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Renault Clio II - Engines - Poor idle when cold

38K views 10 replies 7 participants last post by  Adam1994 
#1 ·
Good day to all of you

I'm new to the forum and I just bought my new 2003 Clio 1.2L 16V sedan...what a great car
I have a small problem about idling when the car is cold, it starts fine no problem at 1200 - 1300 rpm and slightly goes down to 1000 then 700 until it reaches 500 as this is the normal idle level when the engine is warm.....problem is when moving to 1000 the engine begines to vibrate making all the car hesitate in a strange way and I have to press on the pedal until the engine reaches its operating temp (appox.80-85 C ) which also noticed that it takes about 6min to reach this temp!...is this normal ? and if I try to move before this temp it sometimes stops.
Once the temp is 85 it idles very smooth at 500 without any problem and acceleration is brilliant .
From reading the threads could this also be a Top Dead Sensor problem, Throttle body or Map Sensor ? or what???

Thanks for the help

Amr
 
#3 ·
Hi - Amr - sounds very like a temerature sensor problem or a dirty TDC sensor. Start with the easy stuff first - clean the TDC sensor - if that don't help check the air filter is clean. Then move onto the engine coolant temperature sensor and then the air intake temperature sensor. It appears the problem is temperature related. Also has your car an outside temp., sensor. Are you sure theidle speed is only 500RPM as this seems quite low and should be around the 800 to 900 mark. Have any mods been done to the car.:)
 
#4 ·
Hi Madnoel10

Thanks for your reply.....guess I'll check the top dead sensor first and then see other sensors....and no my car doesn't have an outside temp sensor ( I guess )
yes I noticed that idle at 500 is low but I don't have any trouble at this level and the engine is very smooth and when the AC is on it moves to 1000rpm ( I may rise it a bit as I noticed that at the first gear when releasing the clutch I have to press on the accelerator a bit to move )
and...is the coolant temp sensor related to the temp guage in the instrument panel ? as I think the guage is functioning well.

Thanks
Amr
 
#5 ·
Hi Amr - to be honest i don't know if the sensor serving the temperature gauge is used by the engine speed control system or this is a separate one. As far as I remember there is an inlet air temperature sensor located on the inlet manifold and if this is faulty or dirty it will send the wrong signal to the engine management system - thus changing idling speed and fuel supply. I don't believe you can adjust the idle speed manually as I think it is preset during manufacture.:)
 
#7 ·
Hi,
My Wife's 1.4 52 plate 16V clio had a very similar problem, it would stall when cold, and was erratic until it warmed up.
In our case I traced the problem to a dirty throttle body, our one has the "fly by wire throttle" (no mechanical cable to the throttle only a electrical connector. This made sense as the electric actuator was slightly stuch so it did not control the throttle at all well.

I removed the throttle body and cleaned the residue near the butterfly plate and the problem was fixed - easy job so worth a try in your case.
 
#11 ·
Hi, i bought a Renault Clio Mrk2 2005 reg a few days ago. The car drive great, however i have noticed that the RMP counter seems to fluctuate by about 50 RMP every now and again when idling, you are also able to feel and hear the engine sound change slightly. If i turn on the internal fan the RPM also falls slightly. Is this normal?
 
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