refactoring: changing tables names

I need to change some table names, substitute some with views and
duplicate others.

As a first experiment I was planning to create a view that clone a
table and then rename the occurrences of the table name with the
view where needed finally change the definition of the view.

Am I going to incur in any significant slowdown accessing the table
indirectly?

Later I'll have to rename tables that have associated sequences,
pk/fk and are referenced in functions etc... etc...

Any good list of advices?

Is there any tools that works with postgresql that can help me?

thanks

--
Ivan Sergio Borgonovo
http://www.webthatworks.it