New guy, w/ST swapped SFE

[Cody004]

Hey, I’m new here, but I’ve had 6 fiestas over the last years.

My first was a Magnetic Metallic 2016 ST, which I picked because I wanted a low key color, w/Recaros, navigation, silver calipers, and no sunroof.

I had it for about a year, put 20k miles on it, and then broke my Collarbone pretty severely, mountain biking. The payments for the car were about the same as the payments for the surgery, so I sold the car after acquiring my 3rd Fiesta, a 2014 tuxedo ST that had been crashed lightly and had a blown airbag in the passenger side .

The second one was a 2015 S Hatch, which had smashed a curb pretty hard and broke the transmission. I bought and repaired it and sold shortly before I broke my collarbone.

I still have the Tuxedo ST, it’s nearly fully repaired now, and it’s a lot of fun, but I may sell it soonish. I had planned on keeping it to replace my grey one, but…

I then found a wrecked 2014 Oxford White ST, and got it for $1500 without the engine, but with everything else. The bumpers, skirts, spoiler, door handles, headlights and taillights were good as was one door and the hatch. The rest of the body was destroyed. All of the mechanical, electrical, etc was good other than airbags.

I found enough used/secondhand parts to hobble together a 1.6 Ecoboost, with low mile stock internals, new injectors, gaskets, water pump, timing set etc for next to nothing.

I then found a 2014 Oxford White SFE, with a blown 1.0 Ecoboost, which I got for basically free after I pulled the 3cylinder and gave all those parts back to its previous owner for a swap they were planning. This shell was really clean, no dents or scratches, no bumpers or lights, and it only made sense to do the full ST swap to it.

Last summer I did the entire conversion. Sat the donor next to the shell, and meticulously swapped every single part that was different from the ST to the SFE, but I decided to keep the tan interior from the SFE, so I had to rewire the headliner, center console, and dashboard for the keyless stuff, the auto climate control, and the sync3 that I had aquired for it.

The car has been my daily for about 9 months now, and is really nice, drives exactly like my 2016 ST did, but I am into the entire project for less than 20% of what I spent on the ‘16.

I recently just swapped to the pre-facelift nose and tail lights, as I needed the ST front bumper to finish repairing my black ST. Im actually kind of liking the rounder more polished look. If I could find a 3dCarbon front lip for the early bumper, I’ll probably keep it like this. The intercooler fits behind the bumper fine, and it looks like I’ll have room to upgrade to a thicker one when I’m ready to spend more money on it.

I know I’m going to need to add some more cooling soon, and I have a few plans in the works to focus on more airflow and some ducting, and I’m not opposed to extracting heat out from the hood either. I have a set of Cosworth Escort Hood vents (Ken Block signed even!) that I think would look cool, or do something like the M-Sport super2000 hood vents.

I also just bought a 2011 S Sedan, which has a terrible interior, blown shocks, squealing brakes, and two slipping clutches. I think I’m going to swap the Tan SFE interior into it, convert to power windows, along with a spare set of ST suspension I have, the old SFE brakes which were fairly new, and either replace the clutches, or possibly do a 5 speed swap and sell the selectshift
TCM/Transmission.

At that point I’ll probably put a black interior in my SFE, along with the set of Good Recaro’s that I have lying around.

I have a lot of ST spare parts around because I’ve also parted a few out that were then turned into rally cars.

enough words… Pictures?

 

[SyntheticAtmosphere]

You must be able to disassemble and reassemble these little cars in your sleep by now, lmao!

Is that your 68 Torino GT I saw foto bombing? I even like the colour.

 

[scotman]

Welcome to the forum. Nice group of Fiesta’s! Several people here have both the basic and ST versions of Fiesta.

 

[Cody004]

You must be able to disassemble and reassemble these little cars in your sleep by now, lmao!

Is that your 68 Torino GT I saw foto bombing? I even like the colour.

I’m pretty intimately familiar with the Fiestas at this point. I have been servicing, building and prepping fiesta rally cars for several years now, and I couldn’t resist the temptation to own them after a short while.

I’ve had 50+ cars, including 16 Escorts, 4 NB1 Miata’s, a few Probes and mx3’s, and a slew of other fun primarily Fords and Mazdas, plus a couple old turbo Subarus, a lifted TDI golf, and an MR2 .

The fiesta is a natural progression for the others, as they’re drying up, and the fiesta is becoming abundantly affordable. It also fills the spot I’ve had in my heart for the Escorts and Miatas, simultaneously, and it’s more comfortable with better fuel economy.

And yep! That’s my 68 Torino GT S-Code Fastback in Gulfstream Aqua! Poor thing hasn’t driven in about 5 years, I plan to change that this summer. Just needs the headers dropped so I can finish pulling the engine to inspect and re-seal it, then go through the fuel system and brakes, and replace the 13 year old Mickey Thompsons. I also have a 79 Fairmont Wagon!

 

[Cody004]

Welcome to the forum. Nice group of Fiesta’s! Several people here have both the basic and ST versions of Fiesta.

Thank you for the Welcome! I definitely know why several have both! The Fiesta is a fantastic platform, that responds to modifications well, but is totally fun in stock form as well. Fairly reliable (other than the typical DPS6 issues) and quite Economical. I’d like to get my hands on a Mazda2 and play around with that at some point too! The idea of shaving a few hundred pounds is tempting.

I have a few projects in mind for this platform, including a 4 wheel monoblock 4pot/2pot big brake kit (should be sub $1400 for all 4 corners, and will be available for ST’s and base fiestas) targeting 305x28mm directionally vented front rotors, and 280x16mm directionally vented rear rotors, will barely fit some 15” wheels, but also have enough capacity for big power track cars with the thick directionally vented rotors. It looks like they may weigh less than stock brakes too! Also working on a manual shifter for ib5 and IB6 cars that I think a lot of people will really like. I already make vac bagged Kevlar composite guards to protect fuel tanks for the rally cars, and I’m working on Kevlar floor shields and rocker covers too.

 

[scotman]

I really enjoyed my 86 to 88 Escort GT’s. They weren’t very powerful. But, they are so lightweight and they have a four wheel independent suspension. The horsepower and torque deficit could be addressed by the owner.
The Fiesta is not an uncomplicated car in comparison to the Escort GT and Focus. The instrument panel is very bulky to handle, thanks to the airbag structure.
The Fiesta body tub is easily twice as rigid as a 2001 Focus body tub. The twist beam rear axle is the only real letdown about it.
The Fiesta is a great project car that could still have some daily driver use ability.

 

[Handy Andy]

Good to know I'm not the only one whom likes the earlier slope nose front.

Nice work, wild to see you were able to pull out the undercarriage motor mount assembly to swap. I appreciate seeing this!
Please keep this going, as those photos can help the rest of us understand the innards of the frame and body - BEFORE we have to learn the process by the method of "As We Go" after the damage has been done!

Your Tuxedo work is outstanding - they are only missing the Corsage and the Boutonnière!