Vive les voitures du Francais!
Discussion
No idea if the heading makes sense but you get my drift.
There is an awful amount of French car bashing on PH, some of it warranted, some of it not. I thought I would come out of the closet and admit to owning not one, not even two but three Renaults. I thought I would further stir things by saying that I actually get more grins per mile driving my current car than I did in my 996 turbo.
My daily driver is a Megane RS250 lightly modded to 310bhp. It is an absolute hoot to drive whether it is on my daily country road commute or thrashing it around Silverstone or another track. The handling (no FWD is rubbish comments unless you have driven one of these) is fantastic. 8000 miles in it has been faultless.
My wife drives a Koleos, basically a Nissan X Trial with an ugly body.I bought this new but with a 30% discount at around £15k and now 3 years later it is worth around £11.5k. It is a real workhorse. This car is the family hack and is used for everything. The 4wd system is excellent and has managed to cope with everything that has been asked of it. As a family we go skiing each year and take the car over to the Alps. Fully laden with a big roofbox on top it will cruise happily all day at 100mph returning decent mpg. Once up in the mountains it copes brilliantly with the snow and ice (decent winter tyres do help of course)and I have yet to find conditions that have beaten it. 30,000 miles in and not a single problem.
My daughter is just learning to drive and she has a 2002 1.2 Clio - Early days but seems to be a pretty reliable little car.
So to all of you French haters - you don't know what you are missing especially when it comes to the Renaultsport cars;)
There is an awful amount of French car bashing on PH, some of it warranted, some of it not. I thought I would come out of the closet and admit to owning not one, not even two but three Renaults. I thought I would further stir things by saying that I actually get more grins per mile driving my current car than I did in my 996 turbo.
My daily driver is a Megane RS250 lightly modded to 310bhp. It is an absolute hoot to drive whether it is on my daily country road commute or thrashing it around Silverstone or another track. The handling (no FWD is rubbish comments unless you have driven one of these) is fantastic. 8000 miles in it has been faultless.
My wife drives a Koleos, basically a Nissan X Trial with an ugly body.I bought this new but with a 30% discount at around £15k and now 3 years later it is worth around £11.5k. It is a real workhorse. This car is the family hack and is used for everything. The 4wd system is excellent and has managed to cope with everything that has been asked of it. As a family we go skiing each year and take the car over to the Alps. Fully laden with a big roofbox on top it will cruise happily all day at 100mph returning decent mpg. Once up in the mountains it copes brilliantly with the snow and ice (decent winter tyres do help of course)and I have yet to find conditions that have beaten it. 30,000 miles in and not a single problem.
My daughter is just learning to drive and she has a 2002 1.2 Clio - Early days but seems to be a pretty reliable little car.
So to all of you French haters - you don't know what you are missing especially when it comes to the Renaultsport cars;)
I suspect if they came from another country the other side of the Rhine they would get much less bashing.
I wouldn't own one (well unless they start making 8 cylinders), but I admire the fact that they still have an auto industry, sometimes make stupidly awesome but a bit pointless cars, don't follow the standard of rock hard suspensions & hard seats, and try to style them differently even though it doesnt always work.
I wouldn't own one (well unless they start making 8 cylinders), but I admire the fact that they still have an auto industry, sometimes make stupidly awesome but a bit pointless cars, don't follow the standard of rock hard suspensions & hard seats, and try to style them differently even though it doesnt always work.
I thought PH was about purity of driving, blah blah. But then everyone cries about a few rattles? Who cares, I'd rather drive a rattly car with great dynamics than a VAG TDI!
I can't think of many 'hot' hatches where I wouldn't rather have the French equivalent (some exceptions obviously).
I can't think of many 'hot' hatches where I wouldn't rather have the French equivalent (some exceptions obviously).
I have to say that I don't bash French cars in general but I do have a problem with Renault. It's not based on Clarksonisms but on personal experience.
My first car was a 1996 Megane, then six years old. I spent £100-200 a month for about 5 months on repairs. I spent an hour in the pouring rain just trying to change a battery because Renault saw fit to pack it in a really inaccessible place. When the water pump failed, I changed the cambelt but the water pump Renault supplied had to be drilled to fit because it didn't match up. Compare that to the Toyota Corolla that followed it: On the rare occasions anything needed doing, it was like Lego because it felt so simple to work on in comparison to the Megane.
More worryingly, the steering failed when I was on a motorway. Coming to a stop in the fast lane when you're facing the wrong way is an interesting experience.
I'm sure there are similar stories about Toyotas, BMW's and Fords. However, it's hard to have that sort of experience and not be negatively persuaded. However, I've never quite shaken a love of quirky french cars- for example, Avantime, C6, even the steering wheel on a C4... I've been looking lustfully at a Megane 250 but I can't help but feel better about a Scirocco.
This is the problem- my heart was broken by a French car before (and f
king nearly my body too!). So even though I lust after one occasionally, it's hard to trust again when you've been portrayed.
But not impossible- the Skoda brand has been rehabilitated to me to the extent that I now drive an Octavia vRS quite happily. Maybe one day Renault can do the same for me.
My first car was a 1996 Megane, then six years old. I spent £100-200 a month for about 5 months on repairs. I spent an hour in the pouring rain just trying to change a battery because Renault saw fit to pack it in a really inaccessible place. When the water pump failed, I changed the cambelt but the water pump Renault supplied had to be drilled to fit because it didn't match up. Compare that to the Toyota Corolla that followed it: On the rare occasions anything needed doing, it was like Lego because it felt so simple to work on in comparison to the Megane.
More worryingly, the steering failed when I was on a motorway. Coming to a stop in the fast lane when you're facing the wrong way is an interesting experience.
I'm sure there are similar stories about Toyotas, BMW's and Fords. However, it's hard to have that sort of experience and not be negatively persuaded. However, I've never quite shaken a love of quirky french cars- for example, Avantime, C6, even the steering wheel on a C4... I've been looking lustfully at a Megane 250 but I can't help but feel better about a Scirocco.
This is the problem- my heart was broken by a French car before (and f
king nearly my body too!). So even though I lust after one occasionally, it's hard to trust again when you've been portrayed.But not impossible- the Skoda brand has been rehabilitated to me to the extent that I now drive an Octavia vRS quite happily. Maybe one day Renault can do the same for me.
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