197 Track Project

[PaulF]

So here it begins, the main aim for this one is to have fun, there's nothing serious about it at all

Iv got pretty limited knowledge of clios even less on the 197's so im kinda learning on the fly.

Like i said the main aim is a bit of fun, mainly track based but id like to keep it road legal for car related road trips and general fun having.

The car i got was an ebay find, took the train down and drove back 6 hours, it was spot on, brought back some really good memories from years ago so its doing its job already

Mod list so far, that im aware of.

Stripped out Rear
Some sort of Rear strut brace
Nankang NS-2R tyres (pretty much brand new)
EBC Yellow Stuff Pads Front
Looks like uprated discs
HR springs -20mm i belive
Toyo Manifold decat
unsure on rest of exhaust
KTR induction kit
20mm Spacers
Front Splitter

Ill update this list as i get to no the brands and parts as i go.

Iv got a bit of a deadline I'm working on at the moment, 18th August the first track is booked at oulton park so i better get to it.

Bucket Seats of some variety
Harnesses
EBC yellow stuff rear pads
Fix the Horn (im assuming its not hooked up)
try and sort the dodgy idle
fix tc/abs lights coming on randomly

thats it for now god knows what in the future ill see what happens after the 18th !

Some pics


[url=https://flic.kr/p/2m6K7w1]
[url=https://flic.kr/p/2m6Bzz8]

 

[Helpimonfire]

Nice to see another black 197 getting the treatment! Looks a nice base to start with, be interested to see how similar ours end up!

The rear brace looks like the BAF Motorsport (I believe) K Brace to me. Quite a few companies make them now and the general consensus is that they look cool but don't do a great deal as the rear of these is stuff enough anyway!

 

[PaulF]

Cheers mate

Ah yes iv just had a quick google, looks like its one of those. haha yeh my old fiesta mk5 (years ago) the rear brace did loads but the front did sod all.

i might drop it out for a few laps on the track day and see if i can feel a difference. the intention is to cage this eventually so id probably drop it anyways at that point

 

[burrellbloke]

It looks life you have got an aftermarket splitter on the front.

 

[PaulF]

Ah yes i knew i missed something, the mod list was on the ebay listing which is now gone, i should of taken a copy.

 

[PaulF]

One of my mates kindly let me borrow his lift so i could get a good look around the new motor.

One or two surprises but all in all not bad,

Drivers side CV boot to the half shaft either isnt on all the way or has died, cv grease everywhere... yey !

gearbox looks to have a small leak but not enough to get to the floor so ill give that a clean-up and see if it comes back.

pocked and prodded all the suspension, all feels ok, although something is nocking on the front im hedging my bets on ARB bushes.

Borrowed his snazzy snapon scanner to see what the state of play was.. quite a few issues but im 99% sure the majority are due to the steering wheel not being standard.

Speaking of which does anyone happen to no if you need to run the clock spring for things like abs to keep working? do they have a steering angle sensor on them.

Moving through the car i hooked it up to the AC machine to see if it would hold a vacuum, hey presto it works ! so i now have AC again, quite nice ! Although i found out that fan number 4 doesn't work, 1-3 work fine but when you hit 4 it shuts off, im assuming a dodgy contact, ill investigate more later on that.

I didnt want to take the mick on the free lift time so i came home and refitted the stock airbox and the new rear right wheel speed sensor. This in itself was really easy but iv got loads of unanswered questions now ! if anyone could help out that would be great. ill put them in between some pictures below.

New Sensor in

Bit of Rust Developing on both rears.

AC topup

Diagnostics

And the Boot

Question Time, can anyone tell me whats missing on the right hand side, im fairly sure itl just be a tube that runs into the passenger side arch liner + more importantly that vacuum hose that comes across the battery, is that correct? it goes to a device on the right then a small tube comes out and goes nowhere.




Now unfortunately the new speed sensor hasn't resolved the issue with the ABS lights coming on which is a bit of a pain, but at least its new. More on the fun side of things, new parts are on there way, iv got a set of OMP buckets with all the brackets and fixings on there way, downside is the floor mounts are in italy... really hope they get here in the next month.

Thats all for now, still loving it, feels like a bit of a backwards step today but i guess you get those kind of days

 

[burrellbloke]

You are missing the acoustic valve from the end of the airbox. It is a bit of plastic tube with a valve in the end of it that is controlled by the solenoid in your last photograph.

 

[suj]

The pipe that goes into the inlet, goes into that solenoid, it is controlled by inlet pressure and opens the acoustic valve (mentioned above) that is missing.

Also regarding your ABS problem, it'll be the ABS plate that has corroded and damaged the ABS ring on the rear discs. Take the disc off (36mm nut in centre of disc) check the condition of the ABS sensor plate.

If it needs changing, it's about £18

Renault Clio 197 200 Rear Stub Axle ABS Bracket

Renault Clio 197 200 Rear Stub Axle ABS Bracket - Renault Parts Direct - Renault Parts Direct is a web based service from our authorised Renault dealer.

renaultpartsdirect.co.uk

If it's also taken out the ABS ring on the disc, you can buy it from eBay for about £7

Magnetic reluctor ring for Renault Clio 197/200 Rear Disc | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Magnetic reluctor ring for Renault Clio 197/200 Rear Disc at the best online prices at eBay! Free delivery for many products.

www.ebay.co.uk

The centre nut of the disc needs to be done to 175nm (don't over tighten it, or you'll ruin the bearing)

Suj's Nimbus Clio 197 and E36 328i Trackcar

Suraj... speak with Matt (@R27WTF) he’s been making braided hoses in-house now so I’m sure he could sort something out

clio197.net

Here's a post from my thread of how messed up mine was, if I was you change both sides.

Last tip is, the stub axle has an indent, make sure the sensor plate lines up with that (you'll see when you get the plate, it has a bit that sticks out that the sensor goes into, it needs to perfectly line up with that indent) or you cannot knock it far enough back, which then means when you tighten the nut to 175nm it will be rubbing.

So knock it as far back, then put disc on, tighten to 175nm, then spin the disc by hand, if any friction, take it apart and start again, the goal is free spinning, or you'll take off the ABS ring strip then the light will come on again.

 

[PaulF]

Thankyou guys. I'll take a look at the abs later today if I can and report back !

 

[PaulF]

You were spot on there by the looks of it suj thankyou. looks like both need replacing on both sides.

Quite looking forward to getting everything cleaned up and painted, once its all working mechanically ill set to and make it look nice

However it didnt stop the mrs sorting out the rear badge, removed the knackered overlay stuck on and gave the original a polish up, much better !

 

[PaulF]

New Bits

Cracking on missed this

New Stuff on, the old one put up a bit of a fight but gave in eventually.

New ABS Ring, the old one had a small line of material left, this has much more ha

Back together and a good clean later.

The other side wasnt as bad but i like doing things in pairs so that got the same treatment too

@suj thankyou sir abs all fixed !

 

[PaulF]

Nothing overly exciting but i was having a tidy up of the parts i got with the car and would you look at that !, just need to find some nuts to secure it but its fairly solid as it is. nice to have it complete.

Cheers to all that pointed me in the right direction on that one

 

[PaulF]

So i finally got some time to have a mess with the clio again, Stripped out a bit more of the interior, fixed a whole bunch of rattles on the interior and installed the new seats, they are snug and feel a little undersized for the car but after a bit of messing about i got the drivers seat into a good position so im happy

Just waiting on the harnesses to arrive now, i may have made a slight error when i bought the first lot of harnesses, in my excitement i didnt spot they were for 2 seaters... so there way to short, ah well haha.

Im going to pull the rest of the sound deadening out eventually, currently its keeping my feet in the right place, ill grab some foot plates at some point and sort it all out.

 

[Big Ben]

Done well with the sound deadening removal. Looks clean inside

 

[LiamP]

I can see at least 6kg of sound deadening that you can get rid of, the stuff on the roof is about 3.2kg!

 

[PaulF]

cheers gents, yeh there's plenty more that could be pulled out yet, ill get some more done soon


so harnesses are in and fitted although the pic i got was from a while ago but yeh you all no what harnesses look like.

once that was all sorted i turned my attention to the really bad knocking sound i was getting. Fun story eventually. took the fronts off to see if there was anything obvious and result, yes there was, both drop links were stripped on the threads.. not entirely sure how that's come about as it was knocking like that when i got the car, either way i see it as a really good excuse to buy some shiny bits !

And after some shopping on my new favourite site the nice guys over at supreme motorsport sent me these.

And fitted

Harnesses layed in

And i had a helper to put the old seats in storage.... shes only 6 months old.

Just some really small bits to sort now, go pro mount and a good wash, top off the fluids and were ready for the 18th.

 

[PaulF]

Evening Chaps, sorry for the lack of updates on this, there's been a fair bit going on in the background, unfortunately the 18th didn't go as planned, we had some staff go off last minute so i made the decision to not go, literally 11pm the night before. work comes first, but hey life happens there will always be another time to go, so as a thankyou my boss took me on another day at croft in his bmw, loads of fun and croft is alot quicker than i thought it would be !

Anyhow in-between all of this going on i spotted a trailer on ebay.. yeh one small trip to north wales later and we have a trailer, needed and still needs a bit of work, i managed to get it to a suitable level, still needs new arch covers, some running lights and fully painting black and possibly some new rear lights but yeh a solid platform for my first one and unlocks a whole new world of accessibility with the clio.

So the MOT was coming up on the clio before the next track day at oulton park in nov and i made the decision to take the car off the road, it was never going to pass on emissions and i don't really need it as a road car so yeh its now officially a dedicated track car ! Now this may sound a little odd but iv always wanted to tow my own car to a track and beat it to an inch of its life knowing if it breaks its not the end of the world and i can just chuck it on the trailer for fixing another day, kinda a bucket list item

Oulton Park 10th Nov, nothing short of a brilliant day, the car performed amazingly, i love the chassis its really easy to correct and throw around, brakes were spot on, could do with a bit more go on the straights but thatl always be the case, handling wise it sticks real well, limits on tyres and suspension were found which is cool, the unofficial time was a 2:13:279 thankyou trackaddict The day was more a shake down for everything, transportation and the car itself, comically there were a few other clios there that day that looked exactly or very similar, so i need to work on my stickers to make it more unique so the guys were with know who's who. tyres are lasting well so they will be good for another day or two, brakes i went through about 1/2 the pads on the fronts, so maybe try a different compound next time. the video setup in the car needs sorting too, i had a go pro at the back but it died mid way through the day (later found out the card was full haha) The only thing that broke really was at the end of the day which was handy, i did a stint of 30mins all out on my own driving and it got a bit warm, so warm that the heat from the manifold melted the starter wire off the start motor.. easy fix after it had cooled down but we just bump started it to get it back on the trailer.

Anyways that the essay and catch up. time for some pictures.

 

[PaulF]

Well i thought id bring this back out from the depths. I still have the car, iv done a bit more to it since the last update and had a few more track days with it. ill do a proper update with some fresh pics this weekend.

ill have a search about in a min but by the off chance someone sees this first im looking to get a quick and dirty map done just to smooth out the flat spot caused by the air filter + take advantage of the exhaust and ac delete, it wont be alot im just after it being a bit more drivable than anything.

Cheers boys and girls