Gembo's 197, First Project Car

[Gembo]

So this is my first project car, which was bought the week before we went into our first UK lockdown in March.

Its a 2008 Clio 197 with 82k miles.

Mods already done to it are:
- Ice white reg plate lights
- HID Headlights
- Wind Deflectors
- H&R Lowering Springs
- Exhaust Resonator Delete



First mods I made to the car are:
- Removed Clio badge from the boot
- Rear Wiper Delete
- Gel reg plates



Next I did some much needed maintenance and gave it a clean while I was at it. The handbrake cables needed changing as they were sticking and the rear brake discs were completely worn (probably because the cables were sticking). Rear discs were replaced with J hook discs from K-TEC.



While under the car I noticed one of the flexi's had blown on the standard exhaust manifold, as this is a job no one wants to do more than once I thought now would be the time to upgrade, otherwise it will never get upgraded, so I bought a Toyo Sports 4 branch manifold (threw again the budget gasket they include with this and got a genuine Renault gasket).

This was a pain to fit, but just took my time and tried to follow the guide I found on here the best I could and it all went well

 

[Gembo]

Couple of months passed without doing anything to the car then I seen someone on Instagram selling extended shifters and I love the track car look on these cars so had to buy one! While I was waiting for that to be delivered I got hold of a spoiler which I had painted in a black and blue fade and are having the end plates skinned in real carbon fiber

 

[Gembo]

So its been a while since I've posted so where do I start?

So after all of the above I did attend my first car show in the Clio which was North East Auto Show in Darlington. Someone managed to get a sneaky picture of me entering the show

Walking around the show viewing other peoples cars, I over heard people laughing at my car. At this point I knew I had to crack on and make some changes!!

So for my birthday (Oct 2020) my boyfriend bought me a K-Brace from BAF Motorsport and some car mats from K-TEC Racing. The in-laws had bought me the boot mat from K-TEC Racing.



Keeping on the category of interior I knew I had to get some new seats, so for an early Christmas present the brother and boyfriend chipped in on some Corsa VXR Recaro Bucket Seats with me. To get them to fit we had to adapt the runners on the seat to the Renault mounting points.



I was now starting to like the look of the inside finally.



With being happy with the inside for the time being, I started to make a start on the outside appearance

Started off with getting rid of the silver as I thought it looked tacky. I bought black Renault badges off eBay which were easily put on with some sticky tape and just went over the top of the silver badges. Some more gifts off the boyfriend and in-laws, the carbon side bullets which were from Carbon Skins on Facebook and the custom front grills.



MOT was approaching and before I got it booked in I was wanting my front discs to match my back discs. In the process of changing the discs and pads I found a problem that I have been trying to find for a while and it turned out that my break line had a leak and with a slightest touch it snapped. So I made a purchase of some braided break hose lines from Goodridge in blue. While the wheels were off I also did a stud conversion which was bought off eBay.



My most recent modifications with in this past month. A cheeky little Instagram sticker @gembo_197 and some new shoes for it!! So I managed to get a good deal on some Bola FLE's which sit in the arch nicely.



With it starting to come together nicely, it was time to get it into a body shop to repair the damage from the previous owner. This is currently how the car looks now