Michel's Garage | Megane RS

[Michel4AGE]

Hi

My automotive journey started back in 2000 when I got my drivers license. Back then I somehow really didn't care about cars in general. Some of my friends however were petrolheads and during the summer of 2002 they asked if I wanted to come along for a drive through the German "Eifel" area. Yeah sure, why not.. and off I went with my '88 Corolla (AE92 /w 4A-FE for you geeks) not knowing the adventure I was in for.

After some nice driving roads we ended up at some sort of racing track called the norderschlingerreiferingnurburgerring (I think it sounded like that the first time someone mentioned it to me). I really had no clue what was going on there. Everything breathes and oozes motorsport. We were watching the traffic on the track at "Breidscheid" which is halfway down the track in the village of Adenau. Cars all over the place. Not just on the track but also next to the track. Everywhere where you look you can see all kinds of cars. Be it German, French, JDM or American muscle. New cars, old modified cars..you name it and it's there.

At one point one of my friends said to me "we're going for a lap, care to join us ?" and I was like.. uhh yeah ok. So we drove to the ticket office and bought a 1-lap ticket and quickly followed my friends onto the track. What followed can only be described as "WTF?". Luckily my brother was sitting next to me so he could warn me for upcoming traffic. And with a 88hp Corolla and no track knowledge or whatsoever, traffic was quite a thing. Everything flew past me so fast it was hard to concentrate on the track. Obviously we weren't going for any record laptimes and as such I have no idea how long this lap took us but it must've been somewhere in the 12- or maybe even 13 minutes range haha !

But after that first lap it was all said and done.. a 2nd lap ticket was bought and from that day on a new addiction and hobby was born.

After about a year driving many laps with that old Corolla something a bit faster had to replace it but my car knowledge was not exactly something to write home about back in those days. I wanted something reliable and cheap to run and having driven a -so far- reliable Corolla made the choice pretty easy.
Fast forward through the years, these were my cars with some weird choices ;

• '90 Corolla AE92 GTi (4A-GE 16v, no interior with bucket seats)
  
• '92 Volvo 440 GL for daily driving
  
• '89 Isuzu Trooper 2.5 diesel
  
• '91 Corolla AE92 GTi (swapped out the 4A-GE 16v for the "Blacktop" 4A-GE 20v, great engine !)
  
• '92 MR2 SW20 Turbo (with JDM gen2 3S-GTE and E153 LSD gearbox)
  
• '94 Starlet EP81 for daily driving
• '98 BMW E36 323ti (M52 with E30 clutch pack LSD)
• '98 BMW E36 323i Touring for daily driving

Currently I have 2 cars, 1 for daily driving and the other one for uh.. everything else. I'll update this topic with everything about my cars and maybe with some Nordschleife content too, if people are interested in that kind of nonsense of course haha.

'06 Renaultsport Mégane

Specs

Body Style - 3-door hatchback
Engine - F4RT 1998cc I4
Power - 225 PS / 165 kW @ 5500 rpm
Torque - 300 Nm / 220 lb-ft @ 3000 rpm
Weight - 1330 kg
Brakes - Front: 312 mm vented Brembo 4-piston, Rear: 300 mm single caliper
Tires - Front and Rear: 235/40 R18 Yokohama Advan Neova AD08R

Mods

none

Plans / To Do

more noise
different wheels
CUP dampers & lowering springs



'98 Toyota Starlet

Specs

Body Style - 3-door hatchback
Engine - 4E-FE 1298cc I4
Power - 82 PS / 60 kW @ 5500 rpm
Torque - 118 Nm / 87 lb-ft @ 4400 rpm
Weight - 820 kg

Mods

Uhh ?

Plans / To Do

Keep it running for the next few years, maybe replace with a Suzuki Swift (Sport)

 

[Michel4AGE]

My old cars..
I won't show them all because some are just plain boring haha.

First Corolla (2001-2003)
4A-FE engine
Cheap *ss car haha.. have to start somewhere right ?

Corolla GTi (2003-2005)
4A-GE 16v engine
No interior, just 2 bucket seats

Corolla GTi (2005-2008)
4A-GE 20v engine (165hp @ 8200rpm)

That engine sounded great with those 75mm ITB stacks..

SW20 MR2 (2008-2011)
3S-GE & 3S-GTE engine
Very rewarding car, learned the most of this car including 1 crash on a wet Nordschleife
No car to fool around with. Very point and shoot kinda car haha.

Then, for some reason, I thought buying 2 BMW's would be great.

323ti & 323i Touring
Both same engine, M52 (2.5ltr i6)

The idea sounded great but both being mostly a pain in the *ss I was very happy to see them both go. I then went full retard and bought a Renault even though most people warned me because apparantly Renaults are very unreliable. So far the Renault is the most reliable car I've ever had though..

 

[GDII]

Nice list of cars. The AE92 GTis are always a fun car. I had an EE90 with a 1.3 carby 2E engine as my first car. Was slow as but fun and I liked the body style.

Was your SW20 a Euro model with a swapped engine or a JDM model?

 

[Michel4AGE]

Thanks !

My SW20 was a ´92 Euro model so it had the bigger brakes and door bars for safety plus some other minor changes. I bought it with the original 3S-GE engine but that engine burned more oil then fuel haha.. when it finally died on me it got swapped out for the 2nd gen. 3S-GTE. Obviously changed the whole car.. more then I anticipated !

 

[GDII]

Ah yes. Same engine as my car with minor updates. I know the feeling with the oil issues. Mine would burn 1 litre per 300km in the end before I swapped it out for an engine with 400,000km on it. I did pull the engine apart and found the oil control rings were clean so with rings must have just been worn out. I replaced the valve seals but this did nothing. Only got to 230,000km before i pulled it out.

The GEN2 3SGTE would have made it much better.

 

[PASM]

The idea sounded great but both being mostly a pain in the *ss I was very happy to see them both go. I then went full retard and bought a Renault even though most people warned me because apparantly Renaults are very unreliable. So far the Renault is the most reliable car I've ever had though..

Haha I know the feeling. My BMW was by far more unreliable, but then again I am comparing a 30+ year old car to a 9 year old one. My friends thought I had totally lost it (they bought BMW's). Fact is the RS offers something no non-M BMW can give without some serious modding.

Anyway, nice list of cars there!

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

The Renault gets me going...its forbidden fruit. Need more pics. Interior?

 

[homeforsummer]

View attachment 785915

I know you said it was a pain, but E36 Compacts are still a guilty pleasure of mine. We never got the 323ti in the UK but I've driven four of the four-cylinder Compacts and loved them. Even like the way they look.

Good choice on the Renault though. I've hammered an R26.R around a track and it's right up there as one of the best front-wheel drive cars I've ever driven. Regular 225s are outstanding value right now and not that far away from R26.R-style tweaks...

 

[Michel4AGE]

The Renault gets me going...its forbidden fruit. Need more pics. Interior?

These cars don't have a nice interior in terms of quality. The plastics used on these cars have some kinda rubber covering which gets very sticky over the years. All the hard plastic bits can scratch easily. The seats are very good though. Door panels, steering wheel and seats have color matched stitching along with the color matched seatbelts.

I know you said it was a pain, but E36 Compacts are still a guilty pleasure of mine. We never got the 323ti in the UK but I've driven four of the four-cylinder Compacts and loved them. Even like the way they look.

Good choice on the Renault though. I've hammered an R26.R around a track and it's right up there as one of the best front-wheel drive cars I've ever driven. Regular 225s are outstanding value right now and not that far away from R26.R-style tweaks...

The 323ti wasn't bad but in retrospect I had better bought a coupe or sedan for track driving. The compact uses the old E30 rear axle and suspension setup. Which kinda sucks really. I replaced pretty much everything suspension wise, even bought a brand new custom spec LSD (clutch pack). But in the end.. I somehow liked the touring better even though that was car was 100% original. The M52 engines are great though and deliver more power then the official 170bhp or so.

The R26.R's are sublime.. just a tad too expensive nowadays haha.