Lemon's X47 track ST

[lemonjs]

Hey all!

I've been a lurker for a while but thought I'd show my X47 Fiesta as it stands. It's a 2013 UK spec ST that I've owned for the last 5 years.

It's a mixture of a daily and a track car, although as it gets better on track it gets worse on the road!

Current mods are (updated July 2024):
- Pumaspeed X47 hybrid turbo
- Pumaspeed 330mm big brake kit
- Quaife LSD
- RSport intercooler
- RSport hot and cold turbo pipework
- Milltek turbo back exhaust with 200 cell cat
- Meister R Clubrace coilovers
- Half cage
- Fog light delete for brake ducting
- RSport Baffled sump

It made 336hp on the last dyno run, although it had the stock catback at the time

 

[WannabeST]

Love to see the car getting used. Any pics on the false floor? Curious to the look of it.

 

[lemonjs]

Love to see the car getting used. Any pics on the false floor? Curious to the look of it.

Sure! The floor is plywood with carpet stapled in. There's sound deadening underneath so it's not much louder than having the rear seats in.

 

[WannabeST]

That's amazingly done. I'm not sure if I'll ever get my SE to that level. But when (and I will) upgrade to an ST. I would love a look like that. Beautiful work.

 

[Dpro]

damn nice cage! Nice HP too!

 

[lemonjs]

Not much has happened during the winter - looking forward to the weather improving to get back out on track.

In the meantime I've done some boring jobs. First off was installing solid shifter bushings - this took about 30 minutes and wasn't much hassle.

This is the bracket that needs to be removed, it's held in by 3 x 10mm bolts:



I didn't realise until I'd removed the bracket, but the OEM bushes look to be polyurethane:



Bracket reinstalled with the solid bushes:



After refitting I'm not sure there's any difference. But for £25 and 30 minutes time it's not the end of the world.

I also replaced my street tires with PilotSport 5's in 215/40/17. There's no rubbing at all, although I suspect going any wider would. I also replaced all the pads - the fronts are Pumaspeed racing pads, and the rears are PBS:



Lastly, and most boringly, the OEM battery finally died after 11 years, so in goes a Bosch replacement:

 

[lemonjs]

The exciting news is that next week I'll be heading up to Mountune HQ to have a Quaife LSD fitted.

 

[Woods247]

@lemonjs what are your wheel specs? Thanks

 

[M-Sport fan]

It's bad enough that you got the chance to purchase the 2 doors on that side of the pond, when we were not allowed to have them here!

But then, on top of that, you get offered Michelin Pilots in sizes we will never, ever see over here, as well.

I am almost ready to try to buy those tires from a dealer over there, IF they are even allowed to ship them stateside at all.

Were those gram lights custom drilled/ordered, or is that yet another on the shelf/in stock item we are just not allowed to have here?

 

[lemonjs]

@Woods247 and @M-Sport I got the wheels from Pumaspeed (link here) as they were guaranteed to clear the front brakes. They’re pretty reasonably priced over here and fit the Fist perfectly. They’re rebranded Rays wheels from what I can tell - 17x7.5 ET38.

@M-Sport fan I didn’t realise they weren’t available in the US! Demon Tweaks in the UK have international shipping I believe, could be worth a look.

 

[lemonjs]

Dropped my car off at Mountune HQ this morning for the LSD installation. Their showroom was crazy! Full of built engines, carbon fibre and race sims. I received an email later in the day with some photos of the progress. The guys at Mountune are amazing, can't recommend them enough - the service and comms are next level. I'll be taking the train to collect it tomorrow.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Yeah, sadly for U.S. here, they seem to be almost on their way out of business in the states.

I am not even sure that their Cali location still does actual installs or not anymore (@Dpro, etc.??), and even if they still do, that is ~3K miles from here.

 

[Dpro]

Yeah, sadly for U.S. here, they seem to be almost on their way out of business in the states.

I am not even sure that their Cali location still does actual installs or not anymore (@Dpro, etc.??), and even if they still do, that is ~3K miles from here.

All I know is they would not install a diff unless you bought tit from them and they sold Quaife not Wavtrac. I do remember getting quotes on radiator and intercooler about 5 years ago and their pricing was all over the map depending on who you talked too. It started to go down hill right after Randy Robles left. He was their in house tuner. They are still around but focusing a lot on FoRS’s and Ford Trucks .

 

[lemonjs]

After a week or so driving with the Quaife diff, it's impossible understand why Ford didn't fit it as standard. In hindsight, I should have gotten the diff done before doing the turbo. I have a track day booked in April so I'll get to test it more thoroughly than I can on the road.

Today I swapped the rear beam bushes over to Powerflex black series.

Here's the old ones. I'm not sure if these are in good or bad shape for 11 years as I have no reference:



Getting the old ones out was a massive pain in the arse. I tried to use a press but failed. Ended up cutting them out with a multi tool. Here they are removed before I cleaned everything up:



Finally, new bushes installed:



First impressions are good. The rear feels less bouncy than before, and the ride quality does not seem any worse than the MeisterR coilovers already make it.

 

[Dpro]

After a week or so driving with the Quaife diff, it's impossible understand why Ford didn't fit it as standard. In hindsight, I should have gotten the diff done before doing the turbo. I have a track day booked in April so I'll get to test it more thoroughly than I can on the road.

Today I swapped the rear beam bushes over to Powerflex black series.

Here's the old ones. I'm not sure if these are in good or bad shape for 11 years as I have no reference:

View attachment 59972

Getting the old ones out was a massive pain in the arse. I tried to use a press but failed. Ended up cutting them out with a multi tool. Here they are removed before I cleaned everything up:

View attachment 59973

Finally, new bushes installed:

View attachment 59974

First impressions are good. The rear feels less bouncy than before, and the ride quality does not seem any worse than the MeisterR coilovers already make it.

MeisterR’s do not make for bad ride quality vs stock🤣 ya ask me how I know😂

 

[M-Sport fan]

After a week or so driving with the Quaife diff, it's impossible understand why Ford didn't fit it as standard. In hindsight, I should have gotten the diff done before doing the turbo.

Yes, my biggest complaint about this car is that Ford did not even offer that diff as a extra co$t option, let alone as standard (even bigger point with me than them not offering U.S. a 2 door option, like you, and the rest of the world got ).

 

[lemonjs]

Test fitted a Sparco subframe, runner and side mounts this morning. I need to order some high tensile bolts, a resistor for the airbag, and actually choose a seat. Excuse the mess!

 

[M-Sport fan]

Given the height adjustable end plates, I surmise that you are going with a fixed racing shell seat, and not a recliner, correct?

 

[lemonjs]

Finally got round to ordering a seat, went with a Motamec GT03:



However, I had an absolute disaster trying to fit it. First off, having sliders made the whole thing sit so high that my head touched the roof, so they had to go. Next problem was that the seat sits so far forward that I couldn't even get in the car. I'm not massively tall at 6"1, but this was crazy.

Here's the seat loosely installed while the sliders were still installed:



Without the sliders it sits at an okay height, however the whole assembly needs to sit about 10 inches back. I can't think of any way that I could get this to work without making some custom subframes that allow me to mount the side mounts a lot further back. The factory mounting mounting points seem like they're too far forward.

 

[lemonjs]

Finally got round to fitting the seat. I ended up ditching the sliders and drilling some new holes. I've fitted a 4 point harness and used a 2.2ohm resistor to keep the airbag light away. I'm going to remove the original seat belt when I get time, although this looks like it will be difficult with the cage in the way.

Counting down the weeks to the first track day of the year!



One thing I've always disliked about the Fiesta is how massive the steering wheel is. Now that I have a harness in I'm tempted to swap it out for something smaller without an airbag.