#TimeAttackFoST Build Part 3 - Modifications/Results Phase 1

We have been asked numerous times about our set-up on the Time Attack FoST over the past several months as she has shown that she has the capabilities to be one of the fastest Focus ST's to date. I figured, why not publish a blog post about some of the things that have been done. Phase 1 of our Time Attack build is basically nothing more than creating a very hardcore stage 3 Focus ST. Here is a quick run-down of the modifications that we have done so far to the car and the products that we have installed. Shameless plug here, but if you see something mentioned below that you would like to install in your performance vehicle, feel free to check out our site and/or message us for a quote...we try very hard to install products that we have access to so that we can provide our unbiased feedback and product support for our customers!

Weight Reduction

If you have read our previous blog post, then you already know that we aimed to shave around 800 pounds off of our car. She came in weighing an amazing 2750 with driver at our last track event! Shaving this much weight brings our power to weight ratio drastically down which helps in several ways to make the car handle better and achieve better track times. In fact, the current power to weight ratio of this car is along the lines of 7.09 (using engine hp) which is somewhere between a 2014 Jaguar F-Type R Coupe (6.6) and a 2014 Camaro ZL1 (7.1) or 2014 Corvette Stingray (7.2) for comparison...If this impresses you, just wait until we add the Big Turbo!

Interior

Our classing rules for Global Time Attack do not require us to install any sort of roll-over protection, but we opted to forgo the weight savings and install an Auto Power roll bar in this car mainly because this is the only way for us to install our 5 point safety harness system. The roll bar also lends a hand in stiffening the chassis slightly more than it would be otherwise (obviously a full-on roll cage would be the most beneficial in this area, but again, weight savings is crucial to our build and we didn't feel the need for a full cage at this point...probably going to save that mod for a future project as we add more power to the car)

Along with these additions, we chose to sport a Sparco Grid 2 (drivers side) and a Sparco Sprint (passenger side) racing seats mounted on Planted seat brackets. We decided to add sliders to the drivers side seat as well, mainly to raise the seat enough to see a little better over the dash, but also because at most events we attend both Brian and I (Corrin) like to co-drive the car and sometimes prefer different seating positions.

Exterior

We haven't done many exterior modifications to the car yet, with the exception of fixing the rear quarter panels and passenger side doors. During our weight savings project, we accidentally cut a little too much material out of the hood and had to install a set of AeroCatch hood pins to keep the hood in place while on track. Diode Dynamics was gracious enough to provide us with a set of yellow LED fog lights and LED reverse lights for the car to keep us looking good (and visible) while on track and in the grid.

Our future plans for the car include custom wrapping the exterior and some aero modifications as deemed necessary once we give it a good shake down on track.

Suspension

Thanks to Fortune Auto (one of our many amazing sponsors), we have a set of custom 510 Series coilovers installed on this car. If you are not familiar with the 510 series coilovers, they differ slightly from the more common 500 series coilovers in that they include a higher range of customization for your particular application as well as their "motorsports tuned digressive valving". We chose to go with 8k front and 6k rear settings to help offset the huge amount of weight shaved off the rear of the car. These coilovers have worked great on the dragstrip, helping us break the stock turbo record, and before the year is up, we will be able to test and fine-tune them on track.

Check out the following link for more information on the 510 Series Coilovers: http://www.fortune-auto.com/510series.htm

We chose to pair our Fortune Auto Coilovers with SPC Rear camber arms, Fortune Auto front endlinks, and a COBB Rear Sway Bar.

Wheels/Tires

Everyone has seen our 17x9 +45 custom re-drilled gold Enkei RPF1's that we were sporting on the previous Time Attack car. For drag racing purposes, we just slapped on a set of 26x8.5x17 M&H Racemaster Slicks. When we switch over to full-on track mode soon though, we will be mounting a set of 225/45/17 Continental Tire Series Racing Slicks on our Enkei's.

Our future plans for the car include upgrading the 17x9 RPF1's to a set of 17x10 RPF1's and running some 275/40/17 Nitto NT01's to stay legal for our Time Attack class.

Braking

Currently, we are running the stock brakes on the car with upgraded Hawk DTC-70 pads, Stoptech SST Brake lines, and Motul RBF600 Brake fluid. We also disconnected the ABS. As we add more power to the car and more braking power is needed, we will be upgrading to a big brake kit or something along those lines.

Power Modifications

As mentioned earlier, we basically just built this car as a more aggressive Stage 3 Focus ST. It has taken some trial and error to get the car running properly after the accident (including diagnosing and replacing items that were found to be damaged once it was drive-able, such as the fuel pump) but she is running like a champ now with the following modifications:

- Cobb Accessport with a JST Performance Custom Tune
- JST Performance Mishimoto Intercooler Kit
- Focus RS Intake with Cobb Filter
- MBRP Catless Downpipe
- 3" Custom Dump Tube Exhaust
- Turbosmart Wastegate Actuator
- Mountune Windage Tray and Balance Shaft Delete
- E35 Ethanol Fuel blend
- Mishimoto Oil Catch Can
- JST Performance Oil Cooler W/ Mishimoto Core
- Stock BPV, Stock Charge pipes, no AC, no Torque Vectoring

We have some pretty exciting things planned for this thing in the next phase of our build and a few more sponsors coming on board to help make this car a track beast. We look forward to working with everyone as the car goes down again for more modifications before the 2017 Time Attack Season starts!

2016 Track/Dyno Results

As we close out 2016, we wanted to share the amazing results that we have obtained with this car, which include running the fastest quarter mile time in a stock turbo Focus ST, breaking the stock turbo power record, and having the fastest KO3 powered car (to our knowledge).

Now, lets get this thing track ready so we can go try to break a few track records!!