30 years old, some mega-mileage Renault erm... Alpine?
Discussion
Awesome, I remember coming across a little garage in the middle of a wood near me and two guys were restoring a blue one of these, I'm not sure if it's the A160 plate one shown earlier (Judd being in Rugby it makes sense)
In a roundabout way, the same guy ended up painted my M3, as I had a fiberglass CSL bootlid, and it was his attention to detail on the Alpine glass fibre work that swung me - real perfectionist. The car looked mega when it was done, I know a lot of hours went into it.
A310 is just retro enough I reckon for me, would love one.
In a roundabout way, the same guy ended up painted my M3, as I had a fiberglass CSL bootlid, and it was his attention to detail on the Alpine glass fibre work that swung me - real perfectionist. The car looked mega when it was done, I know a lot of hours went into it.
A310 is just retro enough I reckon for me, would love one.
Thanks all. Glad to see people are interested. In today's news, I've changed the exhaust tips. No more quad, I've gone carbon.
Cutting the old tips off with a hacksaw seems a bit drastic (esp when it's a full stainless exhuast) but I'm pleased with how it looks.
|https://thumbsnap.com/ZaSEt6jc[/url]
Cutting the old tips off with a hacksaw seems a bit drastic (esp when it's a full stainless exhuast) but I'm pleased with how it looks.
|https://thumbsnap.com/ZaSEt6jc[/url]alpgta said:
Went all Road Warrior for a bit this afternoon whilst taking off the front bumper to remove the old chargecooler pre-rad.
Applied a fair bit of epoxy-mastic 121 as well, some of which even went on the car rather than me.
The front bumper is a bugger to remove! Did the captive bolts hold still in the polyester? Applied a fair bit of epoxy-mastic 121 as well, some of which even went on the car rather than me.
So few more bits and bobs.
Went up to Bicester for the scramble back in April with the owners club.
So much rare stuff there, but my favourites included the only 911 speedster I've ever seen, plus a couple of 512BBs, RSRs and the only 288 GTO I think I've ever seen in the wild.
What else? Well GTA wise, I tweaked the door slightly as it wasn't sealing quite 100% at motorway speeds ever since I had it resprayed about 15 years ago. I'd got round this with at extra rubber seal on the door but I knew the reason was that the shim on the lower hinge had been removed when it was sprayed. I had bought the official shims for not just doors but also the suspension as well. Suspension is double wishbone all round and adjusted by shims. Anyway, I know exactly where those shims are, but could I find the door shims... nope. Nil desperandum when you have one of her majesty's shiny pennies! Ideal door shim and if I need to tweak further I can always upgrade to a 2p.
Look the door still opens and I barely had to use my hammer.
I also took the chance to respray the trim in satin black. Arguably, you can rub it down with wet and dry and try to polish it back to original, but this is far easier and allowed me to repair a few cracked bits.
Before:
After:
Crack repair:
Rear grill also repaired, but I sprayed that in situ as they're very fragile at this age (i.e. likely to break if you remove them), no longer available and worth a fortune otherwise. I made a small repair to the corner with some epoxy putty and it all came out pretty well.
All done. Here's one for the Alpine geeks as the yellow badge is only on cars supplied by Renault Performance Centres - Radbourne Racing in my cars case.
What's perhaps more interesting is when you remove the rear air vents you can see the rear roll hoop. They run up through the car and across the roof - a similar arrangement is at the front and but is formed by the windscreen pillar itself as obviously a fibre-glass roof wouldn't give sufficient protection.
If you look at the chassis of something like an F40, it's interesting the sorts of similarities that there are with something like this or a Venturi. Late 80s low production volume sports cars with composite (semi-stressed) bodywork and steel chassis I guess dictate that they used a similar style of engineering.
Onwards and upwards though. It's insurance renewal and re-valuation time, just shy of 195K miles now!
Went up to Bicester for the scramble back in April with the owners club.
So much rare stuff there, but my favourites included the only 911 speedster I've ever seen, plus a couple of 512BBs, RSRs and the only 288 GTO I think I've ever seen in the wild.
What else? Well GTA wise, I tweaked the door slightly as it wasn't sealing quite 100% at motorway speeds ever since I had it resprayed about 15 years ago. I'd got round this with at extra rubber seal on the door but I knew the reason was that the shim on the lower hinge had been removed when it was sprayed. I had bought the official shims for not just doors but also the suspension as well. Suspension is double wishbone all round and adjusted by shims. Anyway, I know exactly where those shims are, but could I find the door shims... nope. Nil desperandum when you have one of her majesty's shiny pennies! Ideal door shim and if I need to tweak further I can always upgrade to a 2p.
Look the door still opens and I barely had to use my hammer.
I also took the chance to respray the trim in satin black. Arguably, you can rub it down with wet and dry and try to polish it back to original, but this is far easier and allowed me to repair a few cracked bits.
Before:
After:
Crack repair:
Rear grill also repaired, but I sprayed that in situ as they're very fragile at this age (i.e. likely to break if you remove them), no longer available and worth a fortune otherwise. I made a small repair to the corner with some epoxy putty and it all came out pretty well.
All done. Here's one for the Alpine geeks as the yellow badge is only on cars supplied by Renault Performance Centres - Radbourne Racing in my cars case.
What's perhaps more interesting is when you remove the rear air vents you can see the rear roll hoop. They run up through the car and across the roof - a similar arrangement is at the front and but is formed by the windscreen pillar itself as obviously a fibre-glass roof wouldn't give sufficient protection.
If you look at the chassis of something like an F40, it's interesting the sorts of similarities that there are with something like this or a Venturi. Late 80s low production volume sports cars with composite (semi-stressed) bodywork and steel chassis I guess dictate that they used a similar style of engineering.
Onwards and upwards though. It's insurance renewal and re-valuation time, just shy of 195K miles now!
Edited by alpgta on Saturday 15th June 17:22
alpgta said:
One year on since I started this thread. Added another 2K miles since then.
I'll be using it over the winter a bit but tends to be less as the days get shorter and weather makes the traffic worse than ever. Hopefully should be at the Bicester Scramble again in Oct though.
Always loved all of the Alpines, a yellow A610 was my favourite for some time but now I'd love to own any of them really, all such fantastic looking machines and wonderfully different.I'll be using it over the winter a bit but tends to be less as the days get shorter and weather makes the traffic worse than ever. Hopefully should be at the Bicester Scramble again in Oct though.
SturdyHSV said:
Always loved all of the Alpines, a yellow A610 was my favourite for some time but now I'd love to own any of them really, all such fantastic looking machines and wonderfully different.
I agree, the fact they're different tends to make them feel special. Rear engined layout tends to give it that 911 thing where you need to put the effort into them to really master it, albeit double wishbones all round make the Alpines more forgiving than the older 911s. A110, A310, GTA and A610 all of them had bespoke chassis, they weren't simply a re-working of a saloon car. Front suspension wishbones are borrowed from the R25, but rears are developments of the mid engined R5 Turbo. From the underside it looks like a Tamiya model car - flat floor (except for the gearbox air-scoop) with big wishbones all round.
Pretty chuckable if you know what you're doing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV00r_hmJgs
Then you have the floor hinged pedals which are so closely stacked they're like a racing car. (Don't try driving one with big shoes on).
Even the wipers are crazy, a bit like a mental group C car - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnoalGOZxNA (But then this guy appears to like a soundtrack taken from Lethal Weapon 2)
Edited by alpgta on Monday 23 September 20:33
Well what an odd year it's turned out to be. Not much mileage added this year - crept up to over 196K but really not much action...
Went to a meeting before Xmas with new and potential A110 owners and got to have a drive in the new A110S which even on a small run does feel very special.
Other than that, runs over to my Mum's during Covid to deliver essential medication and food supplies. Here's a frunk of food and super unleaded and a stop off on the Ashdown Forest - deserted due to Covid.
A few meet ups in the brief lull between lockdowns at the Forest Row cafe.
Went to a meeting before Xmas with new and potential A110 owners and got to have a drive in the new A110S which even on a small run does feel very special.
Other than that, runs over to my Mum's during Covid to deliver essential medication and food supplies. Here's a frunk of food and super unleaded and a stop off on the Ashdown Forest - deserted due to Covid.
A few meet ups in the brief lull between lockdowns at the Forest Row cafe.
therealsamdailly said:
What a great ownership story, and a great looking car
I think I'd have to space the rear wheels out a little bit
Thanks! I think I'd have to space the rear wheels out a little bit
Yes funny you should say that, as it's been on my to do list for ages. I need to get spacers and a stud extractor though as it's an odd arrangement on these. There's a single stud / nut and then 3 bolts per wheel, so a spacer would have to account for that and it's just a bit more complex than normal. It's a funny arrangement but makes it easy to put the wheels on as they sort of hang there whilst you put the bolts in.
I've actually had more than one tyre shop remark on it in a "isn't that clever" way. Typically French though, little bonkers details all over the place.
Three wheels on my wagon....
Another year, but again a delayed MOT as covid restrictions just meant lack of use and wotnot. All passed fine, two advisories - paint on the front brake lines, yep that'd be me. Epoxymastic121 is amazing but you tend to catch things you don't mean to as it just sticks to everything. I just throw the brush away afterwards as it's not salvageable. Odd as well as I don't think they'd flagged this last time. And a nail in the rear tyre that turned out to be nothing more than a piece of snapped off thread from a small bolt. Tyre place pulled it out and it hadn't even gone in far enough to pierce the structure of the tyre - I gave them a tenner for the biscuit tin as they didn't even want to charge me. Bargain. Other than that I just had the confused "what is it?" conversation with the guy there who had clearly never seen one before and not sure either when I mentioned Alpine are now back with the new car, F1 and Le Mans victories as well.
Hopefully they'll be something to do when the spring comes back.
Another year, but again a delayed MOT as covid restrictions just meant lack of use and wotnot. All passed fine, two advisories - paint on the front brake lines, yep that'd be me. Epoxymastic121 is amazing but you tend to catch things you don't mean to as it just sticks to everything. I just throw the brush away afterwards as it's not salvageable. Odd as well as I don't think they'd flagged this last time. And a nail in the rear tyre that turned out to be nothing more than a piece of snapped off thread from a small bolt. Tyre place pulled it out and it hadn't even gone in far enough to pierce the structure of the tyre - I gave them a tenner for the biscuit tin as they didn't even want to charge me. Bargain. Other than that I just had the confused "what is it?" conversation with the guy there who had clearly never seen one before and not sure either when I mentioned Alpine are now back with the new car, F1 and Le Mans victories as well.
Hopefully they'll be something to do when the spring comes back.
Edited by alpgta on Friday 3rd December 18:04
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