Radiator borked

[Sniktysnikty]

Hi all,

Hope you can help me with some advice. I have an 2010 RS200, at some point on my way back from Gigrin farm to Bristol I sprung a leak in my radiator. Luckily it was very cold at the time so I saw the steam coming from under the bonnet before the engine got too hot.

I was hoping for advice on the cheapest way to get this fixed. I have six months of Warranty left from Renault (I bought the car second hand from a main dealer) but they believe it to be stone damage so won't cover it under warranty.

First question, I had a quote back from the usual place I use in Bristol and it was way higher than expected. They quoted me £600 as apparently the radiator comes with the AC fans attached, the part is £260 plus VAT and they wanted to charge £65 plus VAT to re-gas the AC. Does this sound right? They were competitive when I had my cam belt done.

Is there anyway of repairing it rather than replacing? Its a tiny hole, I want to avoid using rad weld or any junk that will clog up the radiator but are these parts repairable by anyone?

Has anyone replaced the part themselves? How tough a job is it? Im fairly competent with a spanner, Ive done PAS pumps and the like on my old Fez but the MK6 ST was probably a bit easier to work on than this.

Euro has the radiator at £196, eBay has them at £85 inc P+P though neither will be original Renault.

http://www.eurocarparts.com/ecp/c/R...95d276bc5edbf4dfe384a49e8a25c163a85030&000261

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-alloy...4r-/191841062238?_trksid=p2141725.m3641.l6368

As you can imagine I really don't want to spend £600 on this tiny hole, so any help would be most appreciated!

 

[Sniktysnikty]

oooh, voucher on my https://www.myvouchercodes.co.uk/euro-car-parts gives 30% off bringing the price down to £137

 

[Sniktysnikty]

Incase anyone needs to know, The RS200 has a multi-exchanger which means the air conditioning gubbins are built in to the radiator so the cheap third party rads linked above are no good. If you have a Cup they will be fine.

There are places that will repair for about £100, they will cut out the damaged core and weld in a replacement section. These specialists tend not to be garages so you need to remove the rad yourself and deliver the part to them. Bearing in mind the radiator from Renault is £200+ you may find it worthwhile if you are confident doing the work.

The job is a fixed price service from franchised dealers costing £440 (including vat), I ended up getting bored and paying up as it looked like a ball ache of a job.

 

[turkie172]

The 172 Clio had 2 radiators the front was air con and the one behind was the coolant radiator they bolted together I bought nissen rad they were the only after market rads that had the right hole alignment to bolt together so I replaced both at the same time for about £160 I cant see it being a combo rad because air con is available in different models and Renault aren't going to stock different rads for all the different models. But if a stone has went through then it has gone through the air con and damaged the coolant rad. The Renault part system shows 2 rads and at the time Renault were quoting £265 for just the air con rad.