What goes WRONG with a used Renault Clio RS? Should you buy one?

Mmmm….rare miss on the research on this one Jim and Adam. In 35 years of owning multiple performance cars ( and meticulously maintaining them) this is the only car I’ve ever had to do a gearbox repair on. And I did it twice in six years. Original 3rd and 4th gear synchros were steel with a coating on them. The coating wears off. Yes you can drive around it by rev matching up and down and taking 1 second to change gears, but wtf? Who takes that long to change gears in a performance car? I’m not driving a truck!
Ok, gearboxes. Bulletproof apart from 3rd and 4th synchros. 5th and 6th are the same size and are brass. When rebuilding, replace both the synchros and the synchro hub for 3rd and 4th with 5th/6th brass parts when you replace them. Don’t try to get originals because Renault no longer make them and they are rubbish. If you skimp and replace synchros only you’ll be back in there in 20000kms. Do both synchros and synchro hubs and you’ll get 50000 to 80000kms out of the gearbox synchros. And learn how to pull the gearbox out and replace it. That will save you 2k or more each time. Get a professional rebuilder to rebuild it and buy the parts for them from a quality supplier in France or England (eg Pure Motorsport). Most gearbox rebuilders in Oz have no idea and will get stumped by lack of availability or worse buy Chinese cheese parts that are even worse than the original French ones.
Ok rant over. The cars are huge fun to drive. Despite the gearbox issues, if you’re handy they are still a cheap car to own and maintain. Front wheel bearings need replacing every 30000 to 40000kms but are very easy and quick to replace. If you live regionally and occasionally have to drive on gravel, the front bushes on the alloy control arms also need semi frequent replacement too. But again, very quick and easy to replace. Front suspension is completely different to the cheap versions. Full of cast alloy and if you’ve ever seen a Ford Revo knuckle or a Type R front end, it’s very very similar. Kind of isolates suspension movements and steering input. Also stiffens the suspension as you compress and extend with some ingenious usage of extra linkages. Remember this when you pull it out.
Engines are bulletproof. Put a pod on and it noticeably decreases performance but makes it sound cool and increases the fun factor. Valve covers leak oil but again very easy to repair. Rear engine mounts last 50000km but again really easy to replace.
Interiors are rattle cans on anything but smooth bitumen but…who cares.
I sold mine with a fresh gearbox for 8k six months ago….to the original owner. It depreciated by less than $500 a year. Cheap and fun motoring. I do most things myself so maintenance costs were less than 1k a year. But I was also quoted 5 to 6k to rebuild the gearbox from scratch (pull out, diagnose, rebuild, replace). Do most things yourself (except the actual rebuild) and it’s a <2k job.
If you are mechanically handy and don’t mind researching and getting your parts from Europe, yep it’s a good cheap car to have as a second vehicle. If you are not, it’s not BMW or VW or Mercedes bad, but will still drain your bank account. Stay well away.

I bought the ange&demon version 5 years ago and still love it

I have one, and they are such underrated cars. One of the best handling and fairly bulletproof if taken care of.

A "hot Clio".

Said no one ever.

If something ever happened to my 182, I would probably look for a MK3 in liquid yellow as per this review. Love these cars.

Love the MK3 Clio. Especially in the rare Alien Green. One of the last naturally aspirated hot hatches before everything went turbo. Anything NA after this car were warm hatches in comparison.

Keep it Jap all day even a N Hyundai is not a gamble This is ESPECIALLY used forget it.

I remember driving this when it came out and we had to decide between the clio or the megars265. The clio sounded great however the 5gears makes it loud when driving over 100kmh on highway. amazing through roundabouts but bloody hard suspension. We went with the Meg in the end because the Turbo power and the ride not so harsh

This video made me miss my 197 so much. Hands down, best car I’ve ever driven from a pure driving perspective.

I own an angel and demon and it is a brilliant little car that is able to put a smile on your face every time you take it out for a drive. I use it as my daily driver and it has been completing and utterly reliable in my 1 year of ownership so far. Couldn't recommend this little nugget enough :)

Would an mx5 gearbox fix the problem. 🤔

Jim said its a ' pretty ' car.

This generation of Clio, regardless of engines, is probably one of the most reliable European car ever made. It's brilliant

Is it more fun than a GR Yaris?

I owned one may years ago. They're far more Reliable because they where built by Renault Sport on there own production line and on a different chassis and not by the Communists on the ordinary Clio

Renault Sport reigned supreme.I owned a Renault Megane RS Cup 250 for 9 years and put over 200 000km on it. It was always an occasion to drive it. The speakers and infotainment system was bullcrap. The RS Monitor was fun but one should not look at a RS Monitor when you are pushing on. Changing throttle mapping was lovely.

I have one i use as a track car, had it almost 10 years now, I've kept on top of maintenance, and other than an o2 sensor and a fuel tank evap module its needed nothing. Very solid well built car.

I don't agree with your statement about the plastics in the interior. Trat unit has smooth plastic in the dashboard. In 2005 was the best b segment car.

There are a few things to point out:

1) The gearboxes are straight up bad, there’s no ifs or buts. My 200 is on 60k miles and 4th gear synchro is completely gone, I’ve heard of people getting their boxes replaced under warranty at as low as 30k miles.

2) Another big issue on these cars is the manifold flexis, they WILL start to tear themselves apart. Add the fact that Renault in their infinite wisdom made it so you can’t replace the manifold without dropping the front subframe and it becomes a pain in the ass. The main culprit for this is quickly deteriorating engine mounts causing excess movement.

3) The interior may mostly be quite resilient, but infamously the gear knob and the steering wheel literally start to fall apart, and they will melt in the sun. Changing a wheel is easy but the gear knob is press fit on and needs to be either hacksawed off or attacked with a heat gun for many minutes. Again, Renault for you.

4) Finally, they’re also notorious for going through ball joints and wheel bearings like no tomorrow, and because Renault added some fancy suspension knuckle things to the car to improve handling and reduce torque steer, if these go wrong it’s insanely expensive.

However, even after all of this, they’re brilliant cars with extremely reliable engines and the handling is just incredible. Would recommend.

Now thats a cool looking Autozam

i had a megane for 10 years, the love for these Renaults seem to be one of passion.. indeed - I've owned 30 cars, and the renault was my fav. (only sold to buy a house)

put a megane rs engine in it perfect。。。。。if you can DIY. do a mid-engine conversion even greater

one of the finest hot hatches to come out in the past 25 years

Great hot hatches. Much better choice over a Hyundai.

I had the Clio IV RS and hands down the best car I owned. It was written off in a major hailstorm and by then Renault had stopped selling them here.

Give that AUTOZAM a review

My 197 was quite unreliable, just has loads of things that go wrong commonly, exhaust flexi's, starter motors, windscreen wiper arms seize and break the motor, rear light seals means the boot can fill up with water, and eventually mine spun a crankshaft bearing and killed itself. 200's are a little more reliable but most of these faults are the same on the 200 2.0 NA

Never ever lower a Clio Sport, or a Megane one.

The suspension in these is as close to perfect out of the box as you’ll get, and any lowering is a step backwards for handling.

I bought on that low end of the price range, and even with all the faults in this video, it put a smile on my face. The quote to fix the gearbox didn't, so it's getting a Megane 265 drivetrain swap. It's still in the shed and in pieces but still love it and can't wait until it's back on the road.

Omg, STOP sitting on the outer bolster of other ppl cars!!!

The crew at Auto Paris are awesome. They took great care of my Peugeot and Citroen.

I’m in the UK and have a mint, unmodified (except some poly mounts to protect the manifold flexis), low mileage RS200 in Liquid Yellow. Cup pack, spoiler, Recaros, Speedline wheels, black roof, electric folding mirrors. Great fun; it’s a keeper.

Got a run of the mill, very utilitarian mk1 Clio from 92, still carbureted. Previous owners took good care of it, literally been only doing regular maintenance and fuel and that's it.
Nothing to do with this car or video I know but, some people on the comments forgot that Renault was always very reliable, specially with petrol engines. There's a reason why Mercedes got engines from there for a good while.



I'm not speaking of the first gen 1.5dci (k9k-7xx) those engines were just awful 😅

After a 15 year hiatus from the car scene, my mate told me to look at one of these (for track use). Had never even seen or heard about them. Got a mint 200 AGP Edition & did the usual mods. I absolutely loved it & it never missed a beat for the few years I owned it. It was a stepping stone for the car I really wanted though, but I wish I could have kept the Clio too. I ended up getting the car I 'really' wanted, but now also have a Clio 182 for thrashing around... Cool cars & good to have something different than the Honda's/Toyota's etc.

These cars are amazing - particularly the front end handling. I had a 197 from 2010 and replaced with a Redbulll RS200 when 197 was written off from a rear end accident. I will never sell the Redbull. I have an FL5 and a manual 987.2 Boxster, they will get moved on first if need be! Buy one while you still can. Have also had GT3's, GT4 and 991.2GT3RS, and the Clio is more fun than all of these around town.

I've owned a Clio 197 and even to today, it is one of the best steering feel and gearbox ratio equipped cars I've felt! That said, the 3rd synchro wasn't cared for and it did crunch on quick shifts that aren't rev-matched. That said, I don't know about Sydney but parts are IMPOSSIBLE to find locally and otherwise still are quite expensive - although they are easy to work on. I ended up selling mine because of the gearbox and how unavailable and overpriced parts were. That and it had a similar feeling to Hondas; it feels fast and makes all the right noises and feelings, but it's quite a heavy car for what it is and you actually aren't going as fast as it feels. Although, these take track days a lot more neutrally than some other cars even with a similar macpherson/fixed beam rear axle.

I owned one of these. Great fun. But that gearbox. Nope. Just cant handle the engine. Lunched one myself. I had a mate with one who got through 3 gearboxes!

I would like to have 2 of these ... one in yellow .. other in green :D those colours are just perfect!

Adored my 197 and can thoroughly attest to the paint rubbing off the steering wheel (but how good is that little red stitch!) as well as the side bolsters on even the standard seats eventually wearing through. I thought the cabin plastics were OK for the time (not a fan of the big silver bit in the middle, but the dash top is pleasingly squishy) and I personally LOVE the little Renault audio control pod behind the steering wheel - once you're used to it, controlling the stereo this way becomes second nature. Mine was in a nasty hail storm and took ages for certain parts to come - their rarity means you can't just walk into an Autobarn and grab all the parts you might need. Mine was perfectly reliable.
But then you take it on a mountain pass, and it's just so chuckable - the short wheelbase loves to rotate, and sure you sit up a bit, and there were a couple of times I wished for a bit more power or torque (but that's why the Megane exists, right?) but for what's almost a Q car (certainly my first gen 197 looked...like a little hatchback) there's not much in the same league.

Mines at 155000 kms (2012 car) and it's been in general utterly reliable. Not once broken down. The drivers Recaro is on it's 3rd retrim as the side bolsters keep wearing. The dash LCD display can flicker or turn off but it's very simple to pull the dash out and re-seat the connector. I'm 195cm and i have no issue fitting into the car, just got to watch your man bits getting in and over the side bolsters. The headlight covers are starting to yellow but the paint is in mint condition. I don't have any intention of selling this car, i love it.

had two 172 bought 1500 and 1300 $due to BCU and gearbox issues (cannot downshift 3rd to 2nd). I changed the BCU on one with a second hand from UK, and replace the oil in the gearbox of the second one. it took 2 more service to have the synchro corrected but at the end it worked without changing the gear box the car is still running 6 years later after 20 good track day on top. Both car got coilover upgrades and they were track weapon and fun daily. I never open the engine and did change the coilpack on one. you did not talk about it, but on one of them, i had to change the body throttle... bought few second hand and had to play with them until i found one which synch nicely with the ECU response. CV boots are a consumable, had to change every 2y due to track use. I love these cars on the track so much. I cannot count the number of time porsche owners came to me at the end of a track day to check it.
Note, i strongly advise the upgrade the bushes with powerflex full kit (gearbox mount insert included!).

I had one of these as a daily driver for many years, such a fun little car and I never had one single issue with it

I have a 197 RS. I would say you covered most of it pretty well apart from a couple of things:

1. The gearbox synchro issues maybe are driver error in some cases, but not all. For example, the gearbox was not necessarily made to handle the amount of revs delivered by the engine so if you change into 4th at red line, you will smell it no matter how accurate and delicate that change was. The gearbox straight up sucks when its cold and it lunches and tries to bunny hop you like a 15 year old learning how to drive. Thankfully that goes away after just a minute or two so you learn how to avoid it with a bit of strategic coasting

2. The storage capacity with the rear seats down is insane. It's basically a van. I've put the front seat forward and had a 1.8m tv cabinet in the car. A carseat can fit in the back seats no problem. It is truly magnificent. Also the amount of glass is like being in a fishbowl where you can see everything everywhere and reversing with the arm behind passenger seat is super easy.

3. The fuel economy is way better than you think. It doesn't even seem to use much more when driving it to the max.

The main thing I would say is that this car is two vehicles in one. It behaves like a practical and economical quiet little run about under 3k revs and is effortless to drive. On a back road with 4-8k revs it is a legitimate weapon. Very fast, very loud and changes direction on a dime. Poisoned, balanced and dances around corners better than almost anything.

Incredible value for money and pure fun

Immaculate first gen Rav behind Jim.

These french interior plastics are just some really high quality romanian dragon skin, if you don't believe me, look at its texture... Its obviously some type of skin... actually joking, have owned some Dacias (they are a renault lead brand with romanian origin), and their interiors are the same, even sometimes worse, but they get the job done as cars.

Ok so one of these Cleo's or an FN2R Civic Type R?

Howdy,

Great review, just letting you know the link to the cheat sheet is missing in your video description :).

I've owned several RS Megane models, 225, 250 cup trophee and now a 197 Clio. I do all the work on the car's myself, they are a bit shit to work on, as nothing is simple and parts arent easy to get in Aus. Order from the UK. There's Ktec Kam Racing and Pure Motorsport that suppluy plenty of parts. There's good information on the forums, and video's from the UK ect, and the clio is a bit easier to work on than the megane's. Plenty of upgrades, i've just finished prepping my 197 for the track - refreshed all my suspension components, spherical bearings instead of rubber bushes in the arms, hard mounted the gearbox and engine (does vibrate a bit) Oz Racing Superleggera rim's with Nankang AR1's and a set of Bilstein Coilovers with Silver Project adjustable strut tops & she handles beautifully. Definitely check the drain's, as my strut top bolts were badly rusted and difficult to remove. Overall, I dont think there's many car's that can handle as well as a Clio. Civic' R prices keep climbing and RS seem to be holiding steady especially 182's.

Hey Jim..
I wanna bring my car in for a comprehensive check..
I'm guessing you're in Newcastle..
What's ya waiting times like..