USED Renault Clio Hatchback (05 - 13)

My car

I have just sold the car after five years having owned it from new. It is the 1.4 dynamique with AC (the drop down menuse on the web site didnt have this variant listed).

The only extras were met paint and panoramic sun roof.The car did 41k miles in our 5 years, firstly as my wifes car and then being used by our teenage son to drive and then he used it during uni.

Exyernally, the car still looked fresh with it wearing quite well. Inside, a couple of areas were starting to wear with the trim on the heater knobs starting to crack/delaminate whilst the steering whell developed a strange crease on its top edge.

I decided to trade it for a new DS3, beacuse we wanted something more sporty and I got a decentish trade in, £3750.One of the drivers was also that the CAM belt and tensioeners needed changing at 5 years (£300) and the clutch juddered if the revs werent high on standing starts.It had always had this tendancy but the garage were mooting a new clutch ( an unbelieveable cost of over £600), I felt the analysis was wrong but didnt want to invest in an older and now dated model.

Only real disappoinment was the fuel consumption...never got past 37mpg.The engine had to be worked hard to move the quite heavy car.It was very comfortable and relaxing to drive, a quite mature car and not a flighty supermini.

My car

Owned this car for nearly a year - i added a full body kit and 17inch blacked out alloys, to make it look more like the 'Sport' model

Inside the cabin is spacious including all electrics you can think of, built-in bluetooth (for mobile) and part leather seats, climate control that can cool you down just as quick as warm you up, keyless entry and push button start.

the car has a 6th gear which does help the fuel consumption on longer jorneys.

the engine is powerfull enough (138bhp) to out run even the more 'prestige' of manufactuers.

over all the ride comfort is top class, power is as good as you can get with out the full 197bhp, grip is very good and speaking from Experience this is a very safe car!! 5 stars!!!

My car

Car drives well, it has a good powerful engine, seating is rather nice, better then my 04 Megane, rear is easier to see out of. The space inside even in the rear, is almost as big as my old megane, 60:40 rear is good, tho its a shame the rear bench wont come down. Air con is weaker then my older cars, including my old 51 plate clio, which is a shame, makes it rather hard to cool the car down on a hot day. The rear dash lights dont come on sometimes which means restarting the car, no big deal. I went for xenons, which are good+cornering lights, folding mirrors and extreme blue paint. The car is nice, service prices are very high, as is road tax, the 2.0 engine is fast, tho I would get a smaller less powerful engine next time, tax is too high. I like the car the speed, 0-60 in 8.5seconds, good other if a 197 is too pricey. Love my part leather standard seats!

My car

I have been very impressed with this car over the three years of ownership. I was able to sell my 55 plate 28,000 miles for 5.5k in December, not too bad in my opinion. I have now replaced it with a Mini Cooper, but considering the vast difference in price between the two cars, I feel any direct comparisons would be unfair.

I used it as a third car (Merc E Class estate and VW Eos being the others) but this car never felt like the poor relation and at times I even preferred to use it over the others - for city centre driving the car is perfect. The spec is very impressive for this class of car and was complimented nicely by options such as the panoramic sunroof.

Performance is excellent for the size of car and it has proved adept at both town and motorway driving. Economy was top notch and whenever I used it for longer motorway journeys between Nottingham and London, I have achieved 62-64mpg.

Space is more than adequate, obviously if you regularly carry 4 passengers you are better off looking at used cars in the class above but for the few occasions the rear was used the space was fine. The seats are comfortable and as a passenger you feel very secure.

This car is testimony to how far superminis have come over the last few years - if anyone is looking I certainly recommend you add this car to your shortlist!