1992 Ford Sierra GT - why making a car slow may make sense

The tinkering goes on and the other night we took the thing out for a decent photo shoot.

The high-res images are a bit better but let's save some bandwidth...

Kajsa has entered the car into a digital show, if you want to, check it out and vote for her by liking her post/images;

https://www.facebook.com/events/1144080985964711/permalink/1150673028638840/

Meanwhile, she is working hard at the gocart track in town, where she got her summer job. The back road to the track is a bit to rough to drive the Sierra on so she goes on her moped instead. That's a 45 minute ride so she's soon a decent two-wheel rider as well :-)

Gustaf

oh my!  looks like y'all take your A-Traktors pretty serious over there.

Well, yes...I guess some of us do. For many people it's a way to bond with the children and invite them into the car hobby. Plus, there are more parents than me who can't help themselves with the feature glide when the project rolls along... :-)

Gustaf

Looks like Kajsa & you got second in that virtual show, if its based on likes.  Congrats!

From your worries and difficulties on getting the weight balance properly split between the front and rear axles, I can't help but wonder what was done to handle this on the 740 UTE conversion in the virtual show.  Lead weights under the bed cover? 

Yes, second place :-) She was interviewed live by the regional radio when the results were announced, and today she made the first page in the newspaper, and a 2 page article. :-)

A really nice article actually.

The thing with weight balance is that if you build a cargo bed (really a "ballast bed") you don't need to meet the 60% rear bias. Or, as we put it, if we have a 60% rear bias, we don't need to cut the body and make a cargo bed :-)

Gustaf

Very cool!

I am happy to report that Kajsa is now driving on her own, with more and more confidence. She did drive to high school (or secondary school as we call it) on the first day. 

This Saturday she also went out cruising in town, and had fun meeting up other kids in their tractors. While there are some questionable elements in that culture (not all kids behave) I trust her and of course she wants to use the tractor like intended.

Apparently the air suspension made a good impression. And she came home, stating she wanted to get a nicer air filter to replace the old K&N we had used. So she and a friend drove off to the parts store, took the best part of an hour deciding if a blue or a red filter would look better, and then installed it. Quite a blessing to have two 16 year old (well she's 16 tomorrow) girls using the tools and working on the car together :-)

Gustaf

Great update! Cool that she is immersing herself in the scene.

So, a month later and she is still happy driving the Sierra. Now she has also started training with a real car and with that, also started to plan for her first car. Reluctantly I had to stop her from buying another Sierra a couple of weeks ago - we just don't have the space to store another car for two years until she gets her licence. Instead, she's planning for a separate bank account to be the "Mustang savings account". 

Friday night she came home and woke me up (the deal for being allowed to stay out late, wake us up when you get home) saying that all was fine but the speed limiter does not work anymore.

Most kids would see this as a benefit and probably not tell the parents, but Kajsa had still kept to the stipulated 30 km/h. And she wants it to be legal...

I test drove it and sure, I could force it over the limit. Instead of a hard cut it was more like driving through a soft-cut rev limiter. At first I had expected the solid state relay to have failed but the stationary limit was still "hard". That made me suspect the speed sensor instead, and sure enough, it registered 5 or 6 out of the 8 trigger points. I had been a bit weary about this from the start since the adjustment of the angle and gap was quite sensitive. The quick fix now was to grind a bit off the two points that were a bit "long" to increase the gap between them - seems to have worked.

While having the car up on the Quickjacks I inspected the driveline. And I made the call to remove the transfer gearbox for good. Some bolts in the guibo between the diff and transfer box were loose and they can only be tightened with them separated. So after a rather forced wrenching afternoon (she needed the car drivable by 6 pm) we converted it back to a single gearbox Sierra. Still with 3 forward gears and the speed limiter of course. I had been smart (or hoardy) enough to keep the brackets for the support bearing and parking brake cables that I cut off earlier, so they went back, more or less in their original spots.

The car is much nicer to drive without the extra gearbox to lug around. Now it feels like a standard Sierra - but thanks to the 4.27:1 diff ratio, it's rather quick to 30 km/h :-)

On another note, I couldn't resist helping her to upgrade the sound system a bit. I had an old JBL GT-82 8" subwoofer, so I built a small box for that one to play some more mid-bass. Then I got a deal on two JBL 6x9" and found some sweet GAS 5,25" mid-bass speakers to fill the gaping holes after the stock rear speakers. A minuscule Stetson 3-channel amp (the coolest I have seen in ages, it's smaller than a roll of duct tape) powers the sub and 6x9's. 

Gustaf

What's her dream Mustang? Will it be easy to find one there?

The "dream" Mustang is like for most people, a 1967-69 Fastback... but since it in reality should work as a daily driver I think we are looking at 2005 or newer. Manual gearbox, could be a V6 or a V8. These cars are available here, it is more about how much to spend. Today a reasonable car like that seems to be at least 8-10-12 thousand dollars and that might be stretching the budget in a substantial way  ... we will see in a couple of years.

Gustaf

Time for another quick update. First, a quick partial shot of the winter look.

Yes, it gets dirty...

As she is getting more and more confident driving also on snow and ice, the use goes up, which is nice since that's why we built it. Another new is that she is dating (first real boyfriend) a guy on the other side of town, that also means a bit more driving. Side note, the guy is also a driver in a competing endurance racing team, the team that drives the Citroën BX 16v. He is also building a BX 16v for his first street car (he'll be 18 the coming spring), and Kajsa has gotten into the habit of taking the working outfit with her whenever they meet. Last week I when I picked her up they were working away on the BX. Nice to see shared interests!

A while ago the speed limiter started acting up again. This time we decided a proper job was in order, so we replaced the welded on trigger points with M10 bolts, threaded into the wheel flange behind the disc. Now we have more distinct trigger points that hopefully are enough even when some road salt attacks.

The Capri project comes closer to a "non-driveable" state so I hope this was the last bigger job for the winter.

The "empty bay" in the garage where I have a couple of extra work benches could be vacated in an emergency but it is tight... I might have to put the Capri on dollies and slide it over there to make enough space for a larger car. But well cross that bridge then and there if need be.

Gustaf

Yeah, the new trigger points, although better, was not the complete fix I hoped for.

So the head-less Capri was pushed out in the snow, and the 30 km/h drift monster driven inside. I tried re-aligning the sensor, and taping (using aluminium tape) some washers to the pressed in studs to make them a bit more pronounced. But then Kajsa had an idea - it seems the sensor always works for some time after we have removed the disc (and brushed off the light surface rust you always get on the inside of the bell). What if we paint the inside so it doesn't rust?

We tried that and so far, after something like 2 weeks, it actually seems to work.

But I have made research and plans for a plan B and C. Plan B (I think) is trying an inductive sensor that only has a trigger more straight ahead. The one we use (supplied with the speed regulator) has a sensor head that clearly picks up on the side, like this;

I'm think one that has a more recessed tip may be better;

The problem is that the bell of the disc gets too close. I think.

Plan C is to use the ABS sensor instead. That means using a signal amplifier, but also means we need to reprogram the limiter. Now we have 8 trigger points, the ABS wheel is something like 48. The upside is that it will probably be more accurate in limiting speed but we need to open the sealed box, elongate the wires to reach inside and re-set it all. Bit of a pain...

But last night I did the re-shuffle in the garage, slid the Capri over and made room for the Sierra again. Not to fix the limiter but an exhaust leak, the downpipe gasket was not sealing at all. At 30 km/h any leaks mean that the interior gets soaked in fumes. Most of that is probably fixed now, but I also spotted that the lambda sensor connector seemed to have unplugged itself. 

I choose the positive side - Kajsa gets to practice lots of fiddling with an old car!

Gustaf

Short update, the snow has been coming down in heaps, I think we are well over 1.2 meters now. Kajsa has swapped the fancy front bumper for the old stock one, the Combat kit is just too low to work with the snow banks...

Otherwise the Sierra works fine, the exhaust is sealed up and we have also attacked some persistent oil leaks with somewhat decent results.

Yesterday she passed her snowmobile license test too (aced the theoretical test, 100%).

Not the best machine to practice on perhaps but this is what we had at hand. She handled the sled wisely though. 

An update on the Capri is on the decks too, work has been happening in between other obligations.

Gustaf

We will continue on the same cue as last post. The Sierra is running, now back on the 17" summer wheels of course. We have had a slight mishap with one air bag, the drive shaft rubbed a hole. I managed to patch it in a very redneck manner but it has now been working for months. Still, new ones are on order. This time I will make some kind of "rub shield" so the drive shaft can't reach the bag even if it moves around a bit.

The search for Kajsas first real car is intensifying (and it coincides with me looking for a new daily or two). Both of us have pretty specific "needs" so it's a slow process. She wants a Sierra, stick shift and I say V6 since she wants to be able to test some motorsport action (another Pinto turbo would be the easy option but thanks to our regulations that would be pretty much non-streetable in a Sierra). We have broadened the search a bit to also include a Scorpio. Still looking.

While looking, she got the chance to take an online course for a Drifting license and me being a decent enabler of course thought it would be a good idea. She has also tagged along on some Track racing licence courses and now also a track worker course so she's a pretty well educated 16 year old :-)

Then my buddy Olle (who sold me the turbo for the Capri and did some engine performance calculations) offered to give her some practical training too. Cool!

My gear suits her pretty well!

The practice tool is a BMW 328 e46, a simple steering angle kit, locked diff and hydraulic handbrake. 

A car with parallell steering and a locked diff is a bit of a handful unless you drift it but they started out slow just feeling the track and car. Soon they started initiating some slides with the hand brake and getting around the turning cone. 

Our track is a bit narrow for beginners so there were some rallycross excursions but the last 15 minutes of practice time she had the track all to herself and spent that well driving on her own.

This is how you feel when you somewhat link one turn and one 180-degree together!

It was a great day out and I got to ride with her for some turns, exciting to say the least. We really need to find a car so she can keep this up during the summer. We are in negotiations for a long term "lease" of a simple drift car, let's hope that works out. Or we'll just have to buy an old BMW...

Gustaf

Very cool! Nice to see a youngster having fun with cars.

Yes, it is a blessing! Last night we drove up to the track, we are working (both me and Kajsa) during the big race this weekend (Swedish championship round 2 in TCR/STCC, then there´s Radical, Legends, V8 Thundercar and GT4) - we discussed how to proceed. We really want to find a car so she can continue to do the practice Tuesdays during the summer and see how she evolves.

Gustaf

This is all awesome! Keep it up and good luck finding her a car!

Some kind of update - today, after almost a year of driving she was finally stopped by a police (on a motorcycle). Apparently he couldn't see the rear lights being on (mandatory on this age of car even in daylight). He also made a not too deep check on the speed limiter, and while doing so called me to check on some question marks.

As expected, he raised the issue of the removed transfer box, formally that requires a new tech inspection. I promised to book that right away and he let it go with just a "warning".

Then he ended the call by saying that my daughter was nice, polite and easy to work with. :-)

The new inspection is booked for July 12th, perhaps not ideal in the middle of vacation but I think we`ll have to manage.

I had that in the plans to do anyway so no big deal at all. 

Gustaf

Just found this thread, very very cool

The new inspection went well, we made a quick "weight adjustment" before to make sure we're still at 60% rear and it worked great.

Then me and the wife set off on a trip to Stockholm and Kajsa stayed back home for work - and hanging out with the boyfriend, whose parents were also out of town. Wonder why she wanted to work that week?

Anyway, she's been driving quite a lot this summer and it's nice to see the car is put to use. The other day when I moved it I thought it sounded a bit meatier than before. Yes, the muffler has finally split - it always looked suspect and now it has failed. Kajsa likes it since it sounds "better" (and yes, it actually does...) so fixing will have to wait until, sometime.

But the other day she texted from work saying the transmission didn't feel right. It doesn't shift as it used to and will jump out of second. I asked her to check that nothing was scraping, rubbing or getting hot and then just take it easy back home.

We did a quick check and it was immediately apparent that it had copied the black 2.9 Sierra in the terms of completely ripping the rubber mount off the cross member. Funny, now all MT-75 equipped cars I have had, have collapsed this mount. With a bit of luck I had time the same evening to help her swap it out for a good used one I had (for some reason I have at least 2 Scorpio cross members laying around, good for parts). Fixing it was not too bad (this one had been swapped before so the rivets were already replaced), and at the same time we topped up on engine oil, and found that the VSS and lambda sensor connector once again had fallen out. This time, more securely zip-tied and now it should stay, I hope.

Gustaf

So last night it was time to get the winter wheels back on, snow had already fallen and I was late fitting them only because of a stubborn cold.

As I pulled into the garage I noticed that the compressor for the air suspension would not come on. Some digging revealed that the 40A fuse was blown to bits.

Now, the entire air suspension in it's "fish tank" is not so easy accessible so I spent some time getting to it. Trying to power up the compressor with a 20A fuse would give a clunk and a spectacularly blown fuse. So I ripped the head off the compressor and found...ice. A solid lump of ice on top of the piston. Yeah, the humid autumn and then minus 8 C is not a good combo. Cleaned it off and the compressor seems to have survived.

"While in there" and while the car is drying up inside the garage we will have a look at some other small stuff before it is back in winter duty again.

Gustaf

Well, the old 380 compressor did "die", a while after the checks above it started building pressure very slowly.

I once again took the car inside and did a number of checks, and ended up chatting with a very helpful tech guy at Viair. Apparently the compressors are not really made for our temperatures. Anyway, I ordered a slightly larger 444C compressor instead and that was a nice upgrade. It runs more silent and builds pressure quicker. It "just" fit the "fish tank"...barely.

While in there I also added a pressure gauge for the tank, something I have always wanted. The idea is to be able to monitor how the compressor works, instead of just running blind.

With that done, the Sierra is back into service.

Yesterday I helped a friends son with his A-traktor project. He has taken over the family V70 (that has been garden decoration for 4 years, after they bought a Ford S-Max to use instead). It is a 2003 2.4 140 bhp V70 (5-speed), nothing special about it and not worth much, so a good tractor project. The really nice thing is that it is a CAN-bus car with E-throttle. I helped install the speed limiter and it's really sweet. You just connect it to the power feed on the E-pedal, and then re-route the signal wires through the controller. Add a CAN-bus connection (for speed) and then it's done. The only issue we had was finding the right CAN-bus wires to tap into (or well, the issue was reading the instructions on what wires to use). The first trial run only had idle...foolishy I still drove out of the garage so it was a bit of a challenge to get back in ;-)

The beauty of using CAN-bus and E-throttle is that installation is quick and the car runs smooth even at the speed limit - the controller just adjusts the throttle position to whatever it takes to cap the speed at 30 km/h. 

I have another install lined up in a Ford Mondeo 2005-ish, with the same principles. That one is the rare (here in Sweden) 2.3 Duratec and an auto, it will be interesting to try that out. 

Gustaf

So just a line or two to keep this thread updated.

The Sierra is now a quite solid transportation for Kajsa, this winter it has mostly just been running. We are preparing the correct bumpers again after some glassfibre work, hopefully they'll be painted and back on the car in a few weeks time.

Yesterday it was time for the bi-annual safety inspection and this time I had Kajsa drive there and handle the process on her own. She was not entirely happy about that (mostly because it was at 8 am) but she did it. And she came home with a work order... The parking brake is a bit weak (they all are on Sierras) and that probably set off two "while we're at it" fails - front brake hoses rubbing and the illumination for the triangle showing white light rearwards. A couple of "non-fail" remarks too.

The work to fix these things is not a big deal but re-inspection times are scarce. And we have a deadline...so July 14th is the time for the re-check.

We are starting to count down to the sale of this, if all goes according to plan Kajsa has her real drivers license in September and then it is time to find a new home for this project.

Gustaf

The re-inspection went fine, after Kajsa and one of her friends spent an evening swapping rear brake pads, adjusting the parking brake and me adding some guide wheels for the cable to run in. That is a by-product of the raised floor for the old transfer reduction box - the parking brake cable runs in a less than favorable angle.

During the spring we have also worked on getting the correct bumpers ready to go back on the car. They had suffered a bit from winter driving and was temporarily replaced with some stock (but very split) bumpers.

As another reminder that I really should not do too much body work...but the same patient guy who did the entire car last time, agreed to finish these once again. I think they came out great after his second coat. Now we had another deadline to work against. The annual Motor Week in Lycksele has been mentioned before I think, and the show there is what was Kajsas goal already in 2020. That year it was converted into an online event (resulted in an honorary price), but 2021 was just plain nothing. But now, 2022...

It was a full day and then some to fix some small things and get the fresh bumpers in place. But in the end, Kajsa could set sail on the 150 km drive to the show. Yes, at 30 km/h...that is a 6 hour drive including short breaks.

Since the drifting was cancelled, I left the Capri at home and instead took the black Sierra for a rather stunning :-) display at the camp site.

The first event was the "Classic car meet" (but with no US cars since they have their own event later).

It was a good day out and Kajsa got to explain the air suspension and other details to quite some interested people.

But the special A-traktor show was the main goal.

Some finishing polish, but the competition was fierce. As usual, there was a myriad of Volvos in different shapes and conditions. But also a 1978 El Camino lowrider (with hydraulics), a clean Mercedes W124 on air to name a few.

I had made a short PowerPoint to show the work behind the surface and it actually caught the attention of some people.

We almost missed the price ceremony but got there in time just as they called 3rd place - it was Kajsa :-)

This year a jury made the decisions and while ww know lots of people who would probably vote for Kajsa just for friendship, I think we struck luck. The jury actually seemed to make an effort to weigh in the entire build and not just what is popular. First place for the El Camino was no surprise (although I do think it is built in the US and "just" imported but I am not sure), and second to a very classic Volvo Duett was not a bad choice. We are happy!

Kajsa ended the night on the special A-traktor cruise, one hour of only tractors in the city center. Quite cool...and she gave very appreciated rides to some friends kids. 

Gustaf