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Renault 5 Monaco

malcolm

malcolm

& Clementine the Cat
Messages
4,519
Location
Bedford UK
I collected a Renault 5 Monaco today to replace the Campus - it's the 1.7L engined R5 with leather seats. It's covered 38,000 miles from new. The bodywork is sound, and the interior should polish up.

Couple of big vacuum hoses were disconnected so it ran like a bag of nails when I bought it. I've pushed those back on and it's a lot better but not perfect yet. I'll need to look around for other vacuum leaks. Also I have no history of cambelt changes but if recent servicing is anything to go by it will be frighteningly overdue so that's a priority.

Should be fun. It's not quite as different from the Campus as I had expected. You sit up a bit higher in the Monaco. It's faster but not road scorching, it's quieter but not refined, and it feels like a heavier car. It just feels like a more grown up Renault 5. And it's got remote control central locking and intermittent wipers!
 
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It is funny that you get excited about intermittent wipers :D

I like the leather - there are quite a few R5s in our village (of 55 people) mostly retired farmers pottering around.
 
My favourite cars ever. I love the Monaco series of Renaults.
 
Perfect car!

Only thing left to do is put rear axle from GTTurbo and you have beast on road.

I own an R5 GTE which is actualy GTT body/interior/suspension and 1,7L multipoint injection engine.
It drives like on train rails.
 
Looks great. Get those seats! Well posh. Some fun motoring ahead, I'm sure. Look forward to some stories. :)
 
Haven't quite figured out the vacuum leak. Feels like a vacuum leak causing the car to run very lean on part throttle and be a bit unresponsive and jumpy. I'll give it a good service and have a look around. With that done it should be nice.
 
Solex carbs had big problems with baseplate
warping should have fan motor and ductpipe too keepit cool cuts in after engine switched off
 
Thanks Paul - that could be it. I've bought a can of Easystart to squirt around. When the revs rise I've found a vacuum leak. A job for the weekend.

Is there an accepted fix for warped carbs? I'd be inclined to fit a thick soft gasket under the thing and let it warp.
 
Better off using carb cleaner than easy start, it isn't half as hard on the engine.
 
I made a bit of progress. The carb gasket looks a hopeful design 23 years on, and I have fuel bubbling in an inline filter that needs moving. First the inlet manifold needs changing - that's where the big vacuum leak seems to be, though it's next weekend's job.

Bought a cam belt kit too, and have ordered the Haynes manual in case there are any instructions.
 
Well I'm the new and proud owner of the above car ;)

Thank you Malcolm!

I picked it up last Sunday and drove it the 50 miles back home, it still had the issue with the air leak which was causing very difficult low speed running and very little tick over!

I got it back and then fixed a small blow in the exhaust downpipe which made it sound a lot better and then went and filled up with some Esso Supreme unleaded at my local fuel station (having had cars with the same engine (Laguna and Volvo 480) I know they like a bit of super unleaded occasionally.

Since then its behaved itself impeccably, I've driven over 200 miles, the tickover is smooth, the low speed running is lovely and I've since had a chance to fix a few more squeaks from the rear of the car (mainly the tailgate) and its now running beautifully.

What a lovely little car! Although my friends don't see the beauty of her compared to my 4L, just seeing an 80's car!

I lusted over these when I was young and they were new and fresh in my local Reads Renault in Wellington Shropshire.

Next thing to sort out is the stereo, I remember these having a great stereo system, but someone has replaced it all with an aftermarket Sony (does anyone else think that Sony car stereos are far too fiddly?) and the front speakers aren't there anymore and the rear speakers sound awful!

I shall be visiting a scrap yard and getting a complete set of speakers from another car, I'll probably find a Kia Sedona somewhere and take the complete set of speakers and tweeters out of one and put them in the Monaco.
 
Excellent. Glad to hear it's working again without too much trouble.
 
Hi,
My wife bought me a monaco for my birthday last week and it broke down with the exact same issues as this one! The garage have talked about the carb on it - does anyone have any more info on this as we cannot find anything.

How is your monaco getting on now? Any more problems?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

Chris
 
Hi Tutton, welcome to the forum.

I own Malcolms Monaco now and it seems to have cured itself I can't take any credit other than I drive it lots and filled it with super unleaded.

I suspect the petrol was off, it's very very common these days, in fact Stihl produce a special 2 stroke oil with conditioner to help prevent exactly this as it was becoming so common.
 
Thanks for getting back to me so quickly! This is reassuring, we are going to pick the car up today and I intend to put some fancy fuel in to see what that does. The garage ran the car for 45 mins without issue before it started playing up again, hence the talk of the carb. They were reluctant to pull it apart as they said they would not be able to get a new one.

Do you know what carbs are on the monacos? Would we be able to source another or a compatable generic?

Im really hoping it is just the fuel as the car is so rare and has only done 32k but if it needs a new carb I dont think we will be able to keep it :-(

Thanks in anticipation Pepper, its great to connect with another Monaco owner.
 
You can buy a brand new replacement carb quite easily, they do cost a fair whack though!

Have you put fresh petrol in the car since you took ownership?
 
Yes, i filled up with standard fuel when i first got it last week and again today with shell V power before I set off. Drove it back (nearly 100miles) and it spluttered once for a couple of seconds then was fine. Ive adjusted the tickover and put new plugs on, and im going to change the dizzy cap, rotary arm and leads. Can you recommend any good places to buy these parts ?

Still a bit baffled by what it could be as when it broke down it sounded awful and would not tick over at all, even when I tried it 5hrs later! But seems to have miraculously recovered when left alone!

Do you know how to tell if I have got an unleaded head? Is there some markings i can look out for?

Thanks again :-)
 
The head is aluminium and has hardened inserts to cope with unleaded petrol.

The car just seems to run far far better on the super unleaded!

For replacement parts have a talk with our very own Renault4mad of this forum he's able to get genuine Renault parts at reasonable prices, do a search for him, if you can't find him he has an eBay shop too and Google will find him easily.
 
Hi Pepper,

Yeah thought it might have hardened inserts with it being an ali head but wasn't sure if they coud handle unleaded! There was some lead substitute in the car when I picked it up, so maybe the previous owner wasn't sure either! You never know that could've caused the problem, although I had a Capri and ran lead substitute in that until I found out the head was ok. cheers will have a search for Renault4mad, it's going in garage on thursday to have aux belt done, as it's not too clever and slipping a bit, then hopefully will be able to tune it a bit better! So far new plugs, leads, dizzy cap and rotor arm have gone on, well, not the rotor arm yet, can't get the old one off! Think I'll ask the garage whilst they have it! :-) Certainly feels a lot better than it did!
 
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