The High Mileage Track car

It's not a bad track and only about an hour drive from the Dublin ferry terminal! It suits lower to mid horsepower cars best, there usually 4/5 clios at every trackday there now

First trackday of the year was done on Saturday at mondello park. Over the Christmas break I'd got the Clio checked over for bits of suspension wear, general check over and a service. All it needed was two bushes replaced on the passenger side wishbone which I had a feeling might be worn out

It was a nice dry day out with no issues. I wasn't chasing times it was just getting back into a groove for the year. The r888r are definitely at the end of their life so a new set will be ordered and fitted to a new set of braid wheels which have been sitting the garage waiting for this day I think there was about 8 Clios on track at one stage with a mix of that being 172/182/197/200, they seems to be a good "budget friendly" car and definitely take all the abuse we throw at them.

Next day out is February but I might skip it and try fund a few trips to some UK tracks this year for a bit of a change up

Second trackday outing of the year didn't exactly go to plan
It was a clear enough day and pretty busy so off I went to bring the car out for a few warm up laps bring it back in and check the wheels etc after two laps. Headed back out for a bit more spirited driving 3 corners in and going from 3rd to 4th the gearbox gives up on me. Limped back to the pits and onto the trailer sounding like a bag of nails along the way Now to split the box and see what I've broken

At least I got a decent picture from the day

So a small update as I haven't posted in a while, been trying to source a gearbox in Ireland, see if there's any good reconditioned ones online etc.
I've ordered a used gearbox from ktec to get me by for the time being and so my car won't be stuck on a ramp while gathering bits for whatever's broke in the current box The plan is to take out my broken box, swap in the used one for now, split open my broken on figure out what's gone and begin collecting parts for it slowly and give it a good rebuild along with new clutch, flywheel, slave cylinder and diff. Won't be a cheap option but seems like the better one in the longer run and having a spare gearbox seems like a good plan!

burrellbloke said:

The idea of having second gearbox sounds like a good plan.

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Mine was fine for years so I was thinking it would never go just makes life easier now if I ever have issues in the future

Over the weekend myself and two friends went about replacing the gearbox in the Clio. It went smoothly for 3 lads with no experience in doing it but we still hit a few snags along the way, took us about 8 hours to drop the old one in and get in the new one

Subframe was pretty easy to drop and disconnect everything, thought we could get it out without taking out the rad support but that needed to go to, we lost a fair bit of time doing that. Might end up replacing it the next time along with the rad as it's a bit knackered

Swapped over senors and slave to the new box and bolted it up. Putting back in the driver's side driveshaft was an absolute pain but got it eventually. Same with the drop links on the coilovers I'm running but with some brute force and determination we got it all back in together. Bled the clutch line and it was definitely the first time in a long time that's been done as the fluid was black! Quick "legal" road test and it's fine! Long day but a hell of a lot learned. There was an abs and esp error but this morning I gave the sensor a quick clean and turned the steering from lock to lock, switched it on and off and it seems to be fine again!
Absolute pain of a job and so many little bits in the way you'd never notice but well worth it. Now to split the old box, see what's broke and order parts and a diff, it'll be a slow job but it'll get done!

First day out with the "new" used gearbox from ktec went pretty good overall. A few test laps to make sure nothing leaked and a bolt check and I was pretty happy with how the gear changes felt. Thought I noticed a bit of notchyness if I changed very quickly from 2nd to 3rd, probably expected with a used gearbox really. I figured out how to drive around it by letting the gear stick sit in neutral for a split second before changing into 3rd and it seemed to have gone away.

Towards the end of the day it got nice and quiet on track and I was hammering around no issues. Went back out to do a final stint for the last 15 minutes of the day, 2 laps in I went to downshift to second but the gear stick wouldn't budge the things running through my mind were not happy thoughts Checked the rest of the gears, they all worked fine no bangs or rattles so I finished the lap like a cool down and stayed in 3rd gear and got it up on the trailer. I suspected it was the cables as it didn't automatically pop back into neutral and it was a bit sloppy. Removed the battery tray when I got back home to find I was right thankfully!

Popped it back in place, heard the "click" and it would select 1st and 2nd again, crisis averted New cables are added to the list to go along with the old gearbox rebuild!

burrellbloke said:

My gearbox is still not quite right. You have described your issue as "notchyness". Is is that you cannot change quickly and you have to wait for a split second after taking it out of on gear before putting it in to another gear? If so make sure you give your clutch a really good bleed. It could be clutch drag and a bleed might sort it out.

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Yeah that pretty much describes the issue I'm having! I wasn't 100% confident we had bled it correctly so I may have to give it another go. I was reading your thread about it too and it sounds like a fun problem It'll be another month before I get to test it out again so I have some spare time to try it. Appreciate the advice!