Clio 197 Cup - Track Attack Build

Alistair

Gold Member
Good evening!

I thought I'd set up a thread and share the progress I've done this far and what I shall be continuing to be doing.

I've owned a couple of Renaultsports before, an Arctic Blue 182 FF was my first, and then an early R26 #0076 iirc which then went on to have coilovers, new clutch/TTV flywheel and a forged engine. Ill post two pictures of them below. Also between the R26 and this Clio, I owned an S2000 for a few months, would love one again!
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I brought the car earlier this year, around March time to be a daily driver / fun car. As it turns out I can stay away from modifying and it happened almost instantly.
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Car has been maintained by Alex at AW Motorworks, very highly recommended

First job was to get the gear box rebuilt, the dreaded second to third gear ruined the driving for me for a month while I awaited that to be fixed!
Full gearbox rebuild, with new syncros on 3rd to 6th and new bearings etc along with a BlackLine Differential which made a huge difference along side an OEM clutch kit to finish it off.
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In between that I did some general maintenance of the paint work, it wasn't too well looked after so needed some good cleaning as you can see.
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Next up on the list was brakes! New fluids, braided lines, Brembo HC discs and DS3000 pads's where my go to combo for this as it worked well on my R26. Safe to say, they stop me very quickly!
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Next two jobs where a rusted and worn ABS ring and sensor, and polybushing the engine, gearbox and upper torque mount, made a good difference and now they're bedded in the car doesn't vibrate too much.

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Then the part I was looking forward to .. Coilovers! I went for the Yellowspeeds in the 7kg/4kg set up for road, with the want to change the rear springs out for 8kg in the new year for track days. Had them fitted and set up with a good fast road geo.

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Had them fitted at AW Motorworks the following week and set up and corner weighted, with out rear seats the car sat at 1210kg, which isnt too bad i guess!
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The most recent purchases where a new Inlet manifold I had sent off to MS Custom Engineering to get ported and gasflowed as well as painted, along with buying a new manifold, cat replacement pipe and a solid lower torque mount. All should be fitted and then mapped with in the next two weeks, super excited and an early christmas present to my self.
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To this!

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Sports cat and dogbone came the other day. car should be a bit more of a vibrator on wheels now! haha.
Looking at getting the black series also for the upper torque mount, along with black series ARB, wishbones and rear beam bushings so it should be a lot more direct.
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Had the car mapped and sorted late last week, we did a test between a stock inlet and the Portmatched and gas flowed, to which ill leave my mechanics report just down below, with the dyno graphs!

Nope all good.

Obviously this morning we tested it with manifold already fitted, with the old map testing was pointless, although wasn’t much in it top end.

Loaded our base map, good enough to test. Produced 197hp.

With inlets swapped, no other changes 198hp.

That’s within enough to say the inlets do absolutely sod all top end.

Everything looks healthy & correct. Airbox is restricting it a bit, proved by disconnecting air filter when we made 206hp.

Would have been nice to test it prior to exhaust manifold etc, but the point of today, manifold makes no difference, reduces torque in mid range by 3lbft, otherwise exactly the same.

Overall it’s been okay, 198hp as it sits, 206hp with an open cone type filter. No need for map tweak with cone air filter fitted.

Nice to finally have some proof that inlets are pointless on these!

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Next up, new tyres, seat and harness and rear cage .. then its track time!
 

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Nice car and so much done already, keep it up.

2 things:
1) the upper torque arm, the purple insert part is on wrong, should be flipped 180degs so it sits flush, not sticking out
2) the YSR coilovers, track ones are 8kg front 7kg rears, you can't just put the current 7kg on the back due to being pigtail coils, just a word of warning.
 
Nice car and so much done already, keep it up.

2 things:
1) the upper torque arm, the purple insert part is on wrong, should be flipped 180degs so it sits flush, not sticking out
2) the YSR coilovers, track ones are 8kg front 7kg rears, you can't just put the current 7kg on the back due to being pigtail coils, just a word of warning.

Thanks!
I did get that sorted out after i had taken the picture when I fitted it. I just never got a picture of it being correct so it has been rectified!

The spring rate change is known about, I wasn't looking at putting the fronts onto the rears, it just wouldn't work! I'd be looking at changing both front and rear spring rates at the same time to suit.
 
Thanks!
I did get that sorted out after i had taken the picture when I fitted it. I just never got a picture of it being correct so it has been rectified!

The spring rate change is known about, I wasn't looking at putting the fronts onto the rears, it just wouldn't work! I'd be looking at changing both front and rear spring rates at the same time to suit.

Nice one regarding the bush.

Also it's the wording "swap out rear spring for 8kg" is why I replied, just making sure you had the facts, stops wasted money being spent lol.
 
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Nice one regarding the bush.

Also it's the wording "swap out rear spring for 8kg" is why I replied, just making sure you had the facts, stops wasted money being spent lol.

agree'd on the wording, it didn't sound correct did it!
 
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Stance looks very good. Thanks for the testing of the intake manifold.

Thanks!
We wanted to know if it was worth it and it turns out they're not. The other test we did manage to do was stock airbox with aftermarket filter VS an open cone filter. I've always been told the stock box is good enough, but on the test we made 8hp more. which is also good to know for future reference!
 
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Wrote out a spec list of the car today and thought I'd share and update my page a little bit!

Engine / Gearbox:

Rebuilt gearbox (New 3rd to 6th syncro's, all new bearings)
Black line LSD
ZeroPointOne Full Fat shifter with Ti gear knob
Toyo sports manifold
Scorpion sports cat
Miltek cat back system
Ktec induction kit
Portmatched/gas flowed inlet painted red
Mapped to 206.5 @ Engine Dynamics

Suspension:

Road series Poly bushings:

Engine, gearbox and torque mount.
Black series dog mount
K brace
No rear seats, with extended boot Matt
YellowSpeed coilovers 4kg/7kg spring rates
Black series bushings:
Wishbones, Front anti-roll bar, rear beam
New lower ball joint's
Inner/outter tie rods
21mm spacers front
10mm hub axle spacers
Stud and nut kit
Geo set up:
-2.4 camber / -.18 toe front
-2 camber rear (toe needs dialling in)

Brakes:

Hel braided brake lines in red
RBF660 fluid
Brembo HC discs
DS1.11 pads front
PBS Protrack rear pads
New abs rings both rear sides.

Interior:
Cobra Sebring GT bucket seat
OMP 801 harness
Cobra Imola
OMP 801 harness
Sw side mounts
ZeroPointOne full fat shifter
Safety devices rear bolt in cage

Exterior:

Renaultsport factory splitter, skirts and wing
Ktec carbon wing ends
Cup racer towing eye


Picture as she stands:
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Should be getting a set of some AD08RS's and a bucket seat and harness set up next month. exciting times being closer to getting onto track again!
 
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So I was meant to have Bedford At the end of the month .. but now having to put it off until this is sorted
I think it’s just the bushings making noises, but Alex up at AWmotorworks has said it’s the swivel hubs, makes sense if it is because everything else is new and they’re the last things to have been changed!
Just annoying as I was meant to have Bedford at the end of the month

So track times being pushed back yet again :worried:

Link to noise
 
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Got the shifter fitted today .. 100% transformed the gear changes, much more direct feeling, and the shorter throw just helps a lot more as well!

fortunately today at Alex’s the swivel hubs where okay, turns out they’ve been changed before .. it’s just the steering rack that’s buggered. So we’ve got a 200 cup one coming to be fitted next week, should improve the turn ins with the quicker rack ratio 732F6BDC-93F1-4DD4-AE1F-10775FFB682F.jpeg
 
Lovely car, like the choice of mods :blush: did you stick with the OEM throttle body when you fitted the intake manifold as I know they offer a slightly larger option!
 
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