Renaulsport Ownership Experience?
Discussion
Hi everybody.
I'm totally new to Pistonheads and a bit overwhelmed by the number of forums on here so please accept my apologies if I've posted this in the wrong place or if this is asked a lot.
I currently own a 2009 Civic Type R which I really like. Lately though the monthly HP payment is starting to look crazy as we recently had a baby and are hoping to save to move house later this year.
I'm looking for a car with similar performance, practicality and running costs but maybe a year or two older than the Civic so I can reduce my loan to around £8-10k and therefore reduce my HP payments. Two cars I am very interested in are the Clio 197 and the Megane 230 R26. These seem to fit the bill perfectly but I've heard polar opposite ownership experiences for both cars. I'll be using the car daily for work so I need it to be reliable and some of the tales I've heard suggest I should run a mile from either of the Renaults.
I'd be really keen to hear people's experiences of these cars. Petrol, tyres, road tax, insurance and servicing all seem to be roughly the same as the Civic but buying an older car has me a bit nervous in case it ends up as a money pit.
Any info at all would be great.
Thanks in advance.
Andy
I'm totally new to Pistonheads and a bit overwhelmed by the number of forums on here so please accept my apologies if I've posted this in the wrong place or if this is asked a lot.
I currently own a 2009 Civic Type R which I really like. Lately though the monthly HP payment is starting to look crazy as we recently had a baby and are hoping to save to move house later this year.
I'm looking for a car with similar performance, practicality and running costs but maybe a year or two older than the Civic so I can reduce my loan to around £8-10k and therefore reduce my HP payments. Two cars I am very interested in are the Clio 197 and the Megane 230 R26. These seem to fit the bill perfectly but I've heard polar opposite ownership experiences for both cars. I'll be using the car daily for work so I need it to be reliable and some of the tales I've heard suggest I should run a mile from either of the Renaults.
I'd be really keen to hear people's experiences of these cars. Petrol, tyres, road tax, insurance and servicing all seem to be roughly the same as the Civic but buying an older car has me a bit nervous in case it ends up as a money pit.
Any info at all would be great.
Thanks in advance.
Andy
Hi andy, pop across to French Bread and ask the question there, I would say. Some great knowledge and whilst there will be a bit of bias, you will get some honest views.Great cars.French-but still great.
Surprised your thread hasn't been bumped over there already! But then, it is early and 'they' are probably still all tucked up in bed!
Surprised your thread hasn't been bumped over there already! But then, it is early and 'they' are probably still all tucked up in bed!
Had a few Renaults, though only a 172 in the RS range.
TBH the number of times things went wrong just put me off in the end.
Every month there was something else to sort out.
Plus Renault aftercare is dire, I was told when I pointed out our Scenic A/C wasnt working (still under warranty - due for 1st service) if they didnt find a leak we would be charged for the re-gas!
At that point I decided I'd had enough and wont buy another Renault ever.
TBH the number of times things went wrong just put me off in the end.
Every month there was something else to sort out.
Plus Renault aftercare is dire, I was told when I pointed out our Scenic A/C wasnt working (still under warranty - due for 1st service) if they didnt find a leak we would be charged for the re-gas!
At that point I decided I'd had enough and wont buy another Renault ever.
Hi Andy
I have had a Clio 197 until not that long ago with the cup pack on it. In a year and half of ownership I never had to do anymore than service it and the usual checks. A very competent car around the twisties. One thing I will say about the 197 is the fuel economy is rubbish. Even on the motorway at a constant 70 I was lucky if I was getting high 20's 30mpg at a push. I have also had a Megane Trophy (Not quite the same as an R26 but reasonably close). One of the best cars I have owned really regret selling it). Quick car excellent handling surprisingly good fuel economy mid 30's on the motorway well equipped. An R26 which is even better would be my choice of the 2 both for economy and fun although thats not say the cclio is a bad car in anyway.
Also Andy its seems that the renaultsport cars are actually better built than the mainstream cars as well. So dont base your decision on mainstream renaults.
Loader
I have had a Clio 197 until not that long ago with the cup pack on it. In a year and half of ownership I never had to do anymore than service it and the usual checks. A very competent car around the twisties. One thing I will say about the 197 is the fuel economy is rubbish. Even on the motorway at a constant 70 I was lucky if I was getting high 20's 30mpg at a push. I have also had a Megane Trophy (Not quite the same as an R26 but reasonably close). One of the best cars I have owned really regret selling it). Quick car excellent handling surprisingly good fuel economy mid 30's on the motorway well equipped. An R26 which is even better would be my choice of the 2 both for economy and fun although thats not say the cclio is a bad car in anyway.
Also Andy its seems that the renaultsport cars are actually better built than the mainstream cars as well. So dont base your decision on mainstream renaults.
Loader
+1.
Reliability is generally better on the renaultsport models, they are built in a different factory (dieppe the old alpine factory) and in my experience to a greater standard.
I would go for the R26 out of the two. The clio 197 is a great car but the engine is a bit buzzy which is annoying on at 70mph+ when your cruising on the motorway, even on the later cars with the extended 6th gear.
R26 is a fair bit quicker and day to day will probaly more economical as you don't have to thrash it go fast.
I had a couple of 197's and used to drive like my pants where on fire everywhere - that's how it seemed to want to be driven. The R26 is a bit more laid back and to me didn't seem to beg to be ragged however its still up for it when the mood takes you is and bloody quick cross country.
That said you're coming out of a CTR (and associated power delivery) so try both and see what you think, both are good hot hatches which will put a smile on your face it just depends on how you like to get your kicks.
ETA: Try the boot out aswell for your baby gear, the megane is a bit of a funny shape so the clio might be better for prams etc
Reliability is generally better on the renaultsport models, they are built in a different factory (dieppe the old alpine factory) and in my experience to a greater standard.
I would go for the R26 out of the two. The clio 197 is a great car but the engine is a bit buzzy which is annoying on at 70mph+ when your cruising on the motorway, even on the later cars with the extended 6th gear.
R26 is a fair bit quicker and day to day will probaly more economical as you don't have to thrash it go fast.
I had a couple of 197's and used to drive like my pants where on fire everywhere - that's how it seemed to want to be driven. The R26 is a bit more laid back and to me didn't seem to beg to be ragged however its still up for it when the mood takes you is and bloody quick cross country.
That said you're coming out of a CTR (and associated power delivery) so try both and see what you think, both are good hot hatches which will put a smile on your face it just depends on how you like to get your kicks.
ETA: Try the boot out aswell for your baby gear, the megane is a bit of a funny shape so the clio might be better for prams etc
Edited by waterwonder on Friday 4th February 08:42
With these feet said:
Plus Renault aftercare is dire, I was told when I pointed out our Scenic A/C wasnt working (still under warranty - due for 1st service) if they didnt find a leak we would be charged for the re-gas!
At that point I decided I'd had enough and wont buy another Renault ever.
Surely if there is no leak and no gas in the system a regas should be done? Why should the manufacturer pay? It is considered a maintenance cost. At a guess I would say your car was 2yrs old at this point?At that point I decided I'd had enough and wont buy another Renault ever.
Ive had a EP3 type r and an r26. I thoughtt he EP3 was much better even though it was slower than the R26. Why not get an EP3?
The r26 is fast and prodcues decent fuel economy but I found the engine note dull, power delivery unsatisfying, driving position high and the rattles drove me crazy. Lost a fortune in deprection too.
I would go for the clio or an EP3 if you like revvy engines.
Andy
The r26 is fast and prodcues decent fuel economy but I found the engine note dull, power delivery unsatisfying, driving position high and the rattles drove me crazy. Lost a fortune in deprection too.
I would go for the clio or an EP3 if you like revvy engines.
Andy
Had a 182, loved every minute of it! proved quite reliable. The only things needed in 16 months were a lambda senor - very common on these cars and an exhaust gasket which was covered under warranty.
Beware of Renault dealers though! Pretty much useless and charge the earth when they can be bothered to do anything for you. My local dealer wanted over £600 for the 36K service! I ended up getting a subaru specialst to do it for just over £300 including accessory belts, an MOT, tyre rotation and a courtesy car.
As a daily driver, they are very easy to live with unless you need space, in which case go for the Megane. The Clio is fairly small inside with a boot which is smaller than most glove boxes!
Beware of Renault dealers though! Pretty much useless and charge the earth when they can be bothered to do anything for you. My local dealer wanted over £600 for the 36K service! I ended up getting a subaru specialst to do it for just over £300 including accessory belts, an MOT, tyre rotation and a courtesy car.
As a daily driver, they are very easy to live with unless you need space, in which case go for the Megane. The Clio is fairly small inside with a boot which is smaller than most glove boxes!
Thanks for all the quick replies folks. Really appreciate your comments.
I am booked to go and drive an R26 tomorrow so that will help some of the decision making. I heard the exact same comments from another guy who said the fuel economy of the Megane was much better than the Clio which is the opposite to what I expected.
I'm also hoping to drive a 197 F1 and a Fiesta ST. The Fiesta is on the list as a "safer" and cheaper bet but from reading up it's not quite the same type of car maybe.
My wife owned an 07 Clio 1.4 which I hated and the local dealer was unbelievably bad to deal with on anything at all (even run of the mill stuff) so this is also a worry I have. She now has a new Astra SRI so baby gear goes in it most of the yime but it woild still be good to have the option of using either car for family trips. On the basis of the local dealer, I would plan to get it serviced elsewhere though but it's reassuring that the Renaultsports are built separately to the main models.
I have considered the EP3 also so will hunt about at those too but fancy at least driving the Renaults as a starter and think I might prefer the turbo charged delivery as a change despite my biking background meaning I love revs!
Thanks everyone.
Andy
I am booked to go and drive an R26 tomorrow so that will help some of the decision making. I heard the exact same comments from another guy who said the fuel economy of the Megane was much better than the Clio which is the opposite to what I expected.
I'm also hoping to drive a 197 F1 and a Fiesta ST. The Fiesta is on the list as a "safer" and cheaper bet but from reading up it's not quite the same type of car maybe.
My wife owned an 07 Clio 1.4 which I hated and the local dealer was unbelievably bad to deal with on anything at all (even run of the mill stuff) so this is also a worry I have. She now has a new Astra SRI so baby gear goes in it most of the yime but it woild still be good to have the option of using either car for family trips. On the basis of the local dealer, I would plan to get it serviced elsewhere though but it's reassuring that the Renaultsports are built separately to the main models.
I have considered the EP3 also so will hunt about at those too but fancy at least driving the Renaults as a starter and think I might prefer the turbo charged delivery as a change despite my biking background meaning I love revs!
Thanks everyone.
Andy
Edited by andyp79 on Friday 4th February 09:11
Edited by andyp79 on Friday 4th February 09:12
I've owned a clio 182 in the past and currently own a Megane R26 230 F1 Team. I've had nothing fail on me so far, build quality is very good, very quiet car inside (good thing or bad thing you decide). Overall very happy with it other than fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get > 20 mpg. Thats with a mixture of day to day usage (motorways, rush hour, sensible driving, enthusiastic driving). Only other thing to watch is your speed, because its that quiet you can quite easily find yourself doing xxx leptons without realising it, an easy license loser.
Boot size is very good and can easily accomodate our fairly large push chair and a decent size weekly shop, far far better than the missus' Clio boot.
Boot size is very good and can easily accomodate our fairly large push chair and a decent size weekly shop, far far better than the missus' Clio boot.
I wouldn't rave about the fuel economy too much, my R26 returned 21mpg for the last tank and this tank its showing 23mpg so not exactly frugal but driving around Milton Keynes never is.
Then again I've only had it a few weeks so am probably playing with it more than I would if I'd have had it a while!
Then again I've only had it a few weeks so am probably playing with it more than I would if I'd have had it a while!
I've had:
2 clio 1.2's (phase 2)
A Clio 1.4 (phase 3 - newest shape)
I now have a 182 and a 172
My dad has a 1.5 DCI
My sister has had 2 Clio 1.2's
Not once have we had any major problems with any of the cars! Worst was the alternater bearings going on my dads diesel (it had 60k on the clock and was a driving school car)
So I personally feel the whole french car reliability thing that everyone goes on about is a thing of the past, particularly with Renault! This is only my experience but with the amount of Clios i see on the road I can't see them being that unreliable.
2 clio 1.2's (phase 2)
A Clio 1.4 (phase 3 - newest shape)
I now have a 182 and a 172
My dad has a 1.5 DCI
My sister has had 2 Clio 1.2's
Not once have we had any major problems with any of the cars! Worst was the alternater bearings going on my dads diesel (it had 60k on the clock and was a driving school car)
So I personally feel the whole french car reliability thing that everyone goes on about is a thing of the past, particularly with Renault! This is only my experience but with the amount of Clios i see on the road I can't see them being that unreliable.
R26Andy said:
Wow, I was getting 30mpg average in mixed driving over 6 months in my R26. I dont exactly hang about either.
Really??? I filled up recently and reset the computer in order to see what mpg I could achieve. Driving very very lightly, free wheeling wherever possible, hardly touching the accelerator with a feather, I could manage around 25 ish. The minute I got the slightest bit heavy on the loud pedal, and I'm only talking pulling away from lights at the same speed as other traffic, it dropped down down to 22/23. The very minute I got bored and gave it beans it was back down to 20 or so.
I get 28-31mpg from the Civic but it's got quite a small tank so I'm forever filling it up.
I only used to get 35mpg from my old 100bhp 1.6 Focus so the Civic isn't much worse. Not sure I could live with low 20s though as this would be my daily car.
Will see how I get on driving one tomorrow!
Andy
I only used to get 35mpg from my old 100bhp 1.6 Focus so the Civic isn't much worse. Not sure I could live with low 20s though as this would be my daily car.
Will see how I get on driving one tomorrow!
Andy
SeanyD, Thats sounds pretty poor even for winter. I was leaving mine running on the drive for 10minutes while I scraped the window and it only dropped to around 27mpg.
I done a similar experiment to you on a trip upto Scotland and when I arrived the trip computer was showing 40mpg!
If your not already a member I would get over to the meganesport.net forum and have a look around at what other people are getting. 27-33mpg seems to be the norm.
I done a similar experiment to you on a trip upto Scotland and when I arrived the trip computer was showing 40mpg!
If your not already a member I would get over to the meganesport.net forum and have a look around at what other people are getting. 27-33mpg seems to be the norm.
(Sorry for the thread hijack o/p but I guess it is relevent)
R26Andy, yeah on megane sport already, one of the causes could be my lack of decent motorway stretches. I do a short 5 mile bumper to bumper crawl into a city centre office, same on an evening, car is probably still warming up by the time I arrive. I do the odd short stretch of motorway but probably not enough to influence the figures greatly. To be fair I should probably repeat my test on a weekend.
Just dug out the mpg thread on meganesport, and seems like its the roads thats doing it, others reporting the same, a low 20 ish for urban driving, 25-30 ish for a mixture, and 30-35 ish mostly motorway. The odd person reporting as low as 16, and the odd person reporting as high as 40, so I think I'm 'normal' as it were.
o/p if my figures put you off, feel free to take with a pinch of salt, or assume actual figures will be somewhere between my worst case scenario and R26Andys best case scenario.
(Good thread by the way
)
(Edited to add the megansport findings.)
R26Andy, yeah on megane sport already, one of the causes could be my lack of decent motorway stretches. I do a short 5 mile bumper to bumper crawl into a city centre office, same on an evening, car is probably still warming up by the time I arrive. I do the odd short stretch of motorway but probably not enough to influence the figures greatly. To be fair I should probably repeat my test on a weekend.
Just dug out the mpg thread on meganesport, and seems like its the roads thats doing it, others reporting the same, a low 20 ish for urban driving, 25-30 ish for a mixture, and 30-35 ish mostly motorway. The odd person reporting as low as 16, and the odd person reporting as high as 40, so I think I'm 'normal' as it were.
o/p if my figures put you off, feel free to take with a pinch of salt, or assume actual figures will be somewhere between my worst case scenario and R26Andys best case scenario.
(Good thread by the way
)(Edited to add the megansport findings.)
Edited by SeanyD on Friday 4th February 14:13
This is all really useful stuff! Thanks.
Sounds to me like the mpg will be the same (as near as dammit) as the Civic and the cost to change works out that I would save a lot on my monthly HP payment so this is all going the right direction for what I am trying to do - which is save money without going too extreme and going for a sensible car that I'll just forget about.
My main worry is still reliability as Mrs. P's uncle had an 04 Megane 225 and when I asked him about his experience he was on the phone for ages saying what went wrong, what annoyed him, what broke etc. I've spoken to other owners of later cars that have loved them abnd had no issues at all so it could be Mrs. P's uncle got a bad one? I see from reading the likes of evo that the Meganes seem to have improved greatly after the slight facelift in around 2006(?) The one I'm looking at tomorrow is an 07 with 30k on it. What I am hoping to do is buy a 57/08 plate with around 20k on it for a similar price to this one.
But it all depends on me driving it and the harshness of the suspension etc. and whether I can convince myself it'll be reliable. The Honda hasn't been problem free despite their reputation and the build isn't as good as I thought it would be either so they sound fairly similar cars all told.
Andy
Sounds to me like the mpg will be the same (as near as dammit) as the Civic and the cost to change works out that I would save a lot on my monthly HP payment so this is all going the right direction for what I am trying to do - which is save money without going too extreme and going for a sensible car that I'll just forget about.
My main worry is still reliability as Mrs. P's uncle had an 04 Megane 225 and when I asked him about his experience he was on the phone for ages saying what went wrong, what annoyed him, what broke etc. I've spoken to other owners of later cars that have loved them abnd had no issues at all so it could be Mrs. P's uncle got a bad one? I see from reading the likes of evo that the Meganes seem to have improved greatly after the slight facelift in around 2006(?) The one I'm looking at tomorrow is an 07 with 30k on it. What I am hoping to do is buy a 57/08 plate with around 20k on it for a similar price to this one.
But it all depends on me driving it and the harshness of the suspension etc. and whether I can convince myself it'll be reliable. The Honda hasn't been problem free despite their reputation and the build isn't as good as I thought it would be either so they sound fairly similar cars all told.
Andy
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