October 1998

27.10.98
The local Ford dealer is quoting (are you sitting down for this?) £213 for the short drive shaft, and £243 for the long one. They come complete with inner and outer CV joints, which is the problem. I cant get the 'tripod' bearings that are required to fit the inner CV joints. And they no longer sell drive shafts separately. Better do some shopping around.
26.10.98
There is a difference between Mk2 and Mk3 drive shafts. Mk2's are tubular and Mk3's are solid. Therefore the solid ones must be stronger, although heavier. I'll see if I can get a price for some Turbo/RS1800 Mk3 drive shafts this week.

I've also received an E-mail from the States, which may lead to some Kevlar body panels. Watch this space.
21.10.98
Phoned Autocross, the company that makes body panels for hot rods. They may be able to help, but as they dont have a catalogue its going to be difficult to decide which panels sound best. I want the car to look like this one I saw at Mallory Park last year. Anyone know the whereabouts of this car?
20.10.98
Looked in the Haynes manual last night, and I'm a bit clearer now with regards to driveshafts. They're splined at both ends, which means that I do need to get the Mk2 shafts, as they'd be the correct length. However, are the Mk2 shafts as strong as the ones on the Mk3 Turbo? If not, then I need to get the ones from the Turbo, as potentially my Zetec will produce 240 HP when fully tuned (in the future that is, it'll be running 165 HP for starters) Has anyone ever manufactured GpA drivetrain parts?
19.10.98
Phoned the Fiesta Center re: driveshafts. Its all very confusing! The gearbox I've used has output flanges from an RS1800 Mk3 Fiesta. I need a solid drive shaft as theres no bearing support on the back of the Zetec, like there is on the Cross-flow engined Mk1 XR2

The shafts from the Mk3 have three bearings at the end, and these run inside the flange unit. The Fiesta Center reckon that the driveshafts from a Mk2 are the best bet. (They're about £35 each.)

But does the Mk2 drive shaft have this feature? Is the Mk2 driveshaft strong enough to take 200 HP?

Anybody got any clues? I'm going to consult the Haynes manuals tonight.

I've hopefully found a contact for the company that makes wheel arch extensions for Hot Rods. They may be able to provide me with some competition arches for the Fiesta, something that'll allow me to run some decent rim widths. Maybe even manufactured from kevlar/Plastic.
11.10.98
I've been trying out Microsoft's new Liquid Motion package, which is an awesome tool. It allows you to make animated, interactive images, such as the one that appears on the top of the home page, and on the Engine Info page. All the pages on this web site are coded using a collection of tools, Word 97, Frontpage Express, Arachnophillia, and notepad, and none are as much fun to use as LM. Awesome! http://www.microsoft.com/liquidmotion/
06.10.98
Finished fitting three new flourescent lights to the garage ceiling, as the existing one wasn't putting out enough light to work from. Its much better now. I've been away on a training course for a week, so I've some catching up to do on the car this month. Still busy at work though, I've a server to upgrade and re-install, so plenty of overtime is available in the next few weeks.