grobinson1
Paid Member
Back in March of 2019 I picked up a Liquid Yellow MK3 Clio RS 200 from Steve Murr, a specialist Clio seller near Brands Hatch who trades as R-Sports Cars and I think is well known on these forums!
The car is a 2012 model having just 47,300 miles at the time of collection and 2 previous owners. In fact, the previous owner did just over 3,000 miles in the time he owned it. The car, and the paintwork in particular is in fantastic condition.
Steve had done the cambelt, auxbelt, water pump and a full service on the car. While reflected in the sale price this saved me a fair amount of time and hassle getting the work done on the car right after purchase. I was a little apprehensive as although the car had full stamped service book it was missing its receipts, however just a couple weeks later the original owners, who had got in contact with Steve to see if the car was still available, were kind enough to send me photocopies of all receipts and work carried out - including a replacement gearbox at 40,000 miles.
Here is one of the first photos I took of the car back in March!
At the start of June I took the car to Sean Parker at Ren7oaks, my local Renault specialist, as the car was drinking a little oil (about 0.5L per 1000 miles) and I had seen some oil around the spark plugs and had spotted some dampness around the oil filter. I also asked Sean to look over the car for anything that might be deteriorating or had already deteriorated and would need replacing.
With the car up on the lift he checked over the car for any sign of leaks. Thankfully he found no signs of any leaks, and I had not seen any oil on the ground with the car parked up. He cleaned up some staining on the inlet manifold and I have not seen any oil residue since. However it turned out that I had a broken N/S/F spring. I hadn't noticed it as the spring had broken inside the rubber sleeve at the bottom of the shock and nothing appeared wrong between the N/S/F and O/S/F while driving the car. I decided to replace the Cup springs with a set of H&R Sport Springs - having been looking at a set of Bilstein B14s but didn't want to spend the money just yet on a set of coilovers.
Last week I took the car to K-Tec Racing in Blandford Forum for a KTR Induction Kit and some B14 coilovers to upgrade the standard intake and the H&R Sport Springs I had put on the car 12 months earlier.
I had watched a couple of videos of 197s and 200s with this induction kit on YouTube but wasn't amazed. However, suspecting that was more to do with the microphones used to record those videos rather than the induction kit I decided to go for it being an inexpensive upgrade in comparison to coilovers.
The induction kit comes in 179.00 and replaces the standard air box behind the battery. The kit reuses the existing cold air feed to bring cold air into the panel filter just like the standard intake. I am so happy I went for it because it sounds fantastic. It has a low bass sound at low revs but then as the VVT comes on it brings a lot of higher frequency sounds into the cabin and it just sounds brilliant.
I had decided a month or two ago that I wanted to change the H&R Sport Springs for B14 coilovers as the car was on a 30mm drop which I found to be just too low. I had to use great care to clear speed bumps without scraping the center silencer and the ride was poor at low speeds. I am pleased to say that the B14s have addressed both of these issues at a 20mm drop and much improved ride quality. It was also a good chance to replace the OE Cup dampers which were starting to rust in places and my top mounts which were showing similar age related fatigue.
I am now in the process of getting the car ready for a Circuit Days track day at the Nurburgring in October. The car is running Motul RFB660 fluid but I will be replacing it with fresh fluid, HEL braided lines and Mintex M1144 pads.
The car is a 2012 model having just 47,300 miles at the time of collection and 2 previous owners. In fact, the previous owner did just over 3,000 miles in the time he owned it. The car, and the paintwork in particular is in fantastic condition.
Steve had done the cambelt, auxbelt, water pump and a full service on the car. While reflected in the sale price this saved me a fair amount of time and hassle getting the work done on the car right after purchase. I was a little apprehensive as although the car had full stamped service book it was missing its receipts, however just a couple weeks later the original owners, who had got in contact with Steve to see if the car was still available, were kind enough to send me photocopies of all receipts and work carried out - including a replacement gearbox at 40,000 miles.
Here is one of the first photos I took of the car back in March!
At the start of June I took the car to Sean Parker at Ren7oaks, my local Renault specialist, as the car was drinking a little oil (about 0.5L per 1000 miles) and I had seen some oil around the spark plugs and had spotted some dampness around the oil filter. I also asked Sean to look over the car for anything that might be deteriorating or had already deteriorated and would need replacing.
With the car up on the lift he checked over the car for any sign of leaks. Thankfully he found no signs of any leaks, and I had not seen any oil on the ground with the car parked up. He cleaned up some staining on the inlet manifold and I have not seen any oil residue since. However it turned out that I had a broken N/S/F spring. I hadn't noticed it as the spring had broken inside the rubber sleeve at the bottom of the shock and nothing appeared wrong between the N/S/F and O/S/F while driving the car. I decided to replace the Cup springs with a set of H&R Sport Springs - having been looking at a set of Bilstein B14s but didn't want to spend the money just yet on a set of coilovers.
Last week I took the car to K-Tec Racing in Blandford Forum for a KTR Induction Kit and some B14 coilovers to upgrade the standard intake and the H&R Sport Springs I had put on the car 12 months earlier.
I had watched a couple of videos of 197s and 200s with this induction kit on YouTube but wasn't amazed. However, suspecting that was more to do with the microphones used to record those videos rather than the induction kit I decided to go for it being an inexpensive upgrade in comparison to coilovers.
The induction kit comes in 179.00 and replaces the standard air box behind the battery. The kit reuses the existing cold air feed to bring cold air into the panel filter just like the standard intake. I am so happy I went for it because it sounds fantastic. It has a low bass sound at low revs but then as the VVT comes on it brings a lot of higher frequency sounds into the cabin and it just sounds brilliant.
I had decided a month or two ago that I wanted to change the H&R Sport Springs for B14 coilovers as the car was on a 30mm drop which I found to be just too low. I had to use great care to clear speed bumps without scraping the center silencer and the ride was poor at low speeds. I am pleased to say that the B14s have addressed both of these issues at a 20mm drop and much improved ride quality. It was also a good chance to replace the OE Cup dampers which were starting to rust in places and my top mounts which were showing similar age related fatigue.
I am now in the process of getting the car ready for a Circuit Days track day at the Nurburgring in October. The car is running Motul RFB660 fluid but I will be replacing it with fresh fluid, HEL braided lines and Mintex M1144 pads.
