Yeah I know! That's why I'm not mega fussed about them - I reckon it's be cheaper doing a ph2 front end conversion!
Haha thanks man! Means a lot that. Come new year she'll be getting more added on to catch up to the ever moving field.
A soon as the decats on, maps right and I got the 630s on yep. And some titanium skid plates for the front of the side skirts
Finally finished reading this I was about three quarters through on ms it's great to see such passion going into your car I reckon if I'd had some of these problems you've had id have had a nervous breakdown keep up the good work Naith your car is seriously impressive
Just sat and read the full thread. Didn't realise all the issues that you had with it. Hopefully the worst is behind you. Great perseverance to keep at it.
Naith I assume you'll be doing Le mans this year? I'm hoping to go but need to try and get budget together etc; I don't suppose you would mind pm'ing me a bit of an idiots guide to where to book ferries/camping/tickets from and what sort of costs for the trip?
Remember this when you first got it, well done for sticking with it naith:cool:, brilliant job, just done my wheels black but not feeling it as yet, lower would change my mind i reckon though lee
Wow that's brilliant, 50% sale at house of Fraser! Oh the megane...... Looks ace mate look forward to the updates
so I just fork out for another years membership on meganesport and im thinking where have all the people I know disappeared to. some are still on here but don't seem to visit/post very often. even Naith appears to have lost interest in tdk and hasn't posted any update since may 13' perhaps fatherhood has taken over.......... then I stumble upon this forum and everyones in here!! FFS! really pleased to see you haven't given up on tdk Naith, still looks great, looking forward to seeing it in lemans 2014 decals whatever they will be
OK. Here goes. The megane, its ermmm fixed but not fixed. About 2 months before LeMans I started to sort her out. Tidy xenons, cut a bigger inlet in air box, refit dust seals on brakes and cover all interior holes with metal tape. My son knows more than me about cars so I left it to him... photo by NaithanAriane, on Flickr I bought BigAshs Sabelt Taurus seat off him recently and managed to source some Team Pyro RenaultSport Clio Cup Racer mounts for dirt cheap. The 225 has the same floor plan as the 197 so they are a straight bolt in job (obviously with mild tinkering as is always the case with Renaults.) My mate Alex C got me some eyelets and bolts from his touring car workshop, thanks again for that, and helped me get the seat fitted in properly. Snug, low but my days its good. Really puts you in the car now and you feel the car moving about on the road, I love it, granted I used a pillow in it for LeMans but nobody needs to know about that. This is how it looked during fitting. photo 1 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 2 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 1 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr Feedback on it has been great and yeas the passenger seat is staying OEM as my nan comes shopping in it with me! The O/S hub was totally mashed so I decided to get it taxed MOT'd and down to BTM. Whilst it was there Fred replaced the gearbox oil (which was like treacle), sorted the CV boot, changed the oil, fitted the Milltek decat and sorted the hub bearing out. Unfortunately we didn't have time to fix my N/S CV boot and check the hub and on return from France its really deteriorated, more below. It was mainly due to time, the bolts on the cat took HOURS to get off, they were a right bugger, gotta be fair to fred he kept smiling and we got it all on. photo 4 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 3 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 2 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 5 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr Car felt alot smoother on the way back up north, the gear change was better but not much noticeably better. The decat though, my lord. During startup, when cold its marginally louder but not so much you think 'god thats had a decat put on'. Its when you're at speed and you can hear the turbo spinning along with the boost being dumped and/or used it truly becomes addictive. The midrange is alot stronger since fitted, talking 5/7bhp off the top of my head but theres definitely greater pull, its thrown the engine management light up once but a single flash with the scangauge and it hasn't come back since. It'll need mapping asap as a friend blew his car up with a decat and no fettled map and I dont want that. Pops and bangs on overrun are naughty but no way in your face. So its all good. With a few days to go before Lemans I got some Contis 5s on the front and had my split track rod end replaced. photo 3 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 2 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr It was then time to set off for lemans. We met Danny and Gaz and along with my mate sy in his R26 we set off from Mcr on the tues night at midnight. The cruse down was nice, the car wasn't heavy on fuel and bar a minimal pull to the left felt utterly fantastic. We got to the others at about half four in the morning and I decided to sticker the car up in the carpark of their hotel, as you do. We'd done an allnighter and were 7 miles from Dover so sleep seemed pointless. We left for Dover at 9 and pulling onto the M20 I decided to give Gav in his diesel Megane RS chase. Closing on him up the slip road I braked and there was an almighty wobble. Its like nothing I've felt before in a car and it scared the s**t out of me, the car started to instantly wander across lanes. My brother told me to stop but being so close to Dover i decided to nurse it, applying the brake the car kept violently juddering so I'm thinking the calliper has seized. My heart honestly sank as for once I had tried to make the car run well and be in top form and yet again she'd developed an issue. We kept going and crawled into the ferry port, I passed through passport control and then slowly through the check in booth, I turned left and lost steering. I was hoping I'd make it to the holding lanes and get under the car but we fell short. My brother jumped out saw one wheel pointing left and one right and noticed the drop link had fallen out, yeh, THE DROPLINK HAD FALLEN OUT!!! photo by NaithanAriane, on Flickr I was literally lost for words and started to get really annoyed as we dragged the car into an area away from everyone else. I started to think about it failing at speed and how I'd have had no control but as someone said 'someones watching over you'... What happened next really made me realise how lucky I am to have the friends I have. James (Bigash), his mate Dom, Danny and Gaz, Riad, Bloor, Rich and Sy between themselves instantly got the car jacked up and the wheel off. Fearing the worst we could see that the nut had sheared on the thread and that due to it being a fine thread a spare nut wouldn't cut it. Bear in mind it was 10am when this happened and the ferry was leaving at 11.10am.... I resigned myself to not taking the car at this point but and old chap then turned up, Bob from P&O maintenance. He basically says theres a ECP/GSF in Dover so he'll have a run over there and see if they have a drop link, we ring and they do... Off he trots and we're sat there. We checked the hub and drop link for damage and this point and it was all ok. I was still full of adrenaline at this point due to what had happened and went to the ticket office to book a later ferry and calm my little self down. He arrived back at 10.45... photo 2 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 3 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr We used the bolt off the TRE and tightened it back on (holding the bottom of it too so it didn't spin as I think thats what caused the issue in the first place) and dropped the car, due to Bob from P&O's ancient jack catching the side skirt as we dropped it in a flurry of excitement we clean snapped the front of the side skirt off, FCUKS SAKE. But the car was working so I taped it back on we started the car and I kid you not drove into the loading bay as we were called forward to embark, we then got shouted at for stopping for a celebratory pic! photo 4 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr Arrived at Calais and were first off, we got south of Calais and the car seemed fine, pulled into a service station and waited for the gang. It was HOT and I gotta be honest the meg absolutely sang her way to LeMans. The roads on weds are a little more quieter and it was the best journey down I've had in all the years I've been. I noticed now that the gear changes were really smooth as the new oils were in and doing their job perfectly. photo 3 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 5 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr Got the the campsite, unpacked and left her till the thursday morning. Go to start her on the Thursday morning and she won't spark, the car was cranking perfectly but no spark. To give Gaz and Rich their dues they instantly said my Crank sensor had gone, we fettled around for a while, gaz pissed about with the fuel lines to check and fitted one out of an R26 to test. The car fired. So off to Renault in LeMans. Their main LM showroom made any Renault showroom in the UK look a joke, the models on display stood at about 15 I'd say, they were really friendly and offered in a new 'Capture' (Crank Sensor) from Dieppe for the next morning for €28! (They even gave us discount and wanted a look around Rich's 225 Cup!) To be honest, bar the good service from Adam@Wolverhampton any UK dealer I've used could really do with pulling their socks up after dealing with the so called miserable french.... I drank far too much alcohol that night and we picked the part up on friday morning, I was sick and went back to sleep and woke to the news that fred had arrived and fitted the part, probably with one hand, drinking a beer. And thats that really, we went out and did mad friday, did a few burnouts as you do and enjoyed the epic race, blagging Alpine hospitality helped too. photo 2 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr photo 1 by NaithanAriane, on Flickr Left everyone for a while on Sunday evening and drove the circuit a few times with Riad, we met one of Riads clients, Driver Oliver Webb, in the McDonalds there. He had just got a podium in the 24hr race and yet was happy to poke around the car and pose for some pics with it, true to form Riads iPhone froze and we have no bloody evidence of this. Only these bad boys... 10446093_595199140577788_7273348820206497561_o by NaithanAriane, on Flickr 10448768_10154296139655422_7259792796570102059_n by NaithanAriane, on Flickr On the way back on the Monday morning the N/S part of the car with its shot bearing started to creak and clunk and isn't 100%, but the car like on its way down flew on the motorway and made short the journey to Calais. I've not had a chance to get the car on a ramp since I've been back but it needs CV and hub refurb so thats on the agenda for the next few weeks. When we got to Dover we got onto the M20 ready for the blast back up north and finished off the old "Bad luck comes in threes" as a massive stone cracked the windscreen from top to bottom. I didn't even react at the time as I was so worn out and wired from it all. And thats that, I've promised myself she won't sit there anymore and during the next few months I'm going to keep refreshing bits. Ive already refitted alot of interior bits I ripped out and bought new bumper pins and bungs as they do perish over time. So she's still needing the exhaust remounting (not touching DANMAR again), the front windscreen replacing and the N/S hub and CV boot repairing. I've got some buttons for my OMP wheel so I can retain cruise and will fit that next week. I'll sort all the other bits over the next month or so along with the single mass flywheel thats on its way and a prototype diff from the USA, they will however go on when they go on as I need to wait on the limited slip diff. Never a dull day with her.
Great update matey! Looks like it was eventful! One of these days I'm going to do lemans, I've been promising myself for years. Interesting about the mounting points. Does that mean any seat that fits a mk3 clio will fit the meg? Ie sportsters?
Cracking read Naith, sounds like an eventful and fun filled trip. Glad she's back and fighting fit. Love the fact you've kept the passenger seat for your nan!
This has kept me occupied for half of my day at work. Epic thread & car, look forward to updates in the future!
Guessing it was the small droplink that failed then? was it not done up correctly or did the part just fail.
Horizontal stabiliser one at TRE. Garage didn't do it properly but it was a mate so I wasn't about to go mental at him. He didn't hold the bit at the bottom so it must have spun whilst tightening.
You're great mate as good as adam. It's the general dealers that are crap. You know I heart your service x
I don't. I asked him for a price for something the other day and the response I got was "I'm looking in the fridge".
