. Quite a difference in the piston length. Hence reason why I struggled later on to get spring back on without compressors.
Got on phone to BG motorsport who were able to get them booked in to do in only 2 days so got the Sachs jet washed and packed up and thanks to local courier company (Delsol) they got them there in a day
Got call on day they were being refurbished to say that one of the pistons had scored due to being run at low pressure. Was told it wasn't too bad and had cleaned up but wasn't perfect and may cause loss of pressure prematurely. Wanted everything perfect so told the guys to change it. Extra £102 to bill but considering it all was small price.
While I was waiting to get them back gave the top hats a clean and a quick coat of Bilt-Hamber Hydrate 80 and VHT roll bar and chassis paint, which hardens to almost a powder coating like finish
Finished items with cleaned and treated boots
Big thanks to BG motorsport who gt the dampers back to me within the week, so then onto sorting the dampers out. They had replaced the adjusters for me but at some point between these being made and now the rates on the adjuster had changed slightly (1-2 clicks) so I actually had dampers now that are able to go a little bit firmer at max setting. They'd marked up the new default rate setting for me
Spot the other present that had arrived from Tom at Wests Renault
Wire brushed as much rust off as I could and some emery cloth on some spots. Then Hydrate 80 onto the rusted spots
The spring platform was quite badly rusted as was the bottom mounts
Hydrate 80 is awesome stuff, kills the rust, dries quickly and goes from the baby blue when wet to a dark purple once dried and gives a brilliant surface to paint onto. Masked everything I didn't want painted including the original manufacture stickers which weren't in too bad a condition tbh, had to re fix one corner back down but that's it.
Keyed the old paint up and an IPA wipe down. Smooth Silver Hammerite is a perfect match for the dampers.
Gave them few days to dry, then removed the masking from the damper sticker and gave the whole body a quick coat of laquer as extra protection.
New front springs had arrived two weeks after ordering but I still didn't have the rear dampers! Think it took 6 weeks from ordering to getting them but they finally arrived a week later in massive boxes lol
Gave these a quick keying and laqured up seeing how rusty old ones were
Finally after over 6 weeks everything was ready to go
Following weekend back into garage. Had to clear out garage again Dad being the hoarder he is and need to put crap in any cleared floor space lol.
New Top mounts
Little brother gave me a hand so thought I'd throw him in at deep end :rasp:
Had planned to get hubs cleaned and painted but everything came together and instead of putting car off road while I did little jobs got it all sorted in a weekend.
As if refurbishing the dampers wasn't enough needed new brakes too, so on with same setup I had, Brembo Max discs and Pagid RS 4-2 pad.
Never been so glad to have taken car into garage in my life
Had to drop tools for a bit while garage got flooded lol.
Even hailed in May!
Got all torqued up and took for a quick test drive, felt so solid (but needed alignment done) Checked everything once back and left rear dampers for next day
Rears was easy, well I thought it would have been except for one of the cup rear dampers top nuts would not come off, had to grind it off, which was a t**t of a job in the location it was.
All off and top mounts checked and swapped over. The new rear dampers didn't come with top mounts which at fully retail price is a joke. Know others come with them as one unit. Luckily the old ones were in as new condition.
All done, at this point need the alignment done but was happy
Front Dampers were due to be refurbished (had been weeping oil for a good few months from bottom of reservoir, which as I found out later I should have not ran on them) and had been collecting parts for that work, One day while fixing the exhaust sheilds noticed the rear damper was weeping some oil, so onto phone with Renault-Lookers to get 2 new ones ordered. What fun that was! Was expecting some issues with ordering the parts so Gareth had supplied me with the part numbers for the read dampers. The guy just wasn't going to accept the part numbers saying they weren't a Renault part . . . he ordered rear dampers for me, which once I went to pick up were the wrong ones, was bit pissed off. But they agreed following some more key bashing and finding right part number to get them ordered in asap and to honour the price of the wrong ones for the Sachs ones, saved me over £100
Week later noticed car just wasn't sitting right one day, put a jack underneath to see this. Quite scary considering day before I'd been driving back from a Chester Cliosport meet along the twisty old A5 and back roads through North Wales.
So took decision to completely refurbish and replace the springs aswell as planned damper setup front and rear to get the Trophy handling like new.
Monday morning was on phone to Renault-Lookers to get 2 new front spring and 2 new rear springs ordered on top of the current rear dampers on order which still hadn't arrived.
Week later called up to find out the status of them all, Front springs weren't actually in France, so had to be made and they had no idea on the rear dampers still :S at least rear springs, which I din't actually really need just for the price they are was going to change
This is my one and only car and had not used it since finding the broken spring, needed it to get to work so got onto here, cliotrophy.net, ebay and Clio spares to try to get a set of 182 cup dampers and and springs to keep car on road. Few days later I had this collection of parts to fit the following weekend.
Had to clear out all the crap my Dad had piled into garage but few hours later had enough space to get the Trophy in and start work
Sachs off
Can see the broken spring and pretty sure thanks to the rubber sleeve it must have pulled the two pieces in to the point that the car felt ok day to day to drive and prevented the coil from turning.
Trophy Sacks damper next to a 182 Cup damper. Quite a difference in the piston length. Hence reason why I struggled later on to get spring back on without compressors.
Got on phone to BG motorsport who were able to get them booked in to do in only 2 days so got the Sachs jet washed and packed up and thanks to local courier company (Delsol) they got them there in a day
Got call on day they were being refurbished to say that one of the pistons had scored due to being run at low pressure. Was told it wasn't too bad and had cleaned up but wasn't perfect and may cause loss of pressure prematurely. Wanted everything perfect so told the guys to change it. Extra £102 to bill but considering it all was small price.
While I was waiting to get them back gave the top hats a clean and a quick coat of Bilt-Hamber Hydrate 80 and VHT roll bar and chassis paint, which hardens to almost a powder coating like finish
Finished items with cleaned and treated boots
Big thanks to BG motorsport who gt the dampers back to me within the week, so then onto sorting the dampers out. They had replaced the adjusters for me but at some point between these being made and now the rates on the adjuster had changed slightly (1-2 clicks) so I actually had dampers now that are able to go a little bit firmer at max setting. They'd marked up the new default rate setting for me
Spot the other present that had arrived from Tom at Wests Renault
Wire brushed as much rust off as I could and some emery cloth on some spots. Then Hydrate 80 onto the rusted spots
The spring platform was quite badly rusted as was the bottom mounts
Hydrate 80 is awesome stuff, kills the rust, dries quickly and goes from the baby blue when wet to a dark purple once dried and gives a brilliant surface to paint onto. Masked everything I didn't want painted including the original manufacture stickers which weren't in too bad a condition tbh, had to re fix one corner back down but that's it.
Keyed the old paint up and an IPA wipe down. Smooth Silver Hammerite is a perfect match for the dampers.
Gave them few days to dry, then removed the masking from the damper sticker and gave the whole body a quick coat of laquer as extra protection.
New front springs had arrived two weeks after ordering but I still didn't have the rear dampers! Think it took 6 weeks from ordering to getting them but they finally arrived a week later in massive boxes lol
Gave these a quick keying and laqured up seeing how rusty old ones were
Finally after over 6 weeks everything was ready to go
Following weekend back into garage. Had to clear out garage again Dad being the hoarder he is and need to put crap in any cleared floor space lol.
New Top mounts
Little brother gave me a hand so thought I'd throw him in at deep end :rasp:
Had planned to get hubs cleaned and painted but everything came together and instead of putting car off road while I did little jobs got it all sorted in a weekend.
As if refurbishing the dampers wasn't enough needed new brakes too, so on with same setup I had, Brembo Max discs and Pagid RS 4-2 pad.
Never been so glad to have taken car into garage in my life
Had to drop tools for a bit while garage got flooded lol.
Even hailed in May!
Got all torqued up and took for a quick test drive, felt so solid (but needed alignment done) Checked everything once back and left rear dampers for next day
Rears was easy, well I thought it would have been except for one of the cup rear dampers top nuts would not come off, had to grind it off, which was a t**t of a job in the location it was.
All off and top mounts checked and swapped over. The new rear dampers didn't come with top mounts which at fully retail price is a joke. Know others come with them as one unit. Luckily the old ones were in as new condition.
All done, at this point need the alignment done but was happy
