Learn me: Renault Alliance GTA

racerdave600 said:

I'll put it this way, RUN AWAY!!!!!  My brother bought one when it was a year old, and I think in the 4 years he owned it he drove it twice, and both times ended with a ride with a nice man and a flatbed.  I was in it one of those times and remember absolutely nothing remarkable about it.  For most cars I can think of nice things to say about them, this is the exception.  It was poorly built, poorly designed, and cheap.  Those are not good combinations.  I would think age has not added to the appeal.  Just mentioning the name Renault to my brother sends him to therapy.  He was young, had a loan on it, drove it twice, and after it was paid off hauled it to the junkyard because no one would buy it.  Yeah, it was that bad.

I seem to have broken the "go for it" trend to this thread.  Yeah, that was my memory of it too.

Wretched is the only term I can think of to describe this thing jstein77.    I should probably also add that there was much discussion with the local dealer and Renault themselves about this thing, and even a couple of lawyers involved.  Let's just say it was a mess with no happy ending.

My family had a regular Alliance for many years. Dead nuts reliable for over a decade, comfy suspension, lots of grip considering the lean angles it could generate, cool rocker front seats, and slow as balls. Always wanted a GTA version, as they were much more fun to drive. But I grew up in a Renault family, with 2 4CVs, a Dauphine, and a Caravelle, so I'm kind of biased towards interesting French cars.

Let's see.  A 30 year old car built when American car quality was at its lowest in a cooperative effort between an American car company that was never known for good build quality in the best of times and a French car company known for quirky but unreliable cars (in the US anyway).  What could go wrong?

I have no experience with the GTA version but the GM dealer I worked at in the '80s took in a clean, low mileage Alliance on trade and when it didn't sell moved it into the service loaner fleet where it proved so unreliable that we eventually sent it to auction in pieces because even our used car guy felt guilty about pawning it off on another dealer as a running car.

^^^ then again, the one I’m looking at has survived 30 years. I guess they weren’t all junk.

In reply to Joe Gearin :

If you have time check out the history on Bobby Nelson’s Cheese Shop.   Pro Wrestler that opened a cheese place in Kenosha.  

https://m.facebook.com/pages/Bobby-Nelson-Cheese-Shop/124192294301985

Rear suspension is transverse torsion bar, and if you move the trailing arms one spline you will need to cut over four coils off the front springs to match.  Looks sweet that way; rides horrible.

All I can add is that I worked at a Renault dealer when they were new. I drove an 85 VW GTI at the time. The GTA handled and performed very similar. I can't attest to Durability 

I do have a friend they had an 83 encore his parents bought it new he drove it until about the year 2000 or so I worked on it and Boston and Oakland California it was a hell of a good car for his family I worked out of toward the end of its life I replace the thermocouple with a switch to manually turn on the fan I did that in Boston just before he drove it to Oakland

LanEvo said:

^^^ then again, the one I’m looking at has survived 30 years. I guess they weren’t all junk.

Good point.

I’m a big fan of the GTA but there are not many left. I have owned one and driven/worked on a few others. Important takeaways:

• Nobody knows the exact numbers but everyone seems to agree that roughly 2000 coupes and 1000 convertibles were built for 1987 only. They were not priced very competitively when new which is a big reason they didn’t take off.
• Most are off the road because of either rust or timing belt failure. The belt and tensioner have been NLA in the US for some time because the 2.0 F3R engine was only used in the GTA, only for 1987, and Renault gave up on America when Georges Besse was murdered that year. Do NOT trust timing belt/tensioner part numbers from Rock Auto or any other US-based parts house, they will send you 1.7 parts and you will ram your pistons into the valves due to the different tooth count. Get the parts from Europe (IIRC Clio & Espace used the same belt/tensioner) or talk to one of the Renault Club US guys on Facebook.
• They handle very well and had a lot of tire for their time. Snappy lift-off oversteer with the torsion bar rear. You can fit bigger wheels (4x100) and tires but need to be careful with width and offsets to fit in the rear wheel wells. They are LIGHT though, a hair over 2000lbs IIRC.
• There were performance upgrades like cams and headers back in the day but most of that stuff is long gone now. However there is power on the table with the 2.0 due to the terrible intake design and restrictive exhaust. The injection system is Renix TBI, people have fitted Jeep throttle bodies and replaced the dryer hose intake with real piping for some gains, and a larger exhaust from the manifold collector back is a huge help as well.
• I have seen many for sale over the years with sellers thinking the manual transmission is bad due to shifting or “missing gear” issues, really all that happens is the bushings get sloppy and the linkage falls apart, super easy fix if you’re clever.
• The interiors are actually pretty nice and comfortable with good seats and a great steering wheel. French cars tend to get that right.
• Odd parts like GTA-specific trim, window regulators, etc are NLA but by and large the core mechanical stuff is available. These were sold in Europe as the Renault 9 for many many years with different drivetrains and almost everything comes from the Renault parts bin (such as the timing belt/tensioner). I think GTA front brake rotors are NLA in the US these days but were used in Europe on the SuperCinq so you’re good there.
• The Renault Club US Facebook group is your friend. There is a small but passionate community, not many of them are performance guys but they have fixes and parts sources for just about anything.

When I had my GTA I had quite a bit of performance info compiled that is now lost to the sands of time. I have probably forgotten more than most people could ever learn about these since a lot of the info disappeared in the late 2000’s. Nobody really cares about these cars, though they are weird and fun. Growing up in Wisconsin, wrenching on Renaults in my high school years was a way of life.

I would own another but a Peugeot 405 Mi16 is more my speed these days.

I think they look a bit. like the cool Audi 4000 quattros of the day

I read this thread, and I think the same thing that I think while I'm thanking someone for telling me my Fairmont is cool: "DON'T YOU REMEMBER THE STEAMING PILE OF CRAP YOU THOUGHT THIS CAR WAS WHEN IT WAS FIVE YEARS OLD!?!"