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Clio Trophy number 54 aka T.Turbo

Brigsy

Media Mogul. Instagram legend.
Morning all

We have purchased Trophy number 54 off Steve H back in December 2020.

Lots of detail from the previous owner on this thread on Cliosport.net started way back. Some of you may remember this clio from the RTOC days, posted by Speedy.


After several months of rebuilding and furthur modifications its now road legal again and a few of you might have seen it at CS Festival last weekend.

Sneak preview, have approx 200 hours of updates to come in due course ;)
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Current spec of the car to the best of my knowledge, as i had to put it together as part of a massive jigsaw puzzle.

Engine/Fuel system

Megane 250 block, custom J.E. forged pistons (around 8.3:1 with 197 head iirc, id need Steve to confirm).
Catcams conrods, balanced crank and rotating assembly. Block prepared by AMAC, including hone and decked to suit.
Arp hardware, head studs etc.

Ported 197 head done by AMAC in Northallerton, with larger Supertech valves, double valve springs (catcams?) and titanium retainers.

197 inlet cam, 182 exhaust cam using 197 vvt setup. Timing currently set to stock.

Custom Nortech inlet plenum with internal trumpets, centre fed Bosch motorsport DBW throttle. Inlet/head is dowelled to locate perfectly on the head.

Custom Nortech exhaust manifold to suit twin scroll turbo with 2x 38mm tial external wastegates for each pair of runners, venting back into the downpipe. Egt sensors per cylinder. Ceratec coated.

Garrett gtx3071 gen1 .82 twin scroll turbine housing. K&N air filter.

Intercooler/pipework is custom by Nortech, intercooler is bar and plate garrett core rated to 600hp iirc.

Direnza radiator, Mtc silicone hoses and 12" Comex high flow cfm fan. All shrouding fitted correctly to force air through rad and intercooler.

3" custom turbo back exhaust with 2x sliencers, 2.5" slash cut tips for discreet look. Possibly made by Btm/yozza would need to confirm.

Ecumaster black standalone ecu, on my own custom engine bay wiring harness. 980cc bosch motorsport long pintle injectors (flowmatched), running full sequential injection and 197 vvt on pwm so full scope of 40deg inlet advance available.

Audi R8 coilpacks and Ngk Bkr8eix plugs gapped to 0.7mm.

Egt per cylinder using Ecumaster egt to can module. Oil pressure/temp, fuel pressure/temp, wideband 02, dbw throttle and various other essential sensors all feeding back to the ecu. Mac valve plumbed in for boost control, 4x separate boost settings on potentiometer fitted in car via Ecumaster can switchboard for expansion.

Ecumaster edl1 data logger fitted in glovebox logging all ecu parameters onto sd card, and bluetooth, which displays all gauges via canbus on an android tablet or phone.

All connected up to the oem clio 250kb baudrate canbus syetem so oem dash works nice. No warning lights present, dash works as oem, stock engine ecu fully removed.

1.5ltr swirl pot fitted in boot with Bosch 044 fuel pump, sytec fuel filter, turbosmart fpr 1200 fuel pressure regulator.

-6an ptfe lines fitted front to back as return system, oem pump used for lift pump for swirl pot.

Battery relocated in boot using 50mm2 wiring from memory, maxi fuse fitted in boot, bulkhead connector and distribution block fitted in engine bay. Optima Redtop battery fitted in billet alloy tray.

Transmission/running gear

Megane r26 NDO box with gripper diff, oem megane 6 speed shifter and cables.

Clio v6 pedal box and reservior for meg hydraulic clutch.

Custom motorsport driveshafts for meg NDO to clio fit. (poss made by Dave Mac?) Made to flex under extreme conditions to take some strain off the transmission.

Ttv megane r26 smf flywheel, Helix 6 paddle clutch and pressure plate.

Vibratechnics engine mounts and custom dogbone torque mount made by Nortech.

Bilstein B14 coilovers.

Clio 2 epas conversion/column on looped 182 rack.

Whiteline rear arb.

Front subframe seam welded and powdercoated.

Track control arms fitted with PMS strengthening plates and powdercoated. Both tca's and arb polybushed with powerflex bushes.

Renaultsport steel sump guard powdercoated black.

Northloopcup roll correction kit. Front geo currently set at -2.5deg camber and 10 mins of toe out overall.

Wilwood jamsport 4 pot brake kit up front with Reyland 2 piece discs and Ferodo DS1:11 front pads, Motul RBF 600 fluid.

Larger diameter piston brake master cylinder for sharper pedal feel, and custom braided pipework to re route the bulkhead brake pipes away from the turbo whilst retaining abs, and pipework to suit hydraulic clutch.

Speedline 2118 wheels in anthracite, et43, Toyo R888R tyres.

Interior

Recaro CS leather/alcantara seats up front on Jon foz subframes. Mint unmarked 182 rear split seats.

Snappy retrimmed steering wheel.

Clio V6 pedals.

Alpine stereo, focal components and crossovers, small alpine amp discreetly mounted behind dash.

Bodywork

Stock trophy as intended, wind deflectors.

Current power output

Currently mapped by EfiParts to 349hp/300ft/lb at 14psi due to issue with fuelling system (fuel line resonance) but should go high 400s once sorted. Low boost with wastegate pressure of 8psi gives around 270hp. 20220605_175040.jpg20220605_175033.jpg

A couple of awesome pics took over the weekend many thanks for them.
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This is mega spec!!! Can’t believe you kept this under wraps for so long…. If it’s was mine I would’ve been running my mouth constantly 🤣 I was gunna enter the show and shine at CSF, Adey was egging me on to enter it but I thought this or that immaculate Renault18 was going to win 🤷🏼‍♂️
 
Thanks for the great feedback all. Its been a fair old job putting it together, especially as i had to build the engine wiring harness and everything is custom or needed a tweak from oem to fit right. Learnt so much along the way too which was great.

@CreweTube the pulley is for my efi converted Renault Extra van. Looks spot on too many thanks for removing and posting 👍
 
So lets get the ball rolling.

We are going back, way back from when i was a member of the Renault Turbo Owners Club forum (Rtoc) which was mostly for R5gtt's, i believe a few of you were members back in the day. This is where i first read about this Trophy, around 2008-09 iirc, Steve used to post as Speedy on there from memory. Its all a bit hazy but i recall his regular updates and improvements being posted, the car was running a forged engine, standalone ecu, log manifold with garrett gt series turbo, and made good power 330 ish then going up to 370ish.

I was more of a R5gtt fan at the time and just classed this as another modern car that i couldnt afford on limited wages, but appreciated the development and power it made, as it was leagues ahead of the shitey 1.4 turbo carburettor engines that i was working on and tuning. Injection looked like a black art to me and i was still of the oldskool carburettor tuning via screwdriver and drill bits for the jets.

A pic of the car from the early years, on the original turini's.

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Around that time the Rtoc national days were at Mallory park, i seen the car on them days and out on track. It can be seen in this pic on the left hand side, one car away from Extra van. Chris Blight's RB clio next to it iirc.


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Im sure i have a pic of it on track somewhere as i used to take my dslr to the track and snap a few pics back then. Id have never thought that a decade later, it would be sharing the same garage as my Extra van.

A few years go by and we had bought the meg 225, had flirted with buying a couple of nice 182's as they were on the radar. Turbo power was always preferred so the 225 took preference over n/a 182, which was my introduction to the modern Renaultsports and the F4R engine. Was frightened to get balls deep in it and got the cambelt done by a specialist, but was getting stuck in fixing the other bits, doing the swivel bearings etc.

Around 2015 i done a guide on replacing swivel bearings for the megane rs on TurboRenault as we had all moved over there. Steve had a megane r26 at that point and got in touch for info on how to do them. From then on we kept in touch and seen him at Croft, arranged local curry nights and the like. I then went on to purchase my orange clio dci in 2016 and the Kangoo 172 in 2017, so was always raiding his parts stash for bits to keep that going. Dci was a firm favourite and i was enjoying it, and thought a 172/182 would be a nice upgrade on the pov spec dci.

I had seen the Trophy sat in his garage looking awesome. The Red Rocket, aka T.Turbo (or sometimes called Red Shed when it was broken). Bit of a unicorn as low mileage of 43k and one owner from new. 440hp and all the trick bits under the bonnet but still looking relatively stock on the outside apart from lowering and speedline 2118's.

2017 we went to the Nurburgring as a large group and i had my "Jonguard" moment when i put the meg 225 into the barrier and Steve and the group took the piss out of it for ages :LOL: Shortly after the trip i had to go to Scotland to pick up a megane rs bumper to replace the one id smashed, and dropped Steves engine hoist off at his en route in the Kangoo.

The clio rarely moved at that point, id never seen it move out of the garage, as he had a new m140i to use daily. It was a nice dry day and he offered to get the clio out for a quick blast to show us what the clio was about. Me and Shez were well up for that and he took us for an ride out, performance was unreal even with all 3 of us in it. 440hp burying the speedo with ease (on private roads of course) quickest clio ive ever been in by far. Serious bit of kit and well put together.

Snapped a couple of pics on the day.

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The engine bay at that point.

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Tested the water at that point and asked if he wanted to sell it as was so impressed with the performance and excellent condition. Flirted around a price but he didnt want to sell, so thought that was that.

Shez was gutted as she really wanted it, as she loves the clio's after having a ph1 1.2 for first car. Also wanted a 250 cup so shortly after we bought Yel cup and that was that! Or was it?!

To be continued..
 
Now where were we?

So T.Trophy is off the cards at that moment for us and we have an itch for another car. We had been looking for the unicorn that is the extreme blue meg 250 cup, in low mileage with recaros etc. After being extremely messed about with a few examples (usual Bullshit, i want to sell but dont want to take your cash even though its over the odds price wise!?)

Anyway finally get a 32k fully loaded 250cup in sport yellow instead. Its a lovely car and does everything we chuck at it with ease. Unreal looking car but just did not love it as much as our mk2 megane rs225 for some reason. Miss it looking great sat on the drive sometimes.
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Anyway back to it. Im still in regular contact with Steve and having the usual banter calling the Trophy red shed and asking if hes using it or just leaving it in the garage until kingdom come.

The running theme with the car is that he books a trackday to do in the Trophy and something breaks in the runup so it never goes. Croft booked and it pisses its gear oil out all over after a clutch slave swap the day before. Croft booked again, the optima redtop battery is fucked and barely holding charge, with the fitted tray cant just strap another battery in. Its raining heavy, so lights/blower/wipers on and it cuts out before Clervaux on the sightseeing lap which is a 100 yards or so out of the pit entrance so needs to be towed in. So another day over and a piss ripping from us for the tow of shame :LOL:

It did make our local circuit Teesside Autodrome for a couple of hours on an evening session which i sadly missed.
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Getting the occasional pic coming through of it sitting pretty. Note red r26 next to it that in coincidence i ended up breaking for parts for the Kangoo!
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The Trophy is being used occasionally on the road by Steve. Getting updates on what higher end cars its seen off in the process, its going well at 440hp. Get an update one day saying the ndo gearbox has failed and its lost a couple of gears, 3rd & 4th gear iirc!

So next updates are the car has had a final wash and in the garage for repairs and upgrades aka T.Turbo 1.0
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Last view of the old engine setup before stripdown.
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On axle stands ready for work to commence. From memory this was late 2017/early 2018.
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To be continued!!
 
When I had the 2nd engine built for my 200 I was gunna do the 172 inlet mod, I would’ve thought that the 197 cam would be too aggressive for a boosted motor?
 
You do not f@ck about when it comes to Renaults/Renaultsports! This looks fantastic!
Cheers mate. Ive really enjoyed putting this one together, picking up new skills on the way.
When I had the 2nd engine built for my 200 I was gunna do the 172 inlet mod, I would’ve thought that the 197 cam would be too aggressive for a boosted motor?
197 inlet cam is quite hot for turbo but seems to work OK on this, especially with the full 40deg scope of 197vvt on pwm control. Previous owner specced it and hes shit hot with the f4r, and a couple of people who know these engines have confirmed it should work OK. 182 exhaust cam is good though, tried and tested.

The 197 cams are far too wild for the smaller turbos though. Same with 172 cams, if using standard sized megane exhaust turbine its too much, both setups are better suited to larger turbos.

Interestingly the previous owner had 172inlet/197exhaust on it in the last configuration with advanced exhaust cam timing. They are almost identical to Kelford 272's what the EVO boys use, but in practise it was dissapointing. Using 182 vvt with 16deg fixed inlet advance, it actually caused more lag with the vvt on bizarrely.

Minefield speccing cams for turbo. If the current setup is not right at high boost ill start doing some research on what is better suited. The tried and tested route is ideally 172 cams, as nigh on identical to aftermarket catcams for meg.

Overall the engine seems to be responding well with 349 @ 14lbs, compared to the usual meg hybrid needing 20+ psi to make that hp, so see what happens once its wound up i guess.
 
Back to it.

In our group chat i was receiving regular updates about the strip down of the Trophy for the next evolution. I recall this was early 2018.

Parts coming off.
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Large oil cooler and remote oil filter setup, with view of centre fed plenum.
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Ndo gearbox sat in the bay.
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One of the issues found on the stripdown, alt wire melted poss caused by loose connections or running the knackered battery causing large current draw. Bit naughty.
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Checking things over.
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Steve had told me a few issues that spoiled the refinement of the car, which had prompted the T.Turbo 1.0 rebuild and upgrades whilst gearbox change was needed.
A list of upgrades was made that were deemed necessary to improve the car.

The throttle needed attention. The current setup was a cable Jenvey item fitted to the Nortech inlet manifold. The throttle body cam profile mated with ph1 172 throttle pedal worked OK, but due to the throttle cam profile ratio of the jenvey vs pedal ratio, it made for a snappy short throttle pedal.

This put your ankle in a funny position when cruising at normal speeds using low throttle openings. The other issue was wear to the throttle body. Steve explored options enquiring about rebuilding the throttle and altering the cam profile for a less snappy, linear response which Jenvey could do, but at an expensive price.

Decisions were made and it was deemed best route to take was to modify the plenum and upgrade to DBW Bosch motorsport throttle. This was decided as dbw throttle opening vs throttle pedal position could be mapped to suit a nice linear response, and cold start idle could be taken care of via mapping as the current cable setup had no idle control valve. The engine would not idle without throttle from cold on the cable throttle due to this making it a bit of a pig to drive until warmed up.

Bosch motorsport throttle vs Jenvey.
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Another issue was the dash was lit up like an xmas tree, with asr, serv, eml, electrical fault light on, the immobiliser red light of doom causing issues often. Usual clio s**t on standalone ecu to be fair. The current engine management setup had the original 182 ecu still fitted with a SCS Typhoon ecu piggybacked in, to keep the immobilser and dash happy.

This caused a few issues. A few sensors were doubled up so the original dash cluster would work, i.e. original coolant temp sensor still fitted, and the typhoon ecu needed its own coolant temp sensor fitted. This was fitted in the original place on the side of the head, and the coolant temp sensor for the dash was post thermostat, so no readings on the dash until stat had opened which was not ideal. This also caused a rats nest of wiring as it had 2x map sensors, one for standalone ecu, one for the Zeitronix boost/afr/egt setup.

This all needed to go for a single ecu and single sensors, binning the original engine ecu and s**t piggyback setup, simplifying wiring in the process with single engine sensors. To be fair the typhoon ecu worked but was dated, better options were available ten years on.

Various ecu options were looked at, including pnp options me221, Gen90, and the option of rewiring the car and using an aftermarket digital dash in place of the oem dash cluster. All had pro's and cons and it was difficult to choose the right ecu.

At this time it was noted that the EcuMaster Black and Link ecu's supported the original dash via can wiring. The info was flakey at best on ecumaster about dash support, but ecumaster confirmed that clio2 was supported and the emublack would run rev counter, temp gauge ok via canbus. So the decision was made to to rip all the old shite wiring out and start with a fresh loom for the ecumaster, as it covered all requirements, had H Bridge for Dbw control, onboard wideband afr controller and lots of options for expansion if needed via can, cost vs spec was also good.

Another issue Steve told me about was the engine used a little more oil than he wanted it to. Its not uncommon for a forged engine to use a bit of oil, i think 1ltr per 1000miles is still deemed as acceptable, and i dont think this was using loads of oil via rings, it was using more oil pissing it out of the crank seal area.

The engine ran great and no blue smoke and had only done 3000 miles, but the piston ring gaps were on the slacker side of the scale when it was built so the decision was made to strip the engine and check it over/fresh rings, sort out oil leaks, and change spec i.e cams and head work.

Engine on stand ready for stripdown.
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Head off showing J.E pistons and Arp head studs.
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Pistons out on the bench, for checks and cat cams conrods visible.
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Balanced crank.
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A new block was selected from his large stock of spares as the current one used was from memory an F4RT grand espace which only had 2 holes for ndo driveshaft bearing carrier which was not ideal.

New block was sent off to the machine shop for preperation.
 
Next update - Engine refresh

Over 2018 - 2020 Steve refreshed the engine. As the previous post there was not a lot wrong with the previous engine build apart from it pissing oil out of the crank seal and due a cambelt change.

New block was prepared by Amac engineering. Its a meg 250 block to replace the old espace block. Block was checked over, decked, honed and fully cleaned/prepped for fresh build.
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Rings were gapped to suit which is pretty painful and time consuming if you have ever done it before.
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Crank was installed with new mains/big ends, apparently this was a ballache to get tolerances right and a few sets of oem bearings were ordered until it was right. New oil pump installed at the same time.


Some pics of the head, this turned into an expensive do from memory. Steve bought a used big spec ported 197 head, when arrived turned out to be scrap as all the cam journals were scored badly. A good used standard 197 head was sourced and sent to Amac for porting, fitting supertech valves and general prep. They port matched the inlet ports and dowelled the head to locate the inlet perfectly. Labour cost was eye watering by all accounts.
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Cams were chosen to suit from a large selection. 197 inlet and 182 exhaust were chosen this time round.
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Head fitted with arp studs.
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All the alloy parts were aqua blasted and thoroughly cleaned for the as new raw alloy appearance.
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A nice clean fresh build.
 
Engine build part 2

Assembly continued. Cam cover sealed with anaerobic sealant from Renault as originally intended.
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Note 197 dephaser fitted for full scope of 40degrees of inlet advance available.
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Cam timing to stock settings using genuine tooling. Horseshoe fit video as everybody loves a vid of it sliding in perfectly :LOL:



Manifold was wrapped with expensive Dei titanium wrap over the ceratec coating. This was a great idea but sadly had to remove it, ill come back to that in a future post. Note turbo oil drain tapped for large an adaptor.
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New genuine crank seal fitted with MOT 991. The pic below is from when i used it on the Kangoo, its a great bit of kit, makes the job very easy to do.
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TTV smf flywheel shown. Spigot bearing fitted to crank as was missed on first build giving gearshift issues.
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Turbine housing was also changed from the large 1.06ar twin scroll that was fitted on the old setup. It spooled up quite well on this, around 4.5-5k all in but the power and torque ramped in hard and agressive. Flows really good though.
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The decision was made to change to .82ar twin scroll turbine housing. This was for more response in the mid range and hopefully help smooth out the torque delivery with good mapping instead of it all ramping in at once when finally spooling up.


Engine bay was prepped ready for install. Note custom brake lines relocated behind bulkhead.
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Engine hung in the bay. Note no gearbox fitted, as at that point a 250 cup pk gearbox was mocked up, which fitted fine but needed a custom gearbox mount making. Meg 175 dci gearbox spider mount and also 250 spider were tested, but engine was way out of level so no good, and with a new mount and new driveshafts required, the decision to go back to a refreshed megane r26 NDO020 gearbox with gripper differential was made. I ended up buying the pk 250 cup box for the Kangoo!
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