RE: New Clio Renaultsport: the 5 door racer
Discussion
Maldini35 said:
I seriously considered an old cup car as a trackday / occasional race car but the parts and maintenance costs put me off.
They are great mini touring cars (properly engineered racers) but not well suited to the hopeless amateur mechanic (me) on a tight budget.
Those Sadev sequential boxes whilst great fun, aren't buttons to refresh.
But they were built as serious race cars so it's a bit much to expect them to be a cheap and cheerful occasional car.
Having raced a Clio Cup for 2 seasons in club racing (see profile), I can confirm they're not for the faint hearted or shallow pocketed.They are great mini touring cars (properly engineered racers) but not well suited to the hopeless amateur mechanic (me) on a tight budget.
Those Sadev sequential boxes whilst great fun, aren't buttons to refresh.
But they were built as serious race cars so it's a bit much to expect them to be a cheap and cheerful occasional car.
They're great fun when on song, and quick compared to pretty much all road cars up to and including 911s, the manual sequential box is a joy (when it's working), banging up and down the box round a circuit is the best thing about the car, putting an H-pattern box into the car would ruin the experience completely - this is the real deal pocket touring car and the box is integral to that.
But....
If you equate a season to around 6 trackdays a year in terms of track time and usage, the maintenance was as follows.
The LSD lasts less than a season (£800 to refresh, plus gearbox out), the box lasted 2 seasons (£2500 if you do the diff at the same time, which you might as well as again, gearbox out). To take the gearbox out, you need to raise the car and drop the subframe, not a simple job at home with axle stands....
Speaking of gearbox, it's advisable to change the oil after each outing, at £50 a go for the decent stuff which will help the LSD to work.
Many, many small electrical niggles, usually sensor related (throttle pot, gearbox cut sensor) - not expensive but costly in terms of time to fix.
Wheel bearings become a consumable item (think we replaced 8 or 9 in 2 season's racing), it's worth investing in a 10 tonne press if you don't have one, it's cheaper than paying labour charges at a garage.
Driveshafts snap, and thanks to that gearbox, the road car ones don't fit - £160 from Renaultsport IIRC.
In fact, everything that breaks seems to be Renaultsport only and comes with a special 'Renaultsport tax' meaning the self-same part (with a tiny, tiny difference) would cost half at a dealers, 1/3 from a specialist and 1/10 from a breaker, but thanks to that tiny difference, the only place to buy it is Renaultsport.
A great little car, far better and more fun than it ought to be, but buy one with your eyes wide open, they're not a cheap car to run by any means.
That's a biiig bottom. You know small startups always seem to focus on 'traditional' sports cars - well why not a proper hot hatch? If it evoked the 80s and was always going to be a niche product anyway people wouldn't mind it being noisy or having a basic interior, in fact, those things might help. Imagine if the Ginetta G40R (I'm talking price, engine, fit-finish etc) were able to somehow morph into a fwd hatchback... maybe I've lost it but that sounds good to me.
Cannot comment on the RS version of this clio as i havent seen one yet....but i have seen 'a' new shape clio in dark grey with black and polished alloys and 'red lined grille' and to be honest, they do have some presence on the road!
Not sure if they are out in the uk yet, but definately out in France (currently working here)
I would reserve a comment until you seen a clio on the road, because my inital reaction was pretty much the same as most peoples on here!
Not sure if they are out in the uk yet, but definately out in France (currently working here)
I would reserve a comment until you seen a clio on the road, because my inital reaction was pretty much the same as most peoples on here!
Allyc85 said:
Do not like!
Bring back the original Clio Cup car! They look better and the racing was far better too!
Me to first time i saw them was a donny in 2004 40 clios going down craner curves was fantastic the cars have just got to big but the old cars aren't coming back. But with the twingo being the old clio size twingo cup anyone.Bring back the original Clio Cup car! They look better and the racing was far better too!
tux said:
Why do they need paddleshift?
Just a guess but I think it is to stop the drivers over revving the engines on down shift. I am guessing that an ECU will look at all parameters before allowing the change to happen and therefor protecting the engine. In my opinion, for what it’s worth, Renault UK should not have pushed through this new car just yet. The money is not out there to fund this change. Many people have remarked how expensive this championship (TOCA support) is. Well I guess it’s cheaper than the Porkers and definitely cheaper than the banger racers (BTCC), It’s just the level it is.
I still don't understand how Renault can offer the new Clio Sport only with a flappy-paddle gearbox. Renault has spent the last couple of Clio generations building up a core customer base for which driving dynamics are very important and are of the mindset that manual gearboxes are good and a core part of the driving experience. I appreciate that customer research may well have indicated that by offering a flappy-paddle gearbox Renault could well widen the customer pool in which to source sales, but to more across whole sale? I can't think of a better way of alienating your core customer base in one fell swoop.
It does look better as a race car, than it does as a road car. Interesting that the graphics on the race car seem to do all they can to cover up the fact that its a 5 door.
With the new car only being available as a 5 door, you would have thought Renault would want to push this angle every chance they could.
With the new car only being available as a 5 door, you would have thought Renault would want to push this angle every chance they could.
Munich said:
I still don't understand how Renault can offer the new Clio Sport only with a flappy-paddle gearbox. Renault has spent the last couple of Clio generations building up a core customer base for which driving dynamics are very important and are of the mindset that manual gearboxes are good and a core part of the driving experience. I appreciate that customer research may well have indicated that by offering a flappy-paddle gearbox Renault could well widen the customer pool in which to source sales, but to more across whole sale? I can't think of a better way of alienating your core customer base in one fell swoop.
Not just the last couple of generations....way back to the 5 turbo.Have to be honest, I hadnt heard they were only doing the new Clio Sport in flappyness until I read this.....utterly bewildering.
Across the board, what with engine sounds being piped into cabins (m5) and all the other driver gizmo/b
ks, just makes my mind up to go back to older cars for a proper driving experience.Bah.
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