Frayz’s Inferno orange 182 - Back in the old flame

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Another earth lead. I always add a couple of extra earth points back to the battery and chassis from the engine. Always helps running and overall performance in my experience. Especially as the Clio earth lead is a weedy little item and just a single low gauge wire.
Thought as much, hence the extra wire from the battery terminal I guess.
 
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Thought as much, hence the extra wire from the battery terminal I guess.

Absolutely. These cars are knocking on 15 years old now. So replacing items like that just seems like a good preventive measure.
Chunky earth going from battery to chassis point and then chassis point on to the engine. ?
 
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Massive thanks to Mike Rainbird at RB Motorsport for helping me secure a great deal on todays Recaro delivery. I’ve known Mike for a lot of years now and his service and attention to detail is absolutely superb.

Unfortunately I’ve now got the agonising wait till i get time and a break in the weather to get these fitted.

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Finally got 5 min to give the old girl a clean, as it hadn’t been washed in 3 weeks and usually it’s every week without fail.

Doesn’t come up bad for 14 years old and 116k miles.

Inferno is such an odd colour. No filters on these and it looks different in every light.

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Been quiet on the update front with the Clio as im currently up to my neck in kitchen renovation and the car hasn't had a look in. I've just got an ever growing list of parts that i need to fit.
She has seen some attention in the last 2 days however.

Firstly a big thanks to Alex @AW Motorworks for fixing a small gearbox leak & fitting a pair of new CV boots to the NS driveshaft. Naturally it got yet another fresh lot of genuine ELF gearbox oil again too.
Also had a shock to hear it failed it MOT this morning due to high C02. I was pretty shocked by this as it had been running fine and still averaging 36mpg so was surprised to think that a lambda might have gone down.
Quick call to the motor factors for them to express me over an new NTK lambda which arrived at 4:15pm, popped home to fit it before getting back to the MOT station before 5pm for them to re test the emissions.

Thankfully all is right in the world once more and the little 182 C0 is back to normal :)

Also like to say thankyou to Hoolio who true to his word, did indeed send me an alarm grommet, so i've got that to pop on too. Very very generous of you sir. Thank you :)
 
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Massive thanks to Mike Rainbird at RB Motorsport for helping me secure a great deal on todays Recaro delivery. I’ve known Mike for a lot of years now and his service and attention to detail is absolutely superb.

Unfortunately I’ve now got the agonising wait till i get time and a break in the weather to get these fitted.

View attachment 25897
Nice looking seats Frayz , mike rainbird that's a name I've not heard in a long time. I use to get a few bits from him back in my escort cossie days. Last I heard he had moved on to BMW's.
Dont know if you have bought the PMS shifter yet but I noticed Ash saying he has a few bms shifters available, I would say these are a good mid point for a road car and can confirm they clear the cat with a little bending of the hest shield.
 
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Nice looking seats Frayz , mike rainbird that's a name I've not heard in a long time. I use to get a few bits from him back in my escort cossie days. Last I heard he had moved on to BMW's.
Dont know if you have bought the PMS shifter yet but I noticed Ash saying he has a few bms shifters available, I would say these are a good mid point for a road car and can confirm they clear the cat with a little bending of the hest shield.
Haha, I’m an ex Cossie owner too Neil. No doubt we have crossed paths on passionford back in the day.

Ive spoken with Ash and did order a BMS from him. However, it was only after ordering one did I get a chance to try one. Sadly, on this particular vehicle, it was very sloppy even in gear.

It had more side slack in gear, than my own car does in Neutral!
I assume this is due to a tired box and linkage, and not directly the BMS shifter.
I also found the control weight of the BMS incredibly light, this also put me off as it felt a bit aloof.

At that point I decided to stay OEM and leave alone.

Shortly after, I was offered a PMS for a good price, so I’m going to try it.
Worst wayi got it cheap enough that I won’t lose anything on it if I were to sell it on.
I’ve heard the carbon shaft makes an improvement on the resonance of them, so going to try it out and see.
My goal is to get the control weights, touch points and seating as good as I can in the car.
Hopefully that can be achieved. :)
 
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Massive thanks to Alyn @ AS Performance for the box of goodies that arrived for the Clio today. I’ve been purchasing my performance parts from Alyn for almost 15 years now and his knowledge and customer service is unlike any other I’ve experienced. Over the years I’ve never found anyone to get near on customer service or price. Even throws me in a gift from time to time, this time an Xtreme Clutch T-Shirt & Keyring ?

Also had a small delivery from Kam Racing, my first purchase from them and also have to say the swiftness of their service has so far been very good.

So I’ve quite a list of parts to fit and I’ve just added the following to that pile:

Brembo HC discs
Performance Friction 097 pads
OEM rear discs
Brembo rear pads
Powerflex black steering rack bushes
Whiteline rear beam bushes
Pure Motorsport 19mm rear ARB
Pure Motorsport carbon shifter.

Looking forward to adding to the old girls freshness :)

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So I collected WZD from AW Motorworks this evening. I really didn’t fancy swapping gearboxes and doing beam bushes in this weather. So Alex was once again entrusted to take care of proceedings.
Super knowledgable, reliable and friendly. Alex is always a pleasure to deal with and I can highly recommend him to anyone.

I collected WZD this evening after she received the following upgrades.

Whiteline rear beam bushes
Pure Motorsport 19mm Rear Roll Bar
Pure Motorsport shifter
Fully rebuilt Cup gearbox with Quaife ATB diff.

I can’t wait to have proper drive and see how it’s hopefully improved the car.
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Looking great! Keen to hear your impressions

Well my drive home last light was a very gentle one as i still had my OEM gearbox wrapped up in the boot. So can't really comment on the diff/arb just yet. The shifter is very marmite and does transfer some NVH to the cabin. It is very direct to use and more akin to a bolt action rifle in the way it operates.
The placement of the gearknob imo is much improved and feels very focussed to drive. My one was purchased used and is of the earlier revision which means its quite stiff to operate. The revisions were a looser non PTFE spherical bearing and a carbon shaft.
I have fitted the carbon shaft on mine but was holding off on the bearing so i could try it out first. However i will swap it out as it is quite stiff to operate and its an easy swap to do. Ive actually called and ordered one this morning.

The shifter came used from a lad who was breaking his track car, likewise was the gearbox which had done only a couple of hundred road miles since rebuild with new synchros, bearings, seals and brand new Quaife. It was built by Gears of Southport and i have contacted them to confirm the works carried out etc. This was arguably the most affordable way of doing it, and i will probably now have my original box refreshed to sell on, or leave as is (It was in perfect working order) to keep as a spare.

The shifter looks a little out of place at the mo, but im hoping that it will look more at home with the Recaros and steering wheel fitted soon smile.gif
 
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So one of the things I noticed was that my shifter was very stiff to operate and didn’t self centre as per the OEM shifter. This made the drive feel very solid. But the shift always felt a bit vague in location as you was never 100% sure in you location across the gate. It was lovely at low speeds but felt afraid to push on because you lacked confidence in the gear location.
My particular shifter used the earlier revision of bearing with a stiff PTFE liner. So today I dropped the linkage out to swap to the latest revision of steel bearing without liner. It spins very freely and allows the shifter to centre and feel completely free.
Getting up the tower from the underside with some circlip pliers was fun but not as much agro as I first thought.
The downside with the new bearing is I now have the god awful PMS rattle. The shifter buzzes at all different frequencies in all gears.
So now I’m at a quandary as to if I should revert to the PTFE bearing??

My other job for this afternoon was to swap out the steering rack bushes for some Poweflex items. The originals were still pretty much mint even after 120k so was dubious as to if the new ones would feel any different. I’m pressed to say they do appear to have made the way the car changes direction a little sharper
My other job for this afternoon was to swap out the steering rack bushes for some Poweflex items. The originals were still pretty much mint even after 120k so was dubious as to if the new ones would feel any different. I’m pleased to say they do appear to have made the way the car changes direction a little sharper. D2DF8D00-9E06-41F6-B73D-C8445B22EAFE.jpeg977F33CF-7420-4ACE-9ACE-BCE41E9B7586.jpeg6000AB94-16AA-4BF1-866C-CB6E77A9BED2.jpegA4882FFD-B13C-4D68-AA21-B5E45B8FD16E.jpeg
 
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As part of my suspension refurb last year I also purchased the Powerflex steering rack bushes but have not as yet fitted them as it looked tricky to say the least to effect the change.

Can you share your experiences of fitting these and give me a few pointers about technique, tools and the time it took?

My Trophy has done 107k miles but it seems from your comments that there is really not much benefit to be gained from the bush change.

Finally in loosening off the rack from the subframe did you feel is necessary to have the front suspension geometry re-checked?

Would appreciate any information you feel able to share on this matter.
 
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As part of my suspension refurb last year I also purchased the Powerflex steering rack bushes but have not as yet fitted them as it looked tricky to say the least to effect the change.

Can you share your experiences of fitting these and give me a few pointers about technique, tools and the time it took?

My Trophy has done 107k miles but it seems from your comments that there is really not much benefit to be gained from the bush change.

Finally in loosening off the rack from the subframe did you feel is necessary to have the front suspension geometry re-checked?

Would appreciate any information you feel able to share on this matter.

They're not the simplest if you haven't done them before but certainly not hard. The main issue is access.
I hadn't don't a set before and took me about an hour, maybe just over.

The rack clamps have fingers that captively hold the lower M10 nuts, so in order to undo these you undo the 17mm headed bolts through a hole in the rear of the subframe.
The upper clamp fixings are 13mm and have the hose support mounts fixed to them. Remove the two 13mm nuts to take the hose mounts off, and then the two 13mm actual clamp fixings. The NS upper fixing is more accessible if you take the NS wheel off too.
Ideally you would also undo the UJ fixing to the steering column but personally i didn't bother as i could slide the old bushes out and new ones in without touching the UJ. Make sure you keep the rack in alignment when sliding the new bushes in as it makes it far simpler, you simply wont get them back in if the rack isn't level.

You'll want a good selection of sockets and extensions with a UJ and wobble drives if possible, and some decent ratchet spanners as that makes life a lot simpler.
As for Geo re-checking, no i didn't as frankly its not a big enough alteration. I've got inner and outer track rod ends to do along with lower arm replacements, so i'll get her Geo done thereafter.

As for their performance, i think they have made a small but noticeable difference and i'm pleased i swapped them out.
 
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They're not the simplest if you haven't done them before but certainly not hard. The main issue is access.
I hadn't don't a set before and took me about an hour, maybe just over.

The rack clamps have fingers that captively hold the lower M10 nuts, so in order to undo these you undo the 17mm headed bolts through a hole in the rear of the subframe.
The upper clamp fixings are 13mm and have the hose support mounts fixed to them. Remove the two 13mm nuts to take the hose mounts off, and then the two 13mm actual clamp fixings. The NS upper fixing is more accessible if you take the NS wheel off too.
Ideally you would also undo the UJ fixing to the steering column but personally i didn't bother as i could slide the old bushes out and new ones in without touching the UJ. Make sure you keep the rack in alignment when sliding the new bushes in as it makes it far simpler, you simply wont get them back in if the rack isn't level.

You'll want a good selection of sockets and extensions with a UJ and wobble drives if possible, and some decent ratchet spanners as that makes life a lot simpler.
As for Geo re-checking, no i didn't as frankly its not a big enough alteration. I've got inner and outer track rod ends to do along with lower arm replacements, so i'll get her Geo done thereafter.

As for their performance, i think they have made a small but noticeable difference and i'm pleased i swapped them out.
Thank you for taking the time and trouble to provide such a detailed explanation. It is much appreciated. Hopefully others will find the information useful as well.

I will take note of all that you have said and will attempt this at the first sign of tolerable weather as I have to do the job outside on the drive!

Thanks again. ??
 
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