Renault Clio 1.2 Dynamique petrol 16v - Clio emissions light permanently on, car sluggish

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Mon 10 May 2010 18:46
Renault Clio 1.2 Dynamique petrol 16v - Clio emissions light permanently on, car sluggish - ihateclios

It is my misfortune to have a 2004 Clio Dynamique 1.2 16v which has been suffering from (a) constant emissions warning light on dashboard and (b) feeling sluggish. I've taken it to several garages, including a main Renault dealer, but nobody seems able to (a) tell me what the problem is or (b) give me a quote for fixing it that will cost less than the car is worth.

I took it to one garage who plugged in their diagnostic machine, tried changing the ignition coil, but when that didn't work recommended I take the car to Renault instead (they didn't charge me for their labours, which was very decent of them).

Took it to Renault, who charged me £160 to repeat the diagnostic check, change the spark plugs, and repeat the experiment with a new coil. They then told me they could try adjusting the tappets, which would cost around £450, but if that didn't work they might have to strip the cylinder head (I think) and do some other stuff which would cost another £1700. I'm no mechanic so I have no idea if this is meaningful technical stuff or just a load of flannel to extract yet more cash.

Obviously, I balked at these costs, so I took it to another garage who do Renault repairs and quoted me around £250 to adjust the tappets and (possibly) replace the head gasket. But when I took the car in, they told me that replacing the head gasket would take a week and cost over £500, so I told them to just do the tappets. They kept the car all day but when I went to pick it up, they told me they hadn't done anything at all because they might break the gasket if they did the tappets and they didn't have a new gasket in stock anyway. They hadn't bothered to tell me this earlier, so I lost a day's pay for nothing and the car still isn't fixed.

So right now, I've got a Clio which runs (a bit sluggishly) with an annoying warning light, and which may well fail its MOT this month if I don't get it fixed. After all this messing about, and even after reading the discussion boards, I've lost any sense of what the real problem and costs are likely to be, so any advice would be very welcome!

Should I budget for a few hundred, or two grand, or just try and trade it in for something other than a %$£&* Clio?

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Sat 26 Jun 2010 14:45
Renault Clio 1.2 Dynamique petrol 16v - Clio emissions light permanently on, car sluggish - farrpau

Try cleaning the TDC (top dead centre) sensor, you will find this on the top of the crank shaft housing. if that fails a replacement cost me £20 3 years ago when had similar problem on 02 clio extreme 16v. would go into safe mode limiting revs to about 2500. I also seem to remember being told this fault doesn't show up on the diagnostic computer.

instructions for this are in haynes manual renault clio june 01-04 isbn 1844251683 page 4A13 - 14 well worth the investment given how many niggling faults my renault has.

just remembered warning light coming on last time was low water coolant, had a leak somewhere, but any half decent garage would spot that one straight away.

Edited by farrpau on 26/06/2010 at 14:47

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Sun 27 Jun 2010 10:27
Renault Clio 1.2 Dynamique petrol 16v - Clio emissions light permanently on, car sluggish - JONATHAN_11_80

Hi,

We have recently part exchanged a 2003 Clio 1.2 Dynamique we had endless problems after Christmas with eml light being on and the car juddered and drove like a pig. In the end it was found the ecu had a problem. The issue was due to the fact the pins on the plug on the ecu in which the car wiring plugs into had rotted away leading to a bad connection. The fix for this is a new ecu and wiring loom, however we managed to get our ecu repaired took 3 weeks which stopped the ecu light coming on and the car drove ok but was still rather snappy when coming off the throttle and I think if we replaced the wiring loom another £500 that would have solved the snappy throttle but we had spent over a grand on it by then as the garages we took it too kept replacing various sensors. To be honest they arent a very well built car and tend to fall apart around your ears as they get older.

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