1981 Renault 20TS

I would put some rubber buffers/feet? under the battery, not enough to cover the whole area and trap moisture, but say a few rubber discs at the main points of contact so the battery doesn't move about too much, because it will and with grit and crap underneath it is guaranteed it will remove your nice paint.
 
I take it this is not the version with the PRV motor. I talked to a bloke in country Victoria way back in 1992 with a silver one with PRV with progressive downdraft Webers. That would be quite a weapon. Happy motoring, hope the zero dollars stretch.
 
renaultracer said:
I take it this is not the version with the PRV motor. I talked to a bloke in country Victoria way back in 1992 with a silver one with PRV with progressive downdraft Webers. That would be quite a weapon. Happy motoring, hope the zero dollars stretch.
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I did 3 or 4000 kilometres in France in an R30 with the PVR motor but French versions have fuel injection. Very nice car with some interesting fittings for the late 70's.
 
Sunroof said:
Didn't the late model 20's have a 5 speed.
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We had 2 R20s in the family when I was little, one S1 4sp and a S2 5sp. The 4 speed provided better fuel economy dad said, especially if towing even a small trailer or caravan. Maybe our speed limits kept the engine out of its sweet spot when cruising.
 
the late 5sp box was built like a brick dunny, nope, I don't recall the magic number. A sweet gearbox that shifted like silk. Mine was originally an auto that died, the 5sp was a replacement, with lots of challenges for the old guy at Virage Motors, Herman ? great mechanic.
cheers,
Bob
 
Way back when I was searching for an Alpine, no mobile phones or GPS mind, I hitched a ride in the back of a 30TS V6 and it blew me away
with how effortless, smooth and quiet it was. A real limo. Up to then the Citroen ID19 was my benchmark.
Visited Dieppe and was granted the first of my many Alpine factory tours to see the A310 V6 in production. Even taken for a test run around
the countryside. Even though an identical engine, a different character. Gruff and bellowy when the secondary carbys were mustered.
Getting back to gearboxes, those coupled to a V6 ran a physically bigger diff than the 4 cyl. Gear trains and housing remained the same.
A much bigger and heftier gearbox than in the Fuego's whose origins are in R8/10.
This confused many as the Fuego and R20 shared similar engines.
 
Parts: $0.00 ; Supplies: $0.00 ; Maintenance Items: $0.00

TOTAL: $0.00

Zero Cost Job 3: Remove extraneous items

Broke out the steam cleaner for the first time in a long time. A number of items on the car looked as if steaming would be the best way to get them off.

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First to go were those stickers on the back window:

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Forgot how therapeutic the steaming is - could happily steam clean things for hours! Which I kind of did. Opened the hatch to get at the top of the tail-lights where black tape was "sealing" the tops. But then got distracted and just steamed every nook and cranny I could see! Despite little bits of surface rust almost everywhere on this car, some areas cleaned up ok:

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Then it was around to the side to investigate what looked like grey tape under and around the windows. Obviously, this was going to be covering rust - the question just being how much. The tape peeled off relatively easily with some help from the steam. Underneath the tape is what looks like house paint applied with a brush! The good news about that is that it's not exactly bonded with the original paint, so steam is enough to get it off. It's slow going - what I've done so far has taken a number of hours - but it generally comes off without damaging the paint below:

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Sure enough, as you can see, there is rust to be found around this window. Ideally the window needs to come out, the rust repaired and painted and the window put back in with new seals. Not a Zero Cost Job - but something will have to be done at some point. (The car is now always stored on a hard surface and, so far, under a carport or even in the garage - so I console myself that at least conditions to encourage rust are now less than they perhaps have been in the past). What's left isn't the prettiest, but it's the only way to find all the rust. And it's at least that tiny bit closer to "original".

Next on the steam clean list was the rubber pads that had been put on each sill. They peeled off quite easily, but left a layer of latex-ey glue behind that again needed steaming. With the glue removed there's some lurid yellow staining left over, which I'm hoping might polish off. What was more difficult was getting the layer of dark green and black paint immediatley below that off - as I said, this has taken a few hours so far!

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For a break from cleaning s*&t, I had a go at adjusting the latch on the driver's door to better align the door when it's closed. There's only a small amount of play in the hinges, so this adjustement has worked nicely:

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As you can also see, the removal of the non-original rubber strips near the bottom of the doors didn't go as well as I'd hoped. The first few on the other side came off very easily just by hand. That gave me a false sense of security, so I was more gung-ho than I should have been on this side and so on that back door (bottom left of shot), it just ripped a big hole right down to the metal. I've sealed it with the same black rust paint I used for the battery tray (one can goes a long way!), but I'll go back and use the two cans of body colour that came with the car - along with some left-over primer I've got in the cupboard - to do a better repair.

And the moment we've all been waiting for: those timber door tops!

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Some good news there! Yes, there are some splits on some of the doors, but not too bad. Certainly better than I feared! And those splits look like a job for a "$20 cost Job"...

So at the end of the day, this is the pile of extraneous items that came off the car:

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Not a bad day's work, and I learned a lot more about the condition of the body and the list of jobs - zero cost and otherwise - is growing ever longer.

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Cheers,
Tony.
 
Trading Estate said:
Sure did and a better interior and dashboard . I think the first series may have been assembled in Australia, while the 82/83 was fully imported. I stand corrected as I am not sure . Great touring car . Hope you enjoy it . I loved mine.
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I think this one was one of the last few with four speeds. I've since discovered some handwritten notes stapled to the inside of the workshop manual. It seems one previous owner did some research into the car's history. According to these notes, the car was "brought out from France" in 1981/82 by the first owner - a Mr. Jack Betts. So this one, at least. wasn't built here.

Cheers,
Tony.
 
Gats said:
Hi Tony,

Great to hear about another 20TS on the road. I have an early series 1 (1979) which I have owned since 1984. It has done 380,000 and is still going strong and used almost every day of the week. It was a 4 speed but I was able to find a 5 speed box some years ago and changed over. A great improvement but especially on a country drive. I know of only a few 20TS's still around. One is in Queensland and another in Hobart but I am sure there are more around. It would be interesting to know just how many are still going.

Good luck with yours and I hope it goes well for some time.

Cheers

John
Clarendon SA
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Thanks John.

Is this one the one you know of in Hobart, or is there another one lurking around here somewhere?

T.
 
schlitzaugen said:
I would put some rubber buffers/feet? under the battery, not enough to cover the whole area and trap moisture, but say a few rubber discs at the main points of contact so the battery doesn't move about too much, because it will and with grit and crap underneath it is guaranteed it will remove your nice paint.
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Yeah, good point Schiltz! I've given it some thought and have an idea I'll try....

Cheers,
Tony.
 
Great work Tony, thanks for posting!


BlackC2 said:
View attachment 124720
Some good news there! Yes, there are some splits on some of the doors, but not too bad. Certainly better than I feared! And those splits look like a job for a "$20 cost Job"...
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I know you are trying to keep it to 0, but have a chat with a vinyl welder, you wont even know they are split!

you probably know armour all is a no no, baby oil works well to rub on and off vinyl and rubbers.

keep up the posts!
 
Hi black C2
Good on you for taking on this project. I'm looking forward to seeing more of your car.

I'm not sure how much you are chasing originality, but the badges on the rear are on the wrong surface.
A dollar's worth of double sided tape would sort this out.
they should be down on the vertical part of the tailgate, currently they are on the sloping part.
 

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vivid said:
I know you are trying to keep it to 0, but have a chat with a vinyl welder, you wont even know they are split!
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Well you've at least got me googling "vinyl welders hobart"...

You're right - it would be the best result, but I can't justify it at this stage. a) Currently it's easy to overcapitalise on any spending on this project and b) I've other cars that unfortunatley get spending priority for now.

Cheers,
Tony.
 
simca1100 said:
I'm not sure how much you are chasing originality, but the badges on the rear are on the wrong surface.
A dollar's worth of double sided tape would sort this out.
they should be down on the vertical part of the tailgate, currently they are on the sloping part.
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Excellent pickup!! I've been trawling photos of R20's for days and hadn't noticed that one! Brilliant - an easy win! I'll get on to that sharpish!

Cheers,
Tony.
 
Hi Tony

Its great to see another R20 on the road in Hobart. I had one a few years ago in the same colour, Champagne Gold I think it was. It wasn't yours though it was a series 2.

I also have a Fuego (now son's), R17, R12 wagon and a Dauphine and I still have a few parts from the 20 laying about you may be interested in.

I am in the French Car Club of Tasmania and as mentioned by others one of our members has an immaculate, original series 1 R20TS.

Regards

Damien
 
BlackC2 said:
I think this one was one of the last few with four speeds. I've since discovered some handwritten notes stapled to the inside of the workshop manual. It seems one previous owner did some research into the car's history. According to these notes, the car was "brought out from France" in 1981/82 by the first owner - a Mr. Jack Betts. So this one, at least. wasn't built here.


Cheers,
Tony.
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This could explain why yours has the chrome side window surrounds that only the series 2 had out here. AGFIK Aussie ones had painted window surrounds ( see blue one above) Series 2 also had a thin strip around the grille opening.
ps I gave my Renault workshop manual to another Aussie frogger for the cost of postage - maybe he's finished with it . I'll pm his name to you
cheers
Dave
 
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