Fiesta ST race car project
02-01-2010, 09:40 PM
#42
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lol yep that is true.
Shouldn't really account tyres as build cost as they are consumables, although they last pretty long I've heard.
Shouldn't really account tyres as build cost as they are consumables, although they last pretty long I've heard.
02-01-2010, 11:40 PM
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I've heard a lot of stories about cars being quicker so it must mean they are up to something, usually find the better drivers are at the front anyway lol
04-01-2010, 06:56 PM
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Cheers Ally.
Moved on to some other jobs now that the sealer is all out. Actually feels like I'm making some progress with the car doing different jobs.
Both rear quarters can be removed, this will be covered up by an M Sport fibreglass panel eventually.
N/S Rear (same on both sides though)
All the redundant mounts in the car shell that were for speakers, seats etc to fix to can be removed. I counted the spot welds I'll have to drill out in my head, around 50 approximately.
Firstly though I needed to remove the side impact bars in the door (my rollcage will take up this job, although hoping not to use it for that purpose!). This is made out of pressed steel plate, guessing around 2mm thick.
To get this out you need to remove the electric window motor firstly, this allows you then to ease the window down to let you at some plastic brackets.
Basically there are two of these, one at front of rear and window and it locates through holes in the glass. Once these are out the glass pretty freely moves around although you have to be careful not to drop it.
Glass safely aside, the door card is held on by roughly 10 bolts, several wiring connections to door locks, window motor etc are part of this door card.
Door less door card, you can see the side impact bar..
There are 6 spot welds holding this on, 3 at front of door between hinges:
3 at rear below door lock:
You can drill out spot welds with a normal type drill, however being advised that these particular ones are hard to drill out, what I did was first drill a small hole with a 1.5mm drill, doesn't need to be very deep, in the centre of the weld. This allows me then to use my special spot weld drill. Basically this is a small hole drill, if you know what I mean, it has a spring loaded pin in the middle which sits into the 1.5mm hole I drilled
It takes a lot of patience, slow drill speed as you can break the teeth on the drill quite easily. When I thought I had drilled through the skin of the door, got a hammer and punch and that helped push the bar away from the fixings.
This bar is a really tight fit, as you'd expect, so this means it needs to be cut in the middle to let you ease it out. I was careful here with the grinder, don't want to cut through the door haha.
One door bar, and best of it is, I weighed it and this thing is 2.4kg. So times by 2 doors, 4.8kg. Add that to my sealer - 8kg, weight is being shed nicely..
Moved on to some other jobs now that the sealer is all out. Actually feels like I'm making some progress with the car doing different jobs.
Both rear quarters can be removed, this will be covered up by an M Sport fibreglass panel eventually.
N/S Rear (same on both sides though)
All the redundant mounts in the car shell that were for speakers, seats etc to fix to can be removed. I counted the spot welds I'll have to drill out in my head, around 50 approximately.
Firstly though I needed to remove the side impact bars in the door (my rollcage will take up this job, although hoping not to use it for that purpose!). This is made out of pressed steel plate, guessing around 2mm thick.
To get this out you need to remove the electric window motor firstly, this allows you then to ease the window down to let you at some plastic brackets.
Basically there are two of these, one at front of rear and window and it locates through holes in the glass. Once these are out the glass pretty freely moves around although you have to be careful not to drop it.
Glass safely aside, the door card is held on by roughly 10 bolts, several wiring connections to door locks, window motor etc are part of this door card.
Door less door card, you can see the side impact bar..
There are 6 spot welds holding this on, 3 at front of door between hinges:
3 at rear below door lock:
You can drill out spot welds with a normal type drill, however being advised that these particular ones are hard to drill out, what I did was first drill a small hole with a 1.5mm drill, doesn't need to be very deep, in the centre of the weld. This allows me then to use my special spot weld drill. Basically this is a small hole drill, if you know what I mean, it has a spring loaded pin in the middle which sits into the 1.5mm hole I drilled
It takes a lot of patience, slow drill speed as you can break the teeth on the drill quite easily. When I thought I had drilled through the skin of the door, got a hammer and punch and that helped push the bar away from the fixings.
This bar is a really tight fit, as you'd expect, so this means it needs to be cut in the middle to let you ease it out. I was careful here with the grinder, don't want to cut through the door haha.
One door bar, and best of it is, I weighed it and this thing is 2.4kg. So times by 2 doors, 4.8kg. Add that to my sealer - 8kg, weight is being shed nicely..
06-01-2010, 09:07 PM
#51
PassionFord Post Troll
Cheers Brian.
Yeh the spec is very basic so the emphasis is on driver skill, ST is basically Group N spec, so it's as close to showroom as possible.
The AST suspension kit is around Ł1600 + VAT and the wheels Ł100 each, tyres Ł150 each, consider you need slicks and wets so minimum 8 wheels - soon mounts up.
Yeh the spec is very basic so the emphasis is on driver skill, ST is basically Group N spec, so it's as close to showroom as possible.
The AST suspension kit is around Ł1600 + VAT and the wheels Ł100 each, tyres Ł150 each, consider you need slicks and wets so minimum 8 wheels - soon mounts up.
06-01-2010, 10:56 PM
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I'm hoping it won't be much more than 10k all in, keeping track of what I've spent already it's 4.5k, for car, repairs, painting, cage.
Might need to hold fire on racing the car. Heard you're selling yours Andy?
Might need to hold fire on racing the car. Heard you're selling yours Andy?
07-01-2010, 10:40 AM
#55
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yeah going to have a clear out! going try sell the connect too!
11-01-2010, 03:54 PM
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Have continued on removing some of the redundant metal mounts.
Mount that the rear bench hinges on:
Both removed:
Mounts at the rear of the bench. Think these are maybe for seat belts?
All off:
Still got these to grind down, but I'm wanting to wait till there are loads to grind, save me changing discs on the grinder.
Got the side door mouldings, put these on whilst the cordless drill was on charge. Got some double sided foam tape off ebay, it was ideal for this job, cleaned surfaces with panel wipe then using the heat gun made sure the car body was up to a nice temperature before sticking them on.
Left them overnight with tape to hold them in place.
The result
Mount that the rear bench hinges on:
Both removed:
Mounts at the rear of the bench. Think these are maybe for seat belts?
All off:
Still got these to grind down, but I'm wanting to wait till there are loads to grind, save me changing discs on the grinder.
Got the side door mouldings, put these on whilst the cordless drill was on charge. Got some double sided foam tape off ebay, it was ideal for this job, cleaned surfaces with panel wipe then using the heat gun made sure the car body was up to a nice temperature before sticking them on.
Left them overnight with tape to hold them in place.
The result
12-01-2010, 04:18 AM
#59
www.virtualseason.net
Excellent work, saw you on motors tv a few times in the old fiesta, looking forward to seeing you on it again in this hopefully!
Keep up the good work
Ginge
Keep up the good work
Ginge
12-01-2010, 11:52 AM
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Yeh was that me crashing in my first race? 
Also ended up off the track last year at the Knockhill chicane, whacked another car up the back and it made my car shoot off through the gravel.
Also ended up off the track last year at the Knockhill chicane, whacked another car up the back and it made my car shoot off through the gravel.
18-01-2010, 06:29 PM
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So after my rollcage meant to be turning up last Wednesday, they phoned me to say they didn't have the pictures and instructions ready and it wasn't sent out, was told it'd be sent off on Thursday for Friday delivery.
Got my mum to wait in on Friday (she wanted to go shopping..) and I checked it had been sent - delivery folk phoned later on Friday to say they'd got the package but it only had 2 lines on the address, driver couldn't find us etc. Package turns up today with all the details on it on the rollcage manufacturers headed paper...
Poor effort - hate being spun lies, on both sides, rollcage folk and delivery mob..
Anyway it is here now and all 63 parts have been checked off. Felt like Christmas day unwrapping it!
Foot plates, door gussets, a pillar gussets etc..
Got my mum to wait in on Friday (she wanted to go shopping..) and I checked it had been sent - delivery folk phoned later on Friday to say they'd got the package but it only had 2 lines on the address, driver couldn't find us etc. Package turns up today with all the details on it on the rollcage manufacturers headed paper...
Poor effort - hate being spun lies, on both sides, rollcage folk and delivery mob..
Anyway it is here now and all 63 parts have been checked off. Felt like Christmas day unwrapping it!
Foot plates, door gussets, a pillar gussets etc..
18-01-2010, 08:54 PM
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I'm getting someone else to fit it, guy has done a load of the other ST race cars up here, knows this cage well so should be a doddle to him.
In theory you don't need to be a specialist, just need to know how to weld (I don't
). If you want you can do a weld test and send it back to cage manufacturer to show them you're a competent welder, I'm not sure exactly what this gets, must be certification from them that the cage is installed to their satisfaction. The race regs just really specify the cage must be secured at certain points onto certain plates, thats what the extra plates are for here. 
In theory you don't need to be a specialist, just need to know how to weld (I don't
). If you want you can do a weld test and send it back to cage manufacturer to show them you're a competent welder, I'm not sure exactly what this gets, must be certification from them that the cage is installed to their satisfaction. The race regs just really specify the cage must be secured at certain points onto certain plates, thats what the extra plates are for here.
19-01-2010, 06:31 AM
#64
I'm getting someone else to fit it, guy has done a load of the other ST race cars up here, knows this cage well so should be a doddle to him.
In theory you don't need to be a specialist, just need to know how to weld (I don't ). If you want you can do a weld test and send it back to cage manufacturer to show them you're a competent welder, I'm not sure exactly what this gets, must be certification from them that the cage is installed to their satisfaction. The race regs just really specify the cage must be secured at certain points onto certain plates, thats what the extra plates are for here.
In theory you don't need to be a specialist, just need to know how to weld (I don't
). If you want you can do a weld test and send it back to cage manufacturer to show them you're a competent welder, I'm not sure exactly what this gets, must be certification from them that the cage is installed to their satisfaction. The race regs just really specify the cage must be secured at certain points onto certain plates, thats what the extra plates are for here. I know in our championship you dont need any proof on how the cage is fitted, the scruitineering is apauling you could spot weld the cage together and they wouldnt notice.
20-01-2010, 06:34 PM
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Scrutineering can be a bit hit or miss in my experience - what one guy would let you off with, another would notice. For example I have a camera in the car, some guys never check it to see if it's secured around cage as well, incase the mount breaks so it don't smack you in head.
Last edited by BlairM; 20-01-2010 at 08:09 PM.
20-01-2010, 08:35 PM
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Mate, they'd be going in the bin anyway. PM me your address and I'll stick them in a jiffy bag for you this week - you wanting both of them ?
24-01-2010, 07:06 PM
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Car's now ready to go off for the rollcage being fitted, all the mounts are off and high spots grinded down.
There were two of these mounts, I think these are where the rear seat back would clip in to. Both were absolute horrors to remove (with N/S being a lot worse) due to the number of spot welds, thickness of metal etc. Had to cut a lot out with a cutting disc on the grinder first to enable me to get to the spot welds, then I had to contend with two layers of metal to cut through, especially the N/S.
Mount off, all spots ground down
Spot my mistake here... doh!
Some more of the grinding work.
Dash bar and wheel mounted back in place so car can be moved.
There were two of these mounts, I think these are where the rear seat back would clip in to. Both were absolute horrors to remove (with N/S being a lot worse) due to the number of spot welds, thickness of metal etc. Had to cut a lot out with a cutting disc on the grinder first to enable me to get to the spot welds, then I had to contend with two layers of metal to cut through, especially the N/S.
Mount off, all spots ground down
Spot my mistake here... doh!
Some more of the grinding work.
Dash bar and wheel mounted back in place so car can be moved.
25-01-2010, 04:05 PM
#77
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very cool mate good progress on this im weighing up wether or not to buy a fully built car or not. I wanted to go racing the xr's last season but was made redundant, I have no previous racing experience so wasnt sure if karting is the better route to take. Now karting is gunna cost me at least 4k to get going i reckon. What would you recommend from your experience? Is karting actually worth the time and effort or would i be best off buying a race car and doing some track days?
This question is open to anyone else on here with previous racing experience im a newbie to racing cars but ive wanted to do it since I dabbled with karting when I was a kid just never really had an opportunity untill now. Sorry to spam your thread looks very cool
This question is open to anyone else on here with previous racing experience im a newbie to racing cars but ive wanted to do it since I dabbled with karting when I was a kid just never really had an opportunity untill now. Sorry to spam your thread looks very cool
25-01-2010, 05:50 PM
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very cool mate good progress on this im weighing up wether or not to buy a fully built car or not. I wanted to go racing the xr's last season but was made redundant, I have no previous racing experience so wasnt sure if karting is the better route to take. Now karting is gunna cost me at least 4k to get going i reckon. What would you recommend from your experience? Is karting actually worth the time and effort or would i be best off buying a race car and doing some track days?
This question is open to anyone else on here with previous racing experience im a newbie to racing cars but ive wanted to do it since I dabbled with karting when I was a kid just never really had an opportunity untill now. Sorry to spam your thread looks very cool
This question is open to anyone else on here with previous racing experience im a newbie to racing cars but ive wanted to do it since I dabbled with karting when I was a kid just never really had an opportunity untill now. Sorry to spam your thread looks very cool