BXProject

cambelt went on my daughters 1.1 renault clio the other day,

she was doing 60 and being a girlie just carried on trying to keep it going until it died , Her step dad is thinking of getting it repaired .

I think its borderline wether or not its worth doing.

car has done 104,000 miles is a p or r reg iirc was mot'd and serviced last week and is probably worth £900 if mended.

He will be getting repairs done by a garage but will it be worth it ?


I reckon theres going to be a few bent valves in there at least so what are parts and labour for a top end rebuild and new cambelt going to be ?

( and thats if theres no piston damage )

No, no its not, but i would keep stum if some one else is willing to sort it out!

Given garage labour rates alone I would say bin the car.
An exchange donkey would be the cheaper option, but TBH, I would bin it and spend the money on something else.

oh shes got something else ,
A 1.6 zetec focus ( I Know ) but its a 2010 plate with just 2000 miles on the clock.
I think her stepdad thought it would just be a new cambelt and she would recover some of her money

There is only one option apart from the bin.

There are many good breakers around now. (I use Hills at Skem ex burscough).
A perfectly good lump for one of those probably with less miles will set you back £300 delivered.

Yeah, if the work is done DIY, but

mickey taker wrote:He will be getting repairs done by a garage

which means the 300 quid will be nearer 600 I'd expect...

that was my point Matt repairs would probably be between £400 and £600 they have been offerred £200 for the car as is so is it worth all that hassle for £100.00 difference I think not .

I dont think theres much chance of just the cambelt going at that speed on such a small engine but a garage would say they wouldnt know until they took the head off so incurring a labour bill anyway

The least damage I've ever seen when one has gone at that speed, was one holed piston, one cracked and 3 bent valves. Oh and a big hole in the cam belt casing.
So there is no chance of a simple repair realistically. Quite often the head cracks around the valve guides.

Is it a Clio I or a Clio II?
Upto 98 the 1.1 was the old CE1 700 engine that had a timing shain not a belt, and bar some bent rockers it'll most likely be fine.

From 98 it was the Clio II and the 1.1 was replaced by a 1.2 D7F engine that had a belt.
It's also an interference engine and the pistons are weak as fuck in these.
If it's the later D7F engine at it let go at 60 I'd be fucking amazed if it didn't have holed pistons, probably bent a rod or 2 and will have mangled most of the valve's.
Personally I'd bin the engine and replace it, especially since D7F's are readily available for less than £200, but again, if you're paying garage labour for fitting it may be best to bin the whole car or sell it for spres / repair.

Yes. It never ceases to amaze me how they can fuck a good thing up.
The very first belt operated cam drive in this country (on mass produced cars) was the Vauxhall slant 4 engine. It came in 1.6, 1.8, 2.0 and 2.3 all off the same block.
It was really 1/2 a GM V8 with a hemi head, but more importantly the forged pistons were machined away beneath the valves, so that should the belt fail the valves could never impact the piston. Good engineering? Then why dump it for inferior technology.....,beats me!!

Talking to me MOT man about this very thing last week. Different engine, but on a Megane, the very same job was £800. This was for removal and fitting of relevant parts to car, head test, skim, new valves, lapping etc. He'd had two identical failures within 2 weeks!

Philhod wrote:but more importantly the forged pistons were machined away beneath the valves, so that should the belt fail the valves could never impact the piston. Good engineering? Then why dump it for inferior technology.....,beats me!!

Isn't this to do with the performance improvements you get from going from long stroke low/mid compression to short stroke high compression engines?

Modern mapping makes this more or less irrelevant. Power to torque characteristics can be modified on a lap top anyway
The slant 4 motor was well under square actually, the 2 litre having a bore of 3.75 and a stroke of only 2.276.
This returned 104 BHP @5800, but as expected, only 115 lbs/ft of torque in standard form.

I never used mine for towing so never found the shortage of torque a problem.
I had the optional 4 speed g/box with O/D on third and 4th, operated by a slide switch on top of the gear knob.
The motor on mine had twin Zeniths, which were a pain in the arse, so I modified a single carb 4 branch inlet manifold, with a twin choke Weber on it. Slightly more power, less fuel used and a lot more reliable.
I was going to make my own out of stainless tube but building a water jacket for it was too much trouble. It needed one as the exhaust was on the other side making it a x flow. Predating Fords supposed first (pinto) by some 18 months.

Dad had a FE Victor with the slant 4 1.6 back when I was a nipper.
I loved that car, he gave it away