Later this week Ethan will swap out the Brembo HC discs for the new Godspeed G hooks discs to give the discs a few hundred miles of gentle braking to bed the discs.
@EthanMenace has too much time on his hands.

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The crusty Brembo HC discs have gone back into the parts bin and the Godspeed G hook discs have gone on to the front to be gently bedded in. The Clio will definitely get more than 300 miles use before Cadwell Park so they should be good to be used and abused on track.

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The best brake disc and pad combination that we have run on the Clio was Brembo HC discs together with DS Uno pads. We had a great day at Anglesey with maximum stopping power, but after the track day the brakes were very inconsistent and the DS Uno were in hindsight unsuited for road miles.

I have not suffered with brake fade with the Godspeed and DS1.11 combination so far and hope they will be just as good with this new set as they were with the last set.

The Clio is now running with a full set of arch liners which have already suffered with some pre Cup Racer front end rubbing. It will be interesting to see how much of the arch liners are left after a track day? I have seen some guidance in Cup Racer manuals that suggest the front, but rear section, arch liner should be trimmed.

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Has anyone tried running trimmed arch liners?
 
The rear section of the front arch liners are cut to go around the brake lines. The front sections have a larger section cut out to let some brake cooling air in. A couple of zip ties are necessary to hold the remnants of the front liner in place. With Cup front end and relative low ride height, you will probably experience a fair bit of rubbing on the front bumper and possibly the front guard.
 
The 5mm spacers have not solved the issue of the Gaz Gold front adjuster touching the inside edge of the wheel on full lock.

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I think that Cup Racers have a specific rack stop so will see if I can acquire a rack stop for either side of the rack and see if that will help with the issue. I cannot see that we are going to cause any high speed issues on full lock but I would like solve the problem and avoid causing damage to either the adjuster or wheels when we are moving the car about at slow speed.

When @EthanMenace looked under the car on Saturday he noticed an issue with the passenger side CV boot on the brand new extended driveshaft from Pure Motorsport.

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It looks like we have got some grease coming from the CV boot.

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I have e-mailed Nick and will see what he suggests. There do not appear to be any obvious tears to the boot. If it wasn't for the yellow subframe we probably would not have noticed the leak.

The yellow RS badge has gone back on to the front of the car. This time the entire thing is a 3D printed version so the yellow is not so much of a liquid yellow colour. Originally we had a genuine RS badge with silver RS writing. Then we had the silver RS part sprayed liquid yellow. After losing that yellow badge with the first crash we replaced it with a Chineseum version of the RS badge spayed yellow but mounted on a 3D printed bracket. Now the RS writing has been printed in yellow and mounted on to a black printed bracket.

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In the week I ordered a Cup Racer radiator support and two rack stops from RSport. They are coming from France so they wil turn up in the next few weeks. The Cup Racer parts catalogue has an under tray in it so once the Cup Racer radiator support is in I will probably order an under tray as the standard one won't fit as it attaches at the rear where the legs of the standard radiator support are. In a few years time I can tell everyone whether I should have bought a Wheeler Motorsport aluminium version.

We ticked off one of the last few jobs for track day preparation this week by getting some tyres fitted to the spares set of Speedlines that we had. The "parts bin" has been very useful recently. WE dug out of the "parts bin" a set of 7.5J speediness and four part worn MRF ZTE tyres.

The Speedlines need to be refurbed but they will do as track wheels until we get time and funds to refurb them.

I gave the Speedlines a quick scrub today.

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After a clean they were ready to be loaded ready for Cadwell Park.

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On Monday we went to Cadwell Park for a Javelin track day.

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There were lots of other Clios about including @Beany @Helpimonfire @R20BTG @s88thy @RSRowe together with Ben and Simmo from the Track Baguettes. There were also a surprising number of 197/200s and 172/182s there as well. It was a really good day.

The last track day had ended in disaster when I spun and hit the front end of the Clio in to a barrier. Since that fateful day in February 2024 we had made a few changes to the Clio:
  1. Refurbished subframe power coated in yellow with solid PMS bushes;
  2. Refurbished front arms with spherical bearings and solid bushes;
  3. Cup Racer front end (PMS EE bracket kit)
  4. New DS1.11 front pads and Godspeed G hook discs
  5. TRS crutch straps (to add to the existing 4 point harnesses)
  6. New bumper and other parts that had been damaged in the crash
  7. 7.5J Speedline wheels instead of the usual Oz Ultralegerras
We had driven up to Cadwell Park on Sunday night and stayed at the posh sounding Kenwick Park Hotel. We lett the hotel early at 7.00 am so that we cold grab some breakfast from the MSV cafe and heard someone shouting as we were unlocking the car, "Oi! Stop stealing that Clio!" @R20BTG was shouting from an open window wearing a just a towel - not a pretty sight at 7.00 am in the morning!

The weather was perfect for a spring track day. The sun was out, the day was dry all day and the temperature stayed reasonable all day long.

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You can see in the background of the photo above that an 1980s Audi Quattro group B rally car turned up. There were some other cars at the track day that were not Renaults. Someone brought an Aerial Atom who managed to crash it in Hall Bands. There was an obligatory GR Yaris. There were also about 4 or 5 Citroen 2CV race cars which were annoyingly just a bit slow.

We had been to Cadwell Park once before, in March 2023, and I had left feeling that I had unfinished business there. At my last outing the weather had been damp, my sessions had been generally cut short by red flags and I lost confidence in myself when I went sliding sideways through Hall Bends.

After tucking in to an unhealthy combination of bacon and sausage baps for breakfast we completed the sighting laps and @EthanMenace did the first proper session.

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I went out for the second session which was the first opportunity for me to test out the new Cup Racer front end. I will be perfectly honest I could not notice an amazing amount of difference when I first drove it - but more on this later. The car felt good but I was deliberately cruising through Hall Bends to make sure I was being careful.

After our initial laps we had both set markers for the day. Ethan had done a 1m 55s lap and I had done a 2m 00s lap. On our previous trip to Cadwell Ethan's fastest lap in the damp was 1m 56s and mine was a 2m 04s. We both knew that we could make improvements on the lap times.

As we took turns doing sessions it became clear that what you think might be the correct line, or correct way to attack a corner is not always the best way. During the morning Ethan did a session and ended up behind @R20BTG and his lines and braking suddenly made so much more sense in how to get around the track faster. It was just a few small ways in which he was carrying speed by either not braking, or dabbing the brakes and using the throttle/LSD to get round corners. I often finish a track day driving a completely different way to how I started the day and usually it is due to watching other drivers.

After lunch we worked out that we had set the car up with a mixture of hard and medium compound MRF ZTE tyres on each side of the car rather than by axle. The four tyres used had been dug out of the "parts bin" and we knew that we had 2 hards and 2 mediums. Before the put the tyres on the car I had thought that the plan was to run the hards on the rear axle and @EthanMenace thought that we were going to run the hards on the front axle. Because we had both taken the track wheels out of the car we had managed to put the hard compound tyres on the drivers side and the medium compound tyres on the passenger side. We sorted out the tyre mix up and put the hard tyres on the rear of the car and I am pretty sure that we ended up with more grip on the front of the car.

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After lunch the track emptied out a bit allowing more time for some good sessions. @EthanMenace had another good session chasing @R20BTG. During this session there was a E36 M3 which got sandwiched between Ethan and Iain. It struck me at this point that a well sorted Clio is a match for most cars on a tight and twisty track like Cadwell Park.

I enjoyed a session in the afternoon chasing @Beany around the track and later followed @Helpimonfire to prove that I could follow him through Hall Bends without disappearing in his rear view mirror and take out some floppy bollards.

At the end of the day @EthanMenace took the Clio without me as a passenger/ballast. He enjoyed a session harassing and passing an EP3 which later ended up coming off the track and cutting some grass. He managed to get his lap time down to 1m 46. I then took the keys and did a solo session to clock a time of 1m 53s - sadly the petrol light came on as I was starting my session so after a few laps on a virtually empty track I came in to make sure we had enough petrol to get to a nearby petrol station.

So what is the verdict on Cup Racer front end? My feeling is that it has given the car extra front end grip and stability. It seems that when you are going through corners the car is holding on to the tarmac more - it is as if inertia is not having the same force to pull the car out towards the outside edge of the corner you are going through when you are trying to keep the car closer to the inside of the corner. After mismatching the tyres I think that we only felt the full effect of the kit in the afternoon. I am not a good enough driver to comment on whether the 22mm ARB had a massive impact on the car as there had been so many changes it is difficult to pin point one particular difference.

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As usual @EthanMenace managed to get the fastest lap of the day with a 1m 46s.


We knew that by running the Cup Racer front end that we were going to suffer with some rubbing to the front of the car. We had put both sections of the arch liners in to the front arch after installing the Cup Racer kit. We did suffer with some rubbing. The wheels carved out a few holes in the arch liners and also rubbed the front bumper away in a style I like to call "natural rubbing".

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But, I think that the rubbing and wear that was caused was less than I thought we were going to suffer.

The other issue that we have been troubled with is a leaky CV boot on one of the new PMS extended driveshafts. Ethan had noticed this after the EE bracket kit had been fitted and the car had done a few hundred miles on the road. Nick at PMS had said that the minor leak we had noticed could just be excess grease from the edges of the boot spilling out. The photo below shows the grease has got worse so that will need to be cleaned up and the CV boot replaced.

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Despite having our CANchecked display before our track day at Snetterton in February 2024 we had a few configuration issues that meant we were still learning how to set it up/log data properly. At Cadwell I found it really useful having a gear indicator on the dashboard. It might be me but sometimes I forget what gear I am in. We are now able to log simple information like:
  1. Oil temperature
  2. Oil pressure
  3. Coolant temperature
  4. Inlet Air Temperature
None of the temperatures got particularly bad at Cadwell but now we have a better understanding of how hot some of the readings should be when the car is working under load so that we can work out what is abnormal in the future.

I left Cadwell Park on Monday far happier than when I left in March 2023. My lap times were not particularly fast but they had improved due to the weather and knowing the track better. We have another track day booked at Cadwell Park in late May 2024 with Track Obsession - this will be an opportunity to hopefully drive faster than Monday. Cadwell Park really is a spectacular track and I can't wait to go back.

What's next for the Clio? Apart from sorting out the radiator support we have not got any urgent plans. We might get the track Speedlines refurbed in gold/bronze, get some solid PMS engine mounts or refresh the front hubs with new bearings and ball joints by the end of the year. We will book another track day for June 2024 and enjoy the Ring in July. We will no doubt book some more track days later in the summer/Autumn. Now the Clio is fixed, in one piece, and performing well, I am a happy man.
 
Cracking write up.
Was a really good day considering some of the cars on track! I thought we were in for a day of red flags and faffing but it went really smoothly. More Renaults on the trackday than I saw at some of the Renault Sport days I did back when I had the clio! Made for some great lapping out on circuit!
Car looks to handle really well on that video! Handling modifications really making a difference at Cadwell, and that new front ends seems to be making a big difference.
 
Cracking write up.
Was a really good day considering some of the cars on track! I thought we were in for a day of red flags and faffing but it went really smoothly. More Renaults on the trackday than I saw at some of the Renault Sport days I did back when I had the clio! Made for some great lapping out on circuit!
Car looks to handle really well on that video! Handling modifications really making a difference at Cadwell, and that new front ends seems to be making a big difference.
I was also pleasantly surprised at the lack of red flags!

It did feel very stable and predictable in comparison to the last day we did at snetterton, I’m interested to get some more track time and try some different damper settings/tyre pressures and see how the car reacts as it was a bit more understeer biased this time out.

Didn’t end up saying hello but the e46 looked good from afar!
 
More parts arrived today from France.

The first is a Cup Racer radiator support. It is made of steel and is basically the same as the standard radiator support bracket but without the legs. It looks like is is going to rust like a standard radiator mount. It has come complete with dust and dirt from storage including what looks like to be spider eggs or poo.

@Helpimonfire has made a sensible suggestion to spray it with wax oil on the inside to hopefully stop it rusting away. If I have to buy another radiator support in the future then I will probably get a Wheeler Motorsport version made out of aluminium.

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The second set of parts are the Cup Racer rack stops which will limit how far the rack will turn the front wheels to stop any rubbing when the car is on full lock.

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I have looked at at the Cup Racer catalogue and they do sell an under tray.

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The problem is neither @EthanMenace nor I can work out how the Cup Racer under tray is secured in to place. The Cup Racer catalogue does not show the under tray using any screws or other fixings to hold it in place. Ethan showed me a photo of a replica Cup Racer car that was for sale and it's under tray looked like this.

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A piece of ABS 3mm plastic is about £50. I think the Cup Racer under tray will be about £70.

I think that we will fit the Cup Racer radiator support and then see if the existing under tray can be fixed in place. If possible I would like the car to have an under tray but it won't be the end of the world it is does not have one.
 
I have been through all of the video footage from Cadwell Park now.

If anyone is interested the full playlist is here


I have now worked out that I did my fastest lap of 1m 52s whilst I was chasing @Beany in the afternoon with Ethan as a passenger. I am quite pleased with this as I can see in the footage areas where I could have gone faster and without a passenger in the Clio it does go faster. Next time I go to Cadwell Park I need to see if I can get a time that is sub 1m 50s or less.
 
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Today I, yes you read that correctly, I replaced the drive shaft and changed the gearbox oil.

After Cadwell Park we realised that the CV boot on the passenger side drive shaft had a small tear in it. After speaking to Nick at Pure Motorsport he was really good about it and said that if we sent the drive shaft back to him he would replace the CV boot and return it to us. So @EthanMenace took out the drive shaft and it was sent off to Nick.

The car sat like this for a few days.

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Then disaster struck as @EthanMenace had appendicitis and had to have his appendix removed. The drive shaft came back from Nick with a new CV boot. @EthanMenace was told he should stay off from work for a minimum of two weeks and not to do any heavy lifting for four weeks. This left us in a bit of a conundrum of how to get the car back together.

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I decided to sort out the drive shaft today. Even the dog was bored of seeing the car in the air without a drive shaft.

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I am not known for my mechanical skills. This is how things were done today. @EthanMenace sat in a chair in the sun whilst I diid all of the work.

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Although the drive shaft had come off the car with the suspension strut and hub in place I struggled to get the shaft back in place with the hub in the way so out came the suspension and off came the hub.

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Whilst the car was up in the air and we had access to the gearbox drain plug Ethan decided that it would be a good idea to change the gearbox oil. It did have a combination of some Elf and Fuchs gearbox oil in it and had not had a proper change for a while.

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The gearbox oil was drained and then it was filled up with some Fuchs Titan Sintofuid 75w 80 gearbox oil using a massive syringe.

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When the gearbox oil done the hub and suspension went back on to the car. The drive shaft slipped in to to the gearbox and hub without a problem. You can see that the car has not been used for a while as the disc has got some surface rust on it.

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Thankfully the car is now back on the ground and will get used for some road miles to make sure that the passenger side drive shaft is no longer spewing CV grease everywhere.

We have bought some Bilt Hamber wax oil spray to treat the inside of the new radiator support to stop it from rusting inside out. When it has been treated we will put it on to the car and then work out what to do about an under tray.

The Speedlines with MRF track tyres are going to be refurbed this week. They will change from their current gloss black colour and will be done in Clio Williams Gold - the same colour as the Ultralegerras are at the moment. After having track day photos for a few years with gold wheels it just feels wrong having black wheels in track photos now.
 
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We got the track wheels back from Rolling Rims today.

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The extra set of Speedlines that we had in the parts bin have been refurbed and are now a stunning Clio Williams gold colour.

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Rolling Rims have done a good job with the wheels. For an extra £60 they even came and collected the wheels and delivered them when they had been done. That is the kind of lazy service that I like.

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The wheels have got MRF ZTE's on them at the moment. We are back at Cadwell Park in about two weeks and will probably book on to a Donington Park track day in June 2024. The MRFs should last for those two track days. For our trip to the Ring in July 2024 we have decided to spend some money on brand new tyres, and probably a set of Direzzas. If anyone has tried out Yokohama AO52s please let me know what your thoughts are on the tyres?