RENAULT 4 SAVANE
The Renault has been valued for insurance purposes, and adjudged to be worth €3000 – a decent return for my initial €1700. In the past year only minor items have needed attention, so it’s smiles all round.
The first issue was that, despite regular cleaning, two sets of small holes appeared in one front wing. They were tiny enough not to merit a new panel, so I just cleaned everything, laminated some glassfibre on the inside, filled and painted. In the course of this I noticed that the forward bobbin mount for the exhaust had cracked, so I popped a new one on, at the same time correcting the alignment of the bracket on the exhaust, which had been putting the rubber bobbin under stress. I saw that one trackrod end had a badly split gaiter, so I’d better order a new end; they’re only about £12 from Melun Rétro Passion.
Ahead of the valuation, I gave the car the deepest of deep-cleans. Up until then the interior had probably never received more than a perfunctory dust-down, and the underbonnet area was grubby with 31 years of accumulated grime. Steam-cleaning would have been an option but I did everything by hand, and the result has certainly paid off. Under the bonnet the transformation is remarkable, while the interior has responded beautifully, using nothing more than domestic cleaning fluid – with a bit of black shoe polish for the floor mats and some tyre renovator for the boot mat.
With the car up on the lift for the insurance inspection, I was able to profit from the advice of Frédéric, the valuer, and car-club mate Daniel, who had fixed up the valuation. Frédéric was impressed by how corrosion-free the Renault was, but advised that I de-rust and properly protect the rearmost longerons, which are suffering from quite deep surface rust. Hopefully it’s nothing worse than that.
At the other end of the car, the continuing engine-oil leak was spotted and diagnosed. “That’s really common on R4s,” said Daniel. “It’s the gasket for the fuel pump. Replacing that will fix it.”
Daniel also spotted that on one side the housing for the lower suspension balljoint was not sitting flat against the adjacent tie-rod. Re-installing it will involve undoing the tie-rod, so that’s for another day. It’s possible that the ill-positioned bush has thrown the tracking out, because the tyre wear at the front is a little uneven; since I will have to redo the tracking anyway after fitting the new trackrod end, this is hardly a disaster.
They reckoned the rubber bushes on the linkage under the bonnet for the push-pull-twist gearchange were in need of replacement – something I’d somehow neglected to notice when cleaning the engine compartment. New bushes would apparently give a much better gearchange. The action is definitely less slick than on my previous R4, so there’s a strong chance they’re right.
A new set of tyres is also due, a replacement catch for the rear tailgate needs sourcing, so too a rear light. There are various types of light, and although they look identical the spares I have won’t fit. Meanwhile, the car goes about its happy business as my rural runabout, a role it fulfils with perfection. Plus it recently deputised for my Mini, which was indisposed (incontinent, more like) when it came to a recent car-club weekend.
‘The interior had probably never received more than a perfunctory dust-down; the result has certainly paid off’