1982 Renault 18 Reviews

Intermittent electrical failure; got stranded a couple of times, but car started again hours later. Remained a mystery.

Got harder to start in the cold as it got older.

Very, very comfortable car.

Not fast (max I got was 143km/h - 90mph) but fine around town.

Sedan still good looking after all these years.

Engine reached 150,000 miles (240.000 km) and felt like stronger than new.

1) The wiper motor gave up in December 1999 (when the car had covered 135,430 miles).

2) One night (during July 2001) me and three friends were out for a drive in the car. We were going along a narrow country road with thick hedges (and some stone walls). A cow suddenly appeared out of a hole in a hedge. I slammed on the brakes and pulled up the handbrake. The car slid on all four wheels before veering off to the left and crashing though a hedge. I quickly selected reverse gear and slowly reversed the car out. I got out to look at the car and could see that I'd broken the nearside headlight and indicator, cracked the front bumper, and shattered part of the front grille. Fortunately I didn't burst the radiator.

All in all, it's a very reliable car.

The handling is precise, although the car might swap ends when braking heavily from speed in the wet.

Heater unit failed to produce warm air.

No other faults.

This must be one of the most under-rated cars of all time. Sure, without upkeep, the bodywork suffered from some perforation; but then no worse than anything else I'd owned.

It has provided completely reliable, ultimately comfortable and stylish transport for my family as they grew. Peformance of my car is not very impressive, but with unbelievable fuel economy I prefer the latter. After all who wants to burn-up in an 18!

Those armchair seats must be the envy of every other manufacturer in 1982; and still are. Driving position is fine with simple ergonomics. the engine is accessible though parts are a bit 'pricey'.

Rust in the floor and sills.

The boot lid is at the moment quite hard to close - a rear end smash might have occurred sometime in the past.

The seats were badly worn, but I fitted seat covers over them for the time being as good second hand seats for this make of car seem quite scarce now.

There were some problems with the electrical earth connections.

The overall performance is nothing to get excited about, but after eight to ten seconds, it can reach a top speed of 100mph!

The handling is acceptable, but power steering is a must, especially when parking the car.

The seats are very comfortable (they feel very like armchairs) and the interior offers quite a lot of space, even for medium-sized people who have to sit in the back seat.

The boot is reasonably large, with 396 litres of luggage space. The only two bad points for the boot are that the loading sill is far too high and that half the normal size of the boot is taken up by the fuel tank, which is placed behind the back seat!

Like most old French cars, this car has some typically French quirks (remember, the following is in a right-hand drive car) - the ignition switch is located at the left side of the steering wheel, along with the wiper switch; there are two stalks at the right side of the steering wheel - the short one is for the direction indicators, and the long one is for the lights and the horn!

Operating the steering column controls (especially the light switch) takes a bit of getting used to. If you turn the end of the switch 90 degrees and move it down one position the dashboard lights and parking lights come on. Move it down once more and the dip beam lights come on, and when you move it down again the main beam lights come on.

I'll never sell this car as it has a lot of character as well as being cheap to run and easy to maintain.

Partially due to a lot of city traffic, the synchro of 2nd gear gave up. The car now has a second hand gearbox from another Renault 18.

The radiator was replaced. So were all the shock absorbers, the coil springs of the back suspension and the clutch. All brakes have been overhauled.

For some odd reason, the clutch cable broke three times.

Corrosion is an issue that has to be attended to. You have to tackle it at an early stage (which I did), otherwise the body work of your 18 will slowly disintegrate.

Very spacious, comfortable and reliable car. It has the best car seats I ever sat on in my life!!!

The 1647 cc engine is very reliable and gives sufficient power. It never let me down once.

If you have a model without power steering (which I believe applies to most 18s), then parking the car in a tight spot gives you a nice body workout :-)

The car has rather soft suspension, which is great on straight roads, but lousy in curves. However in terms of comfort, performance and reliability, it can still compete with all current models in its class.