Renault Meganes
Discussion
Price of things.
Take the cambelt. On a 1.4 upwards it's a £400 job ; it needs special tools and if you don't know what you are doing it can go wrong ; many mechanics don't change the one use bolt for the crank for example (it's not on a keyway). If done by someone careless which most garages IME tend to be (after all, the customer is paying and on an old car who can determine why it went wrong?) things go bad. On a car barely worth £1k I don't know of many people who will spend that.
They are not free of faults I admit but neither are VAGs despite what people say. The higher residuals would help the VAGs mind you.
That and only certain diagnostic equipment (Renault CLIP) works fine on them. Snap-On's Solus does but even that is not very clear in fault finding.
While it's not a Megane my Clio 172 was quite reliable all things considered
.
Take the cambelt. On a 1.4 upwards it's a £400 job ; it needs special tools and if you don't know what you are doing it can go wrong ; many mechanics don't change the one use bolt for the crank for example (it's not on a keyway). If done by someone careless which most garages IME tend to be (after all, the customer is paying and on an old car who can determine why it went wrong?) things go bad. On a car barely worth £1k I don't know of many people who will spend that.
They are not free of faults I admit but neither are VAGs despite what people say. The higher residuals would help the VAGs mind you.
That and only certain diagnostic equipment (Renault CLIP) works fine on them. Snap-On's Solus does but even that is not very clear in fault finding.
While it's not a Megane my Clio 172 was quite reliable all things considered
.GrumpyTwig said:
vikingaero said:
Same place the Mk1's went - ruined by French reliability.
It's usually helpful to base an opinion on facts rather than tired old rhetoric.If the Meganes are anything like the mk2 Laguna belonging to my father in law that I'm currently pulling my hair out over then there may well be a lot of fact there, the electric handbrake is knackered, I'm hoping the illuminated abs light is something to do with this but I fear not, one of the front springs decided to snap again the other day (to be fair, that could happen on any car, but this one particularly likes snapping springs) and today's problem; hazard lights flashing continually. Great fun.
SebringMan said:
Price of things.
Take the cambelt. On a 1.4 upwards it's a £400 job ; it needs special tools and if you don't know what you are doing it can go wrong ; many mechanics don't change the one use bolt for the crank for example (it's not on a keyway). If done by someone careless which most garages IME tend to be (after all, the customer is paying and on an old car who can determine why it went wrong?) things go bad. On a car barely worth £1k I don't know of many people who will spend that.
They are not free of faults I admit but neither are VAGs despite what people say. The higher residuals would help the VAGs mind you.
That and only certain diagnostic equipment (Renault CLIP) works fine on them. Snap-On's Solus does but even that is not very clear in fault finding.
While it's not a Megane my Clio 172 was quite reliable all things considered.
I think thats it in a nutshell really - once they're down to banger money then a big bill knocks them off the road easily. Fragile electricals - windows, electronic handbrake, key cards and the diesel engines in them can be problematic.Take the cambelt. On a 1.4 upwards it's a £400 job ; it needs special tools and if you don't know what you are doing it can go wrong ; many mechanics don't change the one use bolt for the crank for example (it's not on a keyway). If done by someone careless which most garages IME tend to be (after all, the customer is paying and on an old car who can determine why it went wrong?) things go bad. On a car barely worth £1k I don't know of many people who will spend that.
They are not free of faults I admit but neither are VAGs despite what people say. The higher residuals would help the VAGs mind you.
That and only certain diagnostic equipment (Renault CLIP) works fine on them. Snap-On's Solus does but even that is not very clear in fault finding.
While it's not a Megane my Clio 172 was quite reliable all things considered
.GrumpyTwig said:
vikingaero said:
Same place the Mk1's went - ruined by French reliability.
It's usually helpful to base an opinion on facts rather than tired old rhetoric. We traded it in as soon as the 3 year warranty expired. The leather seats were comfy, and I did like the panoramic sunroof - but other than that, it was probably the most hateful car I've ever owned - and the only car I've ever owned that broke down (more than once) and left us stranded at the road side.It is one of those cars that has just dwindled, I suspect in part due to electrical gremlins and them becoming so cheap that people probably don't bother repairing them.
I've owned two Megane 225s (still own one) and the last one I had was my daily car. Was a a great car and sold it with 50k on the clock and such a fun car to drive.
As divisive as the styling was when it first came out, I still think it's a fairly smart looking car and the RenaultSport model still looks good today.
I've owned two Megane 225s (still own one) and the last one I had was my daily car. Was a a great car and sold it with 50k on the clock and such a fun car to drive.
As divisive as the styling was when it first came out, I still think it's a fairly smart looking car and the RenaultSport model still looks good today.
I have run a 225 as my daily for about 3 years now.
It has its little issues (drivers window occasionally stops working, random EML for "check emissions", slightly dodgy keycard)
I commute about 35 miles each way on a mixture of fast SC A roads and twisty B roads and it is epic fun. Very chuckable and enough grunt to make good progress. Its not the quickest car I've owned but it is probably the nicest to drive. They are quite sensitive to tyre choice, I find Michelin PS4 suit them perfectly. I'm only averaging 27 Mpg though!!
It actually threw up a strange fault tonight. 50 MPH into a sharp left hander which drops away and as I got back onto the power it went into limp home mode? I turned around, went back and tried again and was able to replicate the same fault. No code stored on the ECU and LH mode cleared by switching off/on.
Anyone got any ideas?
It has its little issues (drivers window occasionally stops working, random EML for "check emissions", slightly dodgy keycard)
I commute about 35 miles each way on a mixture of fast SC A roads and twisty B roads and it is epic fun. Very chuckable and enough grunt to make good progress. Its not the quickest car I've owned but it is probably the nicest to drive. They are quite sensitive to tyre choice, I find Michelin PS4 suit them perfectly. I'm only averaging 27 Mpg though!!
It actually threw up a strange fault tonight. 50 MPH into a sharp left hander which drops away and as I got back onto the power it went into limp home mode? I turned around, went back and tried again and was able to replicate the same fault. No code stored on the ECU and LH mode cleared by switching off/on.
Anyone got any ideas?
DuncsGTi said:
It actually threw up a strange fault tonight. 50 MPH into a sharp left hander which drops away and as I got back onto the power it went into limp home mode? I turned around, went back and tried again and was able to replicate the same fault. No code stored on the ECU and LH mode cleared by switching off/on.
Anyone got any ideas?
Just because you cant read it, doesnt mean the code isnt there. It may take a proper Renault / CLIP system to read it.Anyone got any ideas?
It could be ABS related for example - a lot of code readers dont / cant read those systems.
Edited by daemon on Monday 27th February 22:13
My missus had a brave new mark 2. Traded it the day it 3 years old. Was an unreliable f
ker of a thing and the dealer tried to wriggle out of so many issues which should have been covered under warranty.
It just didn't do anything well enough to even consider forgiving it its faults.
The dealers are properly st IMO.
So basically a pretty crap car IME.
ker of a thing and the dealer tried to wriggle out of so many issues which should have been covered under warranty. It just didn't do anything well enough to even consider forgiving it its faults.
The dealers are properly s
t IMO. So basically a pretty crap car IME.
daemon said:
DuncsGTi said:
It actually threw up a strange fault tonight. 50 MPH into a sharp left hander which drops away and as I got back onto the power it went into limp home mode? I turned around, went back and tried again and was able to replicate the same fault. No code stored on the ECU and LH mode cleared by switching off/on.
Anyone got any ideas?
Just because you cant read it, doesnt mean the code isnt there. It may take a proper Renault system to read it.Anyone got any ideas?
It could be ABS related for example - a lot of code readers dont / cant read those systems.
I have a mate with a snap on reader but not much use if I have to replicate the fault then drive to him in limp mode.
Matt UK said:
My missus had a brave new mark 2. Traded it the day it 3 years old. Was an unreliable fker of a thing and the dealer tried to wriggle out of so many issues which should have been covered under warranty.
It just didn't do anything well enough to even consider forgiving it its faults.
The dealers are properly st IMO.
So basically a pretty crap car IME.
Extrapolate that onwards and when one reaches the £500-£1000 bracket its going to get scrapped at the next big bill.ker of a thing and the dealer tried to wriggle out of so many issues which should have been covered under warranty. It just didn't do anything well enough to even consider forgiving it its faults.
The dealers are properly s
t IMO. So basically a pretty crap car IME.
DuncsGTi said:
ericmcn said:
scrap, French engineering.
Just looked out the window, mines still there 
If it was a 2006 1.4 petrol it would already be on borrowed time.
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