Introducing our new project!
I’m very happy to introduce the new Racefix project car… a 2005 Renault Sport Clio!
These little things have been on my radar for a couple of years now as I’ve always wanted to learn to drive fwd properly but the timing has never been right. This absolute belter popped up on Facebook earlier in the week, I went and had a look and a quick drive of it while realising just how bad the body was. Thankfully it drove great and it has some goodies already (which I’ll go into in more detail in a minute) and the price was right so it was good bones to start a project!
Why a Renault?
Well frankly Honda’s are just too expensive for what I want and I wanted to stick with something fairly light and NA to keep reliability high and the cost of consumables low. The little clios have a decent community so parts and help aren’t too far away!
So what’s the plan?
The plan is to just have some fun really. I’ll use the car to learn to drive bum draggers on the limit. Mrs Racefix will use the car to learn to drive on track and along the way it will help us create more content for racefix and show you don’t need to spend big dollars to have fun on track.
Where does this leave #project86?
The 86 is still my baby and THE track car. It’s on its way to being my dream build so it’s not going anywhere! We’ve got plenty of competitive events lined up in it this year aswell as really pushing the boundaries of what a naturally aspirated fa20 86 can do on a track. More on that soon.
Lets get to know #projectclio a little more. It’s a 2005 Renault Sport Clio 172 with a 2L 16v 4 banger that made 124Kw and 220Nm at the crank about 250,000kms ago. In saying that this one still feels pretty bloody strong. The body is certainly worse for wear and won’t be winning any concourse events but mechanically it has been pretty well looked after, not to mention a couple of tasteful mods including:
Ktec coilovers
Ktec intake
Hardened Engine mounts
Homemade bailer buckets to drain the inch of water I found in the footwell on day 2 of ownership 😅
Any planned mods?
First of all, a rule i’ve put in to place for this project is mods must be purchased second hand! Thankfully this one is already a great base for a trackday car so only a couple of planned upgrades so far based around drivability (as the standard seating position is pretty pathetic) so i’ll be putting the spare Velo seat in aswell as a Momo Monte Carlo wheel out of my old E36. I’ll also be finding the source of this water leak as I dont enjoy ponds at my feet while driving.
I’m really looking forward to this new car and I hope you’re all keen to come along for the ride for some lapping and laughs. I’ll be taking it out for it’s maiden trackday in my hands tomorrow at a Trackschool Trackday - keep your eyes peeled for my first video update from that!
More Photos!
