2014 Fiesta OEM+ build

The DNA front brace is a 2-point tubular almost identical to the Pierce. The sheetmetal thing you’re referring to goes farther back where the two OEM braces connect the body to the subframe.

I’m also really happy with my Swave front brace.

OK, I was not sure where that thin DNA brace went on the unibody.

I am wondering if my skid plate 'tightens' things up on the front end of this car when installed.
Most likely not, since it is not tied into the control arm pickup points at all, even though it is bolted to the sub frame.

On first glance I thought that read 'Suave' meaning smooth or good look'n. Second glance it looks like "F-Wave" or "S-Wave"?
Surprised it's made from aluminum.
Being up in Canada, why is your car so remarkably free of rust?
Is it because they don't throw down enough road salt to ensure all the bald tire folks can make it up/down hills?

This must be sarcasm, if it is, I chuckled!

Next step was changing the spark plugs to the Ruthenium NGK (one step colder). NGK Part # 95605

I had previously changed them (around last year) with the OEM heat range, and so out they come to inspect after around one year.


Bought a gapping tool and worked them down to 0.026 as specified by MonsterTuned.


Working with the Pierce bar is slightly more difficult, but still doable no problem.


I think some water infiltrated into the spark plug wells of the engine. How? Good question. The original plugs from 2014 were not rusted.


The tips looked good, however. If I ever reinstall these, I'll make sure to gap them to the OEM spec (I forgot to do that when I installed these).

Forgot you had replaced the front cross member.and control arm assembly.
Yeah the prior part looked like a ship wreck.

Continued my comestic overhaul.

The first order of business was to re-attach the side skirts. Installed all new clips with new double-sided tape. Covered a lot of rock chips before putting back the skirts.




Changed the rear wheel well liner as well.


Front with new SS hardware.

The next big step was replacing my driver-side door. I bought a 2012 regular fiesta door that was not rusted and let me tell you, I was not ready. I realized, halfway through, that I would have to switch over everything, including the electrical harness because of the keyless entry door button.


Here is the door in question. I already started to apply the butyl deadening mats and closed-cell foam on top through the speaker hole. Turns out I had to remove the whole panel, so I had to re-do my job and I covered completely the door.


Old door. You can see the rust on the bottom and side.


Door out!


I had to completely strip the old door and switch over everything to the new ''shell''. This door has been in three hit & runs and repaired with a new skin every time. This is the reason for the rust. Plus, I had to remove the speaker to apply the microfiber & sealant on the door bar because the adhesive they used unglued and was rattling. I also wedged a microfiber in there to dampen the vibrations. Happy to ditch it!


New door installed. This is the damping material I mentioned previously. I did not take a picture, but I completely covered the rest of the interior with deadening and foam.


Taped up the exterior of the door to do a two-stage paint correction, since it was not really all that well maintained. I had fewer scratches on mine.


Before on the worst section.


After. It's rare that you have the chance to work with no door handle!


Final result after a good wash. Very happy, but it took me a good 5-8 hours to do. I took my time and I applied fluid-film in every crack and corner of the door to protect it.


Bonus sunset shot!

Looking snazzy. I have both butyl and the "carpet" sound deadening ready to go in. Did it make any difference in your case?

Yes it does, in two key areas :

1- Sound when closing the door. Solid thunk with no rattles inside.
2- Better bass from the sound system.

It did not improve isolation from road noise because it's really dominated by the wind noise and tire noise on my 2014. I know the latter years have a small protrusion on the front glass elements.

I purchased a used Whoosh V3 intercooler from a forum member here. It arrived in great condition and I installed it. It was my first time doing and intercooler install, and it was fairly straightforward if not for the rusted mounts (more on this later).


A couple of fins were bent. I did my best to straighten them out. There is one thing I was not ready for, the weight! Holy cow this thing is heavy. I'll give it to Ford, their solution was very lightweight. They should have made them 30% larger, but otherwise, it's a very efficient design weight-wise.


The fins in question.


Bumper off. You can see the damage that 139k kms and 10 winters does to a stock intercooler.


Yikes!


My intercooler mount shredded after removing it, necessitating a fabricated plate solution. Used some CAD (PAD) cardboard(paper) assisted design for the plate.


New sheet metal plates in the shape of the interior of the bracket.


Sanded down the OEM bracket. The plan is to drill a hole in the plate, then spot weld it in place.


Just like so.


Painted, cured and fluid-filmed. Ready for the installation.


Everything bolted back up. I would say this is a 100% stock looking mod. No one will ever know (but me).

Other than the shenanigans from crafting the bracket, the intercooler installation is fairly straightforward. The front fender bolts take time and will definitely get a few scrapes on your fingers. Ready for the ADAPT-X tune!

Continuing my rust overhaul adventures, the next stop was the exhaust. The car has started to develop this sound when cold started. It really sounds like an exhaust leak. So I found an exhaust semi-locally (2hr drive) that had ''only'' 80k kms, but was in much better shape than mine.


Exhaust in question. The main things I was looking for was intact front hanger and clean-ish boxes.


I'm using a mix of acid to clean and passivate the rust on the boxes and on the pipes leading up to them. It worked really well. I also treated a good portion of the underside of the car. It produces a white stain occasionally. Here is the recipe : View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZVSMQLPHNo



I really spent a long time brushing the rust with various metal brushes, and applying the acid. It's not perfect, but you'll see, it's much, much better.


The side exposed to the road is not bad as well.


After a couple of passes of VHT Flameproof header paint. I only had a small portion of the paint can left, unfortunately.


I did take the time to spray extra paint into the folded seams of the resonator and the muffler. Also on the side panels where rust can infiltrate.


Here is the old, original 140k kms, 10yo exhaust. Wow!


Life was not easy for this bad boy.


The resonator was absolutely COOKED. This is why I thought I had an exhaust leak.


Here are the two side by side. I decided to cut at the same spot.


Rear portion installed. I did this alone without help and it was a struggle.


Cleaned up the cut surface.


I only had these clamps available locally, but I ordered a better version that will replace this. I trimmed the bolts in the mean time.


Only thing missing is the front exhaust rubber isolator. Since the original exhaust's one had fallen off, I did not have one on hand. However, it should arrive soon.


New bolts, new gasket.

Now, for the most important part... Did it solve my exhaust leak? No it did not. When I started up the car after this 3h endeavor, I was met with the same sound. I am happy with the work I was able to do alone within about three hours, but it was not a cathartic ending, unfortunately. Some of you may have seen my other post when I have two videos of the sound on cold starts.

I'm bringing the car to the dealership tomorrow for a (surely pricey) estimation of what is wrong. I've been let down by local garages. I'd rather fork up 100-200$ to have the issue diagnosed correctly and make the repair myself. Updates on this soon!

https://www.google.com/search?q=site:fiestastforum.com+cerakote

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=cerakote+exhaust+coating


.

^^^Yeah, but it would probably not be worth it to Cerakote a factory exhaust system, especially a used one which had to be extensively media/bead blasted first in order to even consider it prepped for Cerakoting.

The coating isn't expensive and from what someone here or/and on a video said, it can be placed over a used exhaust. Obviously your exhaust can't be crumbling and rust will need to be cleaned/treated and cleaned again.

Personally, I like the stock exhaust as it is relatively quiet. Loud exhaust just aren't my taste. My motorcycles have had stock exhausts.

I've explored cerakoting in the past, but the amount of prep needed to coat an already rusting exhaust appears to be quite intense (at least to get good results).

Following what this gentleman has shown, I think for me, it may not be worth it. However, a new exhaust? Strongly agree.

Big update, I spent the entirety of the last weekend working on this, and I can now say that the exhaust leak I was experiencing is now completely fixed.


As a refresher, I suspected that there was a leak at the level of the exhaust manifold. The broken stud pictured here was the first clue.


I wanted to have the most space possible because I knew I had to extract the broken stud. So out went the subframe assy.


Here is the absolute horrible job the local shop did trying to fix the leak. They butchered my work, and I was incredibly angry at this situation for a good month after finding out. I got a refund at the end, but yeah.


After a couple of hours later, I liberated the engine of it's manifold and turbo. We can clearly see the right-most exhaust port covered in soot.


It's at this point I realized I had two studs broken in the block. Oh boy... You can also clearly see the soot where the leak was.

I was really lucky to have the help of my father. He worked on drilling and extracting the studs on the block and later on the turbo manifold. He even made a drilling guide adapter that slotted into the block to drill square into the studs.


While he was working on this, I started to jig up the exhaust.


After another hour, I transferred the flange off of my old exhaust to the newer one the shop chopped up.


I also had to jig up the exhaust hanger because I had to cut much lower that I thought because the shop inserted the flex pipe a good 1.5in into the ID of the OEM exhaust.
You can see my small welds. I essentially tacked-welded the entire circumference of the pipe. I could not do continual welds because I was burning through the material. The metal was thinner because of corrosion.


At last, my dad managed to get one stud out completely. The other one he could not, he was forced to tap the hole with the old metal still in there. We could not take the chance to torque the extractor more, fearing having a hardened steel part stuck into the head. That would have been much more horrible.


After cleaning both the mating surfaces of the block and the manifold, I installed a new gasket, new studs where needed and all new nuts.
I torqued at around 70-80% the torque value for the stud that we re-tapped. I did not have confidence in a full torque going by the feel of it.


I also broke every single bolt off of the manifold side of the turbo, all three...


Which naturally led to my father helping me drill through and re-taping the threads.


Just before all of this, I installed a DV+ and inspected the turbo. I wished I had a new oil feed line, the old was a bit crusty. I did have a new bolt for it, though.


I installed the turbo back on with new coolant lines and a new oil return line. Torqued all the nuts to spec as well.


Downpipe installed, RMM back on with pretty much all the pipes. And yes, I did not forget the hose clamp on the turbo inlet.


I also copied the @Dialcaliper design for the crossover tube. Even used pyrogel. The only thing different is that I ordered the 10 mm thickness. It's not the final version, I covered the exposed section where you see the insulation at the level of the bracket.


Subframe back on, with the new down pipe, newly welded hanger and flange. My jig fixture was 1/4in off in the rotation axis, so the bottom of the resonator is not perfectly parallel to the ground. It's very close to OEM, though.

Overall, I'm very happy about the result. The first start after doing all of this was uneventful, which was the desired outcome. I also primed the oil into the turbo before starting up the engine.

Quiet as before, smoother than before as well. I worked two 14h days on this, while taking my time, but working through all the problems one by one. I'm thankful for my father's help because the car would still be on the lift without him.

The car smoked for a good 20–30 minutes after it's first start. It seemed to be coming from the manifold area. The smoke was white and close to odorless. It did not smell like oil burning, but closer to coolant burn-off. After the initial smoke, the engine is since smoke free.

Next post will be about the suspension refresh I did (before the exhaust work).

I would have passed out from all the swearing that would have occurred in my garage during this...

Last September, I replaced the struts all around with new top mounts, bearings and bolts. I ordered a full set (2 front), (2 rear) for 350 shipped from Steeda, which, I think, is a great deal for new quality struts on all corners.

I also swapped my 2014MY springs, which have a rate of 171lb/in at the front and 143lb/in rear for the post 2016+ springs, which have a rate of 154lb/in front and 131lbs/in rear.


They are still a twin-tube design like the OEM dampers, but they don't have the ears for the mass-tuned dampers.


Swapping out the components from the OEM struts is easy as well.


If anyone else is doing this, these bump stops and bellows do not fit, don't order them.


For the struts, these are actually the right parts.


My original dampers were pretty tired.


Absolutely horrible, in fact.


Assembled the cleaned parts and new replacements ones, with the 2019 springs.


First time using a spring compressor. The energy accumulated into these springs is quite scary. I took my time, leveling each compressor on each side. Went smooth.


Completed strut.


Installed and fluid-filmed with new bolts, torqued to spec (torque to yield). If I start messing more with struts, I'll order the bolts from Dialcaliper.

Build quality looks to be at least equivalent to the OEM in my eyes. Strut travel is the same as OEM as well. I wanted to wait a couple of months at least to gather my thoughts on these struts, so here are my thoughts:

Disclaimer : I have also swapped the springs to the softer ones, so I changed two variables, not one.

Driving impressions : The Koni STR.T (orange) struts offer a better ride quality overall than the OEM ones. The valving is softer, but I have not dynoed the shocks yet. My feeling is that the car now ''breathes'' better (more) over bumps. It feels like the car uses more travel and there is more body roll. I don't find this body roll offensive, but you feel the weight transfer more when entering a corner. So you lose some of the initial turn-in feel that makes this car feel like a go-kart. You still feel small road imperfections, they just don't enter the cabin as strongly as before. It's not a magical cure for ride quality, but it is noticeably better than stock.

The subjective description would be that the OEM Struts feel like jumping in the air and landing on your heels with your legs straightened. The STR.T struts feel like landing on your toes with your knees bent. I spend half my driving time in the cold and in the snow here in Montréal, so the added softness is good for me. In the cold, the OEM dampers felt like riding on bricks. I'll update my impressions after this winter season.

I previously posted this in Dialcaliper's thread, but wanted to cross post this here as a reference.

I measured the weight of my car two week-ends ago to compare to the corner weights that were available on the forums here and to compare.

Here is my setup:

Full stock interior (with recaro), full tank of gas, essentially daily driver configuration. 2014MY with sunroof. 185/60/15 winter tires with 15x6 OEM ford steelies. Koni orange dampers all around, stock 2019 springs. Stock exhaust.

Front
Whoosh v3 intercooler
Suave 4point bar
Ramair crossover pipe
Whoosh hotside pipe
Butyl 80mil sound insulation in front doors

Rear
Half-size steelie spare tire
Mishimoto rear brace
10 lbs roadside kit emergency bag (right rear of trunk)
Full trunk (but not hatch) butyl 80mil sound insulation

I used the split-weight method of weighting the car.



It's also an interesting way of seeing the difference in droop travel from the front to the rear.

Using an Amazon 660lbs package scale and with this beam method, I was able to measure with a (+-5lbs) accuracy each corner of the car.

Here is an example:


You can see that the front left corner with no driver in it is 407.1lbs. After the driver and the driver+pass measurements, the scale showed 418.0lbs, indicating a shift of 10lbs, (so +5lbs). I averaged both these results. This indicates a good +-10 lbs of potential variance for each axle (after timing the result by two, per the lever arm).

Did three measurements, empty, 160lbs driver and 160lbs driver + 160lbs passenger. Here are my results. You should apply a +-10lbs measurement interval for each corner, and in total, a ±40lbs interval for the total weight.



From empty to one 160lbs driver, it's interesting to see that the delta from the previous is very close (157.8lbs), but adding a 160lb passenger registers as an increase of 194lbs (34lbs too high). Still in the expected variance, however.