'88 F*rd Festiva Autocross/Track/Daily Driver Build

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by rusty76

That is so crazy you can pressure wash seats like that. Never considered that. Awesome. Also today I saw one of those Capris rolling down the road. I’ve never seen one in person till today. Lol.

Yeah a friend of mine told me he had done it on one of his cars so I tried it and it worked great. There's still a few Capri's on the road around here, hard to find a running XR2 that isn't beat, or either the owner has kept it in mint condition and thinks its work a billion dollars lol.

Originally Posted by 69gmcc10

What a difference!!! It is amazing how much human slime and dirt can accumulate in a vehicle, even one that was taken care of and loved. I have pulled out a filthy carpet and power washed it before, but never done it to the seats. the carpet took like 2 days to totally dry, so I can only imagine how long the foam in the seats took to dry completely. When it comes to seats and light carpet stains I "borrow" my wife's carpet cleaner vacuum with the upholstery attachment, it makes a big difference. I am impressed you keep finding theses gems, all the Festivas I see for sale or see driving around are beat to within an inch of their life.

It works great as long as you can get them dry quickly so they don't sour. I stick them in front of the heater in the shop and point a fan at them. Most of the Festiva's around here are trashed, it's rare to find them in decent shape. The nice ones sell quickly if they're not overpriced. There is a very nice GL Sport (top trim level) that gets reposted in Knoxville every few days that has been for sale for over a year. Would be a decent deal if it wasn't automatic.





Here are a few I've spotted locally, they're almost all super rough. I'd love to track down the white car with the red stripe and try to buy it, it's an '89 L Plus. I had a guy stop me in a parking lot after seeing my white Festiva and tell me that he knows the owner of a white Festiva "just like yours" with a red stripe, and they were going to scrap it but decided to try to sell it for $400 instead. I showed him the pic I took and he said it was the same car, but then he wouldn't put me in touch with the owner...











Vid of the carpet being cleaned, the pics didn't really show how nasty it was.

Pressure Washing Fords Festiva Carpet - YouTube

[theastronaut]

I finally found a Capri XR2 in pretty good shape to use a donor! It was running up until 2-3 months ago when the owner added a boost controller and possible put a hole in a piston. He's not sure exactly what happened but begin to tear it down and figured out he was in over his head. It has around 80K miles and was meticulously maintained until the last owner bought it in 2017. According to service records it only had 58k miles in 2014.





I also bought a Festiva parts car with an engine and five speed for $150 bucks a couple months ago. It's an efi car so I could easily swap the turbo Capri engine in it. The shell is solid and straight, so it would make a great stripped out track car.




You can see Charlie's turbo Capri swapped track festiva beggining around 4:00 minutes here.

ESTUNED at INDE Motorsports Ranch, E46 M3 Chasing...

This past weekend I swapped the white car back to it's track setup now that its warm enough for the tires to stick. I also installed a NOS Festiva Motorsport street/strip cam, so now it pulls to 7,000 rpm.

[rusty76]

Really cool. You’ve got me looking at Festivas all the time now. I’ve only seen one Capri like that though.

[Clyde65]

Dang it! You got me looking at them too!!

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by rusty76

Really cool. You’ve got me looking at Festivas all the time now. I’ve only seen one Capri like that though.

Originally Posted by Clyde65

Dang it! You got me looking at them too!!

Go ahead and buy one so you can look at it in your driveway!

[theastronaut]

The A/C had leaked down over the winter so I put some dye in and charged it enough to find the leak. The leak was just a o-ring where the hose end bolts to the compressor, simple fix. It's never been converted to r134 so I bought a drier and orfice tube to convert it. I'll pull everything apart to add all new o-rings when I flush the system.

I knew the air wasn't blowing out of the vents as hard as it should have so I thought that the evaporator might be clogged... wasn't expecting it to be as bad as it was though. I stuck my phone up to the recirc intake with the flash on and the pic was pretty ugly so I ended up dropping the evap housing. The perks of buying a used car!







I really don't know how it could ever get that bad, it was filthy! I brushed off as much as possible then backflushed the fins and soaked/scrubbed it with purple power until it was clean again.





I also cleaned out the evaporator box and glued new foam (upside down headliner material) on the recirc/outside air door so it'll seal up like it should.







I've started buffing the paint.

[69gmcc10]

Well that looked disgusting. Its always interesting to see what out of sight and out of mind will get you, especially when you are dealing with used cars.

What did they do to that poor car? My guess is they went muddin'. They drove it until they got stuck and all 4 people piled out of the car (you don't do dumb stuff when your alone), picked it up and carried it 50 yards back to the road where they all jumped back in and drove off!

[theastronaut]

Pretty sure it's pet hair and nicotine residue.

[69gmcc10]

Originally Posted by theastronaut

Pretty sure it's pet hair and nicotine residue.

Hit a yeti while lighting their smokes! NICE!

[supercheyenne]

Originally Posted by 69gmcc10

Hit a yeti while lighting their smokes! NICE!

LOL!

Your imagination is awesome!

[rusty76]

Using a coil as the filter. Never good. Looks much nicer for sure.

[theastronaut]

Got the A/C all back together, vacuumed/charged, and it's not cooling very well. It'll only get down to 70ish parked and 60ish driving down the road. It also stinks, I must not have got all the junk cleaned out deep inside the evaporator. I ordered a new evaporator core, shoulda done that to start with since they're cheap, and I got a new expansion valve. Pretty sure the expansion valve was the problem with it not cooling enough.


I finally got around to installing the woodgrain shift know a friend made for me.




And another friend gave me a set of leftover 185/60-13 Toyo R888's with a bit of life left. These are a good bit softer than my current track tires so it'll be even quicker around corners now.






I found a set of 13x6" Compomotive mesh wheels to mount the R888's. There were no offset markings so I'm hoping they fit; I've already rolled and pulled the fenders as much as possible. I'll paint them a dark grey to hide brake dust better since they won't be easy to clean.

[rusty76]

Cool wheels. Can’t wait to see them mounted up. Interior looks nice.

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by rusty76

Cool wheels. Can’t wait to see them mounted up. Interior looks nice.

Thanks! A friend bought them early this year and ended up not using them, then gave them away with a car he sold. He posted all of his Festiva stuff for sale but I asked about them after they were already gone. He gave me the new owner's number though, so I sent him a message and he was willing to part with them. He actually gave them to me since my friend Trey threw them in with the car he was selling, so he passed on the favor and I got them just for shipping.

[theastronaut]

A few more parts I picked up recently. Found a domelight from an overseas model equiped with a full length "Funtop" sliding sunroof. I'm buying the US-spec optional sliding sunroof from a friend to go in the maroon '88, so this will be a nice addition to keep it all OEM inside. The factory Fun Top sunroof was pretty bulky looking due to the wind deflector and electric slide mechanism, vs the better fitting US-spec optional sliding top.




A Kia Pride brochure showing the Fun Top.





This site has a few pics of a Fun Top, you can see the dome light I have in the one of the pics.

http://80shero.blogspot.com/2015/01/fun-top.html


A US-Spec sliding roof. These fit much flatter to the roof when closed and don't have the front wind deflector. They're also manual instead of electric.





I bought a set of front camber/caster plates, mainly so I can dial in extra caster. Caster isn't adjustable without these.




Also traded for a pair of 3.5 and 5 degree rear camber spacers; 3.5 for street and 5 for track/autocross.

[rusty76]

So you said Kia Pride. Was that the overseas model?

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by rusty76

So you said Kia Pride. Was that the overseas model?

Yeah, they were sold as the Ford Festiva, Mazda 121, or Kia Pride depending on where they were sold. Ford had Mazda design them and Kia built them, except Japanese market cars were built by Ford in Japan. Japan got the cool stuff we never did, like factory 1.3 DOHC engines (a destroked, high revving version of the Miata 1.6) in the GT, GTX, and GTA models. The sportier models even had dual mode suspension that was switched from inside the car.

[rusty76]

So cool. I thought KIA really? Wow that’s pretty neat.

[theastronaut]

Got the red '88 back out to finish up the engine swap. I'm trying to have it finished by the first weekend in October so I can take it to the Festiva show in Raleigh NC.





Also pulled a wrecked parts car out to cut the roof off for donor sections (future chop top project), remove the rear beam, steering rack mount/joint, and a few other odds and ends.

[theastronaut]

A few friends and I have started a Youtube channel to keep up with our autocross builds. Logan is building an Accord, Blake is building a '90 Integra, and I'll be finishing the red '88 Festiva. We'll be racing each other at one of the Clemson Sports Car Club autocrosses this fall, and hopefully I can talk them into doing a couple of track events as well. Road Atlanta, Atlanta Motorsport Park, Charlotte Motor Speedway, and Carolina Motorsport Park are all nearby and the SCCA hosts track nights there regularly.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbZ...NtKaOYsVJPXKtg

[LEEVON]

I am still enjoying your Festiva fetish, can't wait to see it on the track. I had a red '88 Festiva once, served as transportation when I was painting my '71 at 17 years old. I loved that car...had an 8 ball shifter and nice stereo. Is it just me or is every Festiva a model "L" and does it stand for luxury? I always got a kick out of that, never seen one that wasn't badged "L".

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by LEEVON

I am still enjoying your Festiva fetish, can't wait to see it on the track. I had a red '88 Festiva once, served as transportation when I was painting my '71 at 17 years old. I loved that car...had an 8 ball shifter and nice stereo. Is it just me or is every Festiva a model "L" and does it stand for luxury? I always got a kick out of that, never seen one that wasn't badged "L".

L was the base model, L Plus was mid level trim, and LX was the top trim level from 88-90. L was still the base model from 91-93 but GL was the top trim level. 92/93 had the GL Sport model which had a spoiler and special upholstery added to the normal GL trim. Most are L or GL, the LX and L Plus are fairly uncommon.

[rusty76]

I’ll be checking out the YouTube channel. I seen another Festiva Thursday. Lol.

[theastronaut]

I towed the Capri to the shop a couple weeks ago and have been pulling parts off it. I'll be using the transmission from it in the red car since the first trans I bought has some issues; someone hacked up the bellhousing by adding a lot of holes, and the tip of the input shaft that rides in the pilot bearing has been ground down to the point that it doesn't fit tightly in the bearing anymore. I also pulled the engine harnes, ecu, and all of the sensors so I'll have everthing for a future turbo engine swap. I sold the headlight door assemblies, driver side door, and headlight relay module for $170 bucks...the whole car only only cost me $200 so once I sell a few more parts and scrap the shell I'll be a few hundred bucks ahead.







The red parts car went to the scrap yard.





I used aircraft stripper on the Compomotive wheels to get the majority of the paint off. There's a few areas that'll need to be smoothed out before I blast before I shoot them with epoxy primer and paint.

[mongocanfly]

Looks like your all in on the festiva...
Will you be celebrating fetivus this year?....haha...like on seinfeld...

Those wheels would look good just in plain aluminum...what color you gonna do em in?