yes they were only just too big so thought it would be easy to make them fit, well it wasn't they are as hard as a diamond!! started using cloth then a file onto a grinding wheel and then a cutting disk and it still took an hour plus on each, found that the port holes in the exhaust manifold gasket are the correct size so just kept going until I could get the bottom of the strut to go through. I went with ta technics as I fitted a set to my puma with no problems and I have to say that once fitted I am very happy with them, they have just reduced the speed on the road I live on to 20 mph with lots and lots of bloody speed humps which both cars go over with no crashes or bangs etc although the exhaust on the puma does hit them if you don't get it right.

The exhaust manifold is listed for the 1.8 and the 2.0 but both cars use different gearboxes, had the same problem on mk5 escorts, they fitted fine on a standard car but not on my xr3i which had a mtx gearbox. Think I should have gone for a st170 version but that would mean fitting a complete new exhaust as well. As I said though the quality for the price is very good