1.1 Zetec power upgrades

[Nitrogen]

Hello all this is my first post
I bought a 2018 Fiesta Zetec 1.1 about 3 years ago and it is my first car hence why I am not wanting to simply sell it and get a new one sentimental value and all.
It seems to have a serious lack of power though not sure if this is due to wear and tear so is actually slower or if it just feels slower.
Anything obvious that could be making it lose power?
It comes stock with a whopping 85 bhp and would like to get a power increase for it. Preferably not engine swapping it or turbo charging as the insurance quote doing these doubles if not more.
So what would the best options be to increase the performance I know that it is not going to get to anything crazy but an extra 30-40 would be nice to have.
I have looked at Cat backs, cold air intake (seems to be a lot of debate if these even work), throttle body upgrades, camshaft upgrade etc but all are quite pricy.
What would be the best bang for the buck upgrades to actually get more power for a naturally aspirated engine?

Thanks

 

[econoboxrocks]

I'd really just save my pennies and buy a car with more power.

 

[Handy Andy]

Well, it is worth a look



It's a 3-popper - meaning it's not a big beast nor would it run smoothly when it comes to being at idle - being that the typical 4-cylinder had only to rotate 180 degrees before the next power stroke, in this and any 3-cylinder car - that translates into 270 degrees before the next power stroke. If you don't understand what that means, I'm referring to the typical 4-stroke motor reciprocating engine - meaning there is an intake, compression, power, exhaust strokes - each cylinder does this in 360 X 2 rotation meaning 720 degrees of rotation before the next identical stroke can occur - so 3 other cylinders and the flywheel and the harmonic balancer of the opposite side - are using energy stored or gained - then released to make the engine work

There are several advantages to owning a 3-cylinder engine - main one being that they are efficient. The cost effectiveness becomes evident when it's expensive to buy fuel.

They work - but not very smooth in idle - they "shake" their mounts because of the power stroke is occurring at an uneven or non-axial direction of bore and stroke direction. So, the smoother idle is from the up down motion of a 4-cyliner being 180 degrees, and the V8 being 90 degrees but with offset to every 90 degrees of rotation is power for torque. V6's are similar but their power stroke is 120 (120 x 6 = 720 degrees) - a little less than 180 which helps in torque, but still has some shake to dampen.

No, I do know - I've owned a 3-cylinder car before, Chevy Sprint (GEO Metro) 3-cyl from Suzuki - and I really did not mind the gas mileage. But it is not a sprinter-type of car - it is something more like a sedan or larger station wagon when it comes to action behind the pedal to get it to move. The 5 speed set for it is ok, but I would have liked more "overdrive" gear to help in commutes.

Another concern comes up in this, being that the level of power required to motivate a vehicle that has to meet safety standards and be crash worthy adds weight to anything that requires some sort of reinforcement for protection of it's occupants. The Sprint was a very small car, and got the gas mileage that it did, because of the Power to weight ratio it had. It even came in Turbo - which made it an expensive mistake for some people that thought having a small fast car was worth the effort.

What killed that car was the deer that ran into the road - a 8-point buck - and it left behind part of an antler inside the passenger door.

These 3-cylinder engines can get "buzzy" due to the level of power they are limited in producing - you basically have a 1 liter bottle of air your trying to get power out of. So it's not a torque monster - but it is capable of things that other cars are not as efficient at.

You just have to be patient.

 

[econoboxrocks]

Another concern comes up in this, being that the level of power required to motivate a vehicle that has to meet safety standards and be crash worthy adds weight to anything that requires some sort of reinforcement for protection of it's occupants. The Sprint was a very small car, and got the gas mileage that it did, because of the Power to weight ratio it had. It even came in Turbo - which made it an expensive mistake for some people that thought having a small fast car was worth the effort.

I always liked small fast cars. My first one was this:

Not mine, but same color and red interior.
It was no rocket, but it made just over 100 hp and tq. Glad I never got in a wreck with it. Didn't even have airbags. The thing was built to fall apart, and it eventually did.

Just got back from a 4500 mile road trip in the FiST. It's a bigger car, and weighs 700 lbs. more, and it gets better mileage. I don't think I have to go into the power, handling, braking and safety comparisons. It is king of the road trip; easy to drive fast, and very reliable. It's not working that hard at 100 mph. The Colt could barely hit that.

Still, I have fond memories of that little Colt. Did a lot of road trips with that, too. Perfect for 2 people and all their stuff. Everything was slow in the 80s.