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Oct 23, 2009 20:25:12 GMT
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Who has modded a Sierra then? Thinkin that if I'm to keep my XR4X4 for a bit I'm gonna have to make it a bit different. I reckon on wider wheels and a hefty lowering job being first port of call but it has to be on a stringent shoestring budget as I shouldnt be spending anything on my daily and in fact I should be saving to sort the turbo Capri instead Anyone have any cool sierra modding tips/pics? I was also thinking of getting some more of that tasty V6 sound out of it, Ive removed the top of the air filter and fastened the element down, so far so good. Maybe scaffold pipe the backbox? (Wont be a first, did it on my Cortina!!) My Googlage only returns a thousand awesome mk1s, 3 doors, and cossies - not many like mine Althou did find this cool green one from on here Heres mine ;D
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Oct 23, 2009 20:45:02 GMT
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Here's one i had once. Welded diff, 2.0 dohc and a light tap with the stick made for some great winter fun
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Oct 23, 2009 20:48:43 GMT
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Nice! What was your lowering method? Does the XR4X4 have different suspension to the 2wds? The back end of mine is pretty high although I hear they are supposed to be on the 4wds?
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Oct 23, 2009 20:54:43 GMT
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4 used lowering springs for beer money, cut about 2,5 coils of the ones for the rear, the pics don't justify the lowness ;D The lack of wide rims ruined the look though. Didn't have it long enough to get some proper rims for it.
I do belive 4x4's have different suspension, at least in the front. Not sure if springs fit from a 2wd, I guess at least the rear springs should.
Mine was about the same height as yours when i bought it.
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Last Edit: Oct 23, 2009 20:55:49 GMT by dude
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Oct 23, 2009 20:59:55 GMT
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Might have to photoshop mine, slammed on banded steels. The standard Ford alloys on mine are mint but they jsut don't fill the arches. Wonder how much some banded 15" steelies would set me back? Probably the same cost as sorting out the big end bearings and turbo on the Capri!!
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Oct 23, 2009 21:11:27 GMT
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4x4's have thicker front struts and cut outs in the chassis for the drive shafts to go under, you'll have to shim the rear if you drop it low to correct to camber and toe, it can be done with washers between the swing arm and the hub, needs doing or the tyres will last about 0.6 miles and it'll screw up the handling which is the main reason for owning a 4x4.
Personally i'd only drop it a max of 2" and fit good tyres and it'll out handle most things on the road even these days.
The rear spoiler is pretty clever and produces as much downforce as the XR4i bipane jobby and the cossies whale tail (more drag than the cossies though apparently, if you take it off you'll notice its not there at anything over about 100 as the car will get squirmy at the back)
And once again, hackneyed as it may be, a 24v will make into a 150mph funbox with better mpg than the 12v.
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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MWF
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,945
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Oct 24, 2009 10:13:44 GMT
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For reference this is my old Mk1 4x4 lowered -40mm on 15's They are a big car, 15's look quite small on them. I also found it bottomed out on things a lot as the Sierra floor pan runs quite deep. The old 12v can sound great, the 4 port heads give a good off beat rumble. I had a 4" system with just a back box and genuinely mistook my own car for a neighbours camaro once. I know how silly that sounds but honestly I did. As PopUpToaster points out the camber on the rear goes very negative when you lower the Sierras, it's one of the fundamental problems with launching the 2wd Cossies fast, they squat down and loose a lot of traction. It's well known in engineering the circles the standard Sierra body generated uplift at speed making them feel floaty at speed, this is one of the reasons having a rear wing on them is so effective and why so many models had them as standard. My car also had weird 'ears' on the rear quarter lights. The cool thing is Davey Boy is you already have the sideskirts which I think look good on the 5-door, they square off the rounded sills and make them look lower. I think slammed on banded steels would look frigging awesome.
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Hirst
Posted a lot
This avatar is inaccurate, I've never shaved that closely
Posts: 3,930
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Oct 24, 2009 10:19:45 GMT
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I reckon yours looks ace as it is, smart looking cars those XR4x4s.
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Oct 24, 2009 15:41:29 GMT
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Weirdly mine never felt floaty, very steady acctually for a light car with the worst tires imaginable. Didn't even get scary doing things like this: (obviously taken at my local test track etc ;D) I've had both mk1 3 doors with the huge "ears" and sedans, and this was the only one you were confident in driving fast with, I had a '87 IS sedan with yellow koni dampers and eibach springs, and at over 120km/h you almost shat yourself if you didn't have proper tires on it. Edit: if i didn't make it clear, mine was a rwd, never driven a 4x4 sierra.
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Last Edit: Oct 24, 2009 15:42:56 GMT by dude
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MWF
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,945
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Oct 24, 2009 16:34:24 GMT
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Interest stuff dude, always good to hear a real world report rather than hear say.
I took my XR4x4 up to about 130mph (genuinely on a test track) and that felt very planted. I never took my XR4i over about 100mph and that felt OK. But then both had wings.
I've also been told in the past that Sierras with powersteering feel floaty on motorways but mine felt fine.
The rear wing on the Cossie must have been a big deal, a woman I know was doing her engineering course at uni when the Cossie came out and went to the trouble of going to a dealers and test driving one, just to see if the stories were true about the wing pushing down at speed.
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Oct 24, 2009 16:52:30 GMT
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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Oct 24, 2009 16:56:03 GMT
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Interest stuff dude, always good to hear a real world report rather than hear say. I took my XR4x4 up to about 130mph (genuinely on a test track) and that felt very planted. I never took my XR4i over about 100mph and that felt OK. But then both had wings. I've also been told in the past that Sierras with powersteering feel floaty on motorways but mine felt fine. The rear wing on the Cossie must have been a big deal, a woman I know was doing her engineering course at uni when the Cossie came out and went to the trouble of going to a dealers and test driving one, just to see if the stories were true about the wing pushing down at speed. My speedo went mental after I changed the diff to an older one with a different ratio, with the older diff I did something like 230km/h speedo-speed, so probably a bit less in real life. The car felt completely planted, even though it had power steering, no wing and 185/75 13" tires. It did, on the other hand have most bushings new, and the welded diff probably added to the stability, the rear right tire blew and I thought a spring snapped or something, the steering wheel didn't even twitch ;D Damn I miss that car... PAS on sierras are fine on a daily, if you plan to use it for hard track duty, find one without. The only time you benefit from it is when you parallel park ;D It's very, very slow, unresponsible and doesn't "self-steer" when you go sideways. I do think it's a bit better on the pre-dohc cars though, But on the other hand it's almost impossible to find one of those with it fitted. popuptoaster - loving the estate and the white 5 door, real cosworth wheels and a slam on the xr and it would look awesome!
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Last Edit: Oct 24, 2009 17:01:09 GMT by dude
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Oct 24, 2009 17:02:31 GMT
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most of the mk1 2.3 ghias and XR4i's had PS on them, it was optional but the heavy ol' cologne encouraged adding it, my last 4i didn't have it and it felt fine to drive once you were moving. I wouldn't base my purchase on it though, still thousands of aftermarket parts around for them thanks to the RS lads and they all race with PS, its only the drifters who don't like it and they don't like the 4x4's either although i used to be able to drift mine.
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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Oct 24, 2009 17:11:41 GMT
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Yeah driftin is a bit wierd in the 4x4, understeers but stays fairly well planted, unless you give it some clutch abuse. Its good coming out of a wet junction as it flys across sideways like a crab Not really my bag though handling wise, its a wee bit boring. So the PS is slow and heavy then?
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MWF
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,945
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Oct 24, 2009 17:18:28 GMT
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My XR4i didn't have power steering and I missed it, I felt more in control with the power steering on my XR4x4 TBH.
I like the cossie lattice wheels, I had some on my XR4x4 after I had 17's.
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Oct 24, 2009 17:37:32 GMT
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I nearly killed myself once in a XR4i on the Autobahn. It was absolute Stock with PAS and good Tyres, I floored it and suddenly lost traction and control at 235km/h (142mph). It was almost impossible to catch the car again, the tail went like a dog's one awaitig food, needed all of the 3 lanes of the Autobahn, I then cautiously released the throttle and the Sierra went straight on again, pure nightmare!
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Oct 24, 2009 18:09:09 GMT
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I nearly killed myself once in a XR4i on the Autobahn. It was absolute Stock with PAS and good Tyres, I floored it and suddenly lost traction and control at 235km/h (142mph). It was almost impossible to catch the car again, the tail went like a dog's one awaitig food, needed all of the 3 lanes of the Autobahn, I then cautiously released the throttle and the Sierra went straight on again, pure nightmare! I've heard alot of these stories, only time i've felt anything like it was overtaking a tractor with bald tires, and the car started going sideways when going over the snow sludge between the lanes, when going back into my own lane. blasted scary eventhough it wasn't going too fast. most of the mk1 2.3 ghias and XR4i's had PS on them, it was optional but the heavy ol' cologne encouraged adding it, my last 4i didn't have it and it felt fine to drive once you were moving. I wouldn't base my purchase on it though, still thousands of aftermarket parts around for them thanks to the RS lads and they all race with PS, its only the drifters who don't like it and they don't like the 4x4's either although I used to be able to drift mine. I'd like a 4x4 for some winter fun, doesn't they put most of the power to the rear? And yeah, with a v6 up front I understand the need for power steering. Have some more sierras Random ones: How sierras are meant to be driven. Featuring a turbo and a v6 Turbo'd v6 in this one too. Hard as a hard thing made of some really hard stuff. I'd love a mk1 estate. (i'm avare this is a mk2) Would love to find more pics of this. Two i've photoshopped robinxr4i's Ones i've had Clean... ..trampdrift-spec'd... ... and a week before it died, hard to see here, but the glassfiber bumber was more zip-ties than glassfiber ;D I've never hated anything as much as I did this car ;D 97% of what was done to this car could be found on wikipedia when searching on "bodge" This one was my ought-to-be winter hack, but swmbo wrecked it 2 weeks ago... I already had changed most of the interior for a darker one.. before picOn a more positive note i've already found a mint-totaly-f-ing-stock champagne mk1 3 door to take it's place It's going to be a little more serious build than my previous sierras ;D
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Last Edit: Oct 24, 2009 19:23:34 GMT by dude
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Oct 24, 2009 18:18:25 GMT
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Id love to lower mine but lots of people have said not too wiht a 4x4 Any suggestions of CHEAP wheels that would actually fill the arches rather than be stuck in about 5 inches and look like its on shopping trolley wheels? Really I need to leave it alone and save some cash but I just want to be a bit excited bout my daily. How bad would the geometry be if I properly slammed it? Would i have "negetive camber for the win" or would it look ridiculous? Reckon it's encourage more RWD style characteristics if it was chopspringslammed? I overtook a car full throttle on a wet dual carragway and crabbed sideways onto the other lane! Sometimes I like the way it handles but other times it infuriates me. They say Mitsi Evos are boring, this has about 200 hp less!
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Oct 24, 2009 19:15:18 GMT
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IIRC the 4wd cosworths when lowered have a habit of popin drive shafts out, the XR4x4 however uses different shafts that arnt so prone. Personally I would slam it! Pic of my mates low XR4x4 (it's a DOHC but the drive train is the same, minus the rear lsd) The semi-trailing arm rear suspension will give increased neg camber the lower you go,if you don't want this shims can be brought (or washers used - Jeek on trampdrift did this on his 24v BDC car) to relieve this problem. I lowered mine on coilovers basically as low as they would go, about 80mm front and 70mm rear the rear camber was nice (not excessive) although it did eat tyres although the welded diff made that much worse Pug/Citroen wheels fill the arches better than ford items as they have a lower offset, 15" 405 steels IMO would look nice! Other than that Wellers off a Jago are usually really low offset and wide. Either can be picked up cheap enough. Don't think there is much you can do to make it feel more RWD, apart from make it RWD . Have heard stories about converting the 4wd MT75 boxes to RWD, basically cause rwd V6 type-9 are a bit thin on the ground and expensive and rwd V6 MT75 boxes are very rare. I'm sure popup would have an idea on how to do it? ANYWAY stop this thread it makes me want another Sierra NOW!
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Sierra - here we go again! He has an illness, it's not his fault.
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Oct 24, 2009 20:39:52 GMT
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Its not complicated to convert an MT75 but you need a couple of special tools and its cheaper to import a box than it is to buy the tools, caprisport were selling the boxes for about 400 quid at one point, in a stock 2.9 theres no need to fit the MT75, a V6 type 9 is still cheaper.
14's are as small as you can go and clear the calipers on the front, my white 5 door with cossie bit on it needed 5mm spacers to get the cossie rims to clear the front struts it and yet they fitted on my grey one just fine.
they are already torque biased 66% to the rear anyway, i wouldnt bother trying to make one rwd unless you had the bits laying around as you could easily upgrade a DOHC to the same BHP as a 2.9 and fit gas shocks and lower springs etc etc.
its not just the camber on the back when you lower them its the toe in you get, it really screws up the handling, also the front shafts can hit the chassis, its the V6 ones that have the longer front shafts, the 4 pot ones are the same length as the cossie ones.
You can drive through the understeer if your brave enough to add large dollops of extra power so the back pushes out, you need to be shiftinga bit in the dry to get it to slide properly though.
Personally, i would drop in a 24v to improve the power and MPG and resist dropping it more then 1 1/2 or maybe 2" or you may as well just swop it and some cahs on a stock sierra that don't handle great anyway.
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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