What do you do when you have these two cars sitting around doing nothing:
93 Ford Festiva L and 93 Mercury Capri Xr2 (turbo)
Well, you build a "Fastiva" of course.
Okay putting a higher power engine in a car that already gets 45+ mpg isnt exactly an 'ecomod', but think of it as taking the engine out of a car that gets 35 mpg, and moving it to a lighter body that has more mpg potential
The Capri is a decent little car, pretty fun, and probably good for mid-15's at 85-90mph, and I got 35-38mpg when I was driving it, but it had a rotted out chunk of frame rail that took a sizable amount of floor with it.
But at 1800lbs (or less) the Festiva is over 700lbs lighter than the Capri. Put 2+2 together, even if I leave the Capri engine (Mazda B6T 1.6L DOHC turbo) at a stock 132hp and 136lb-ft of torque, the Festiva is probably still good for mid to high-14's and should be able to get at least 40mpg still (I routinely got 48mpg on average in the Festiva). Nobody keeps a turbo engine bone stock though, and 200hp is *too* easy to get to on these engines.
Sounds like a killer daily driver to me.
My progress so far...
I started off by pulling the B6T and G25MR trans out of the Capri. I also pulled the entire engine harness including where it runs through the firewall into the interior. Inside it ends with three plugs to the ECU and then a plug you splice into the Festiva's wiring for things like ignition power and starter trigger.
Heres the Capri engine bay before I yanked the motor... I had gotten started on freeing up the harness and such things here.
And then the next day or so I had the engine ready to pull...
And the next day or so I had it out...
Only a couple things I need from the Capri now, the intercooler (Its really not that great but I'll use it for now), and the interior part of the harness (I'm trying to trace it up through the dash so I dont have to extend the wires). I may end up using the brakes off the car as they are a HUGE upgrade to the tiny Festiva brakes. After that the rest of the car will be up for parts.
And now today I started on the Festiva, and got the 63hp Mazda B3 (1.3L) pulled.
Even with 181,000 miles and sitting the last year or so the engine ran awesome. It ran a 17.95 at 76.1mph in a car under one ton. I also averaged 48mpg. Probably one of the most reliable engines ever, does its job perfectly. Heres a quick video of its final run, for the record. And incase anyone happens to want it.
Thats all for now though, I'm hoping to get some more done tomorrow, but its a 40 minute drive to my dads... if not for that, I probably would have it done by now.