This Fiesta is not like the other millions of other Fiestas on the road around the world. This particular Fiesta is very special, maybe not to others but to me it’s definitely special enough to be even considered a member of the family. So much so, she has been lovinglynamed Jackie. Jackie came into my live back in June of 2010 where I first met her in a small village in County Cork called Dunmanway. Back then she was a fairly standard looking Imperial Blue diamond in the rough except for three slightly egg shaped OZ Racing wheels. A previous owner had removed the rub strips on the sides and had also attempted to colour code the front and rear strips on the bumpers. But even I could see the colours did not match the rest of the car and I’m supposed to be colour blind. A universal cone filter wasn’t the tidiest addition under the bonnet but it did provide that intoxicating induction sound that is so enjoyable on the back-roads. The rear arches were showing that typical Ford trait of rotting from the inside out and there were a few scuff marks on the corners of the unique Zetec S bumpers. All of these flaws were pushed to the back of my mind. I was already in love. She had me at Imperial Blue.

With every new car, it’s only a matter of time before you want to start making a few changes. First thing to go was the ugly green light illuminating the dials, switches and clocks. These were easily sorted with many different eBay suppliers selling many different kits and colours. Naturally I decided to do a bit of colour coding and went with blue LED’s. Next on the chopping block was the three alloy wheels. The plan from the offset with this car was to keep it looking some bit OEM and to create something that we could call a baby RS. The first set of wheels that came to mind back in those early days was the 16″ Mondeo Si wheels. They had the rounded 5 spoke design that was very similar to that of the wheels found on an Escort RS Cosworth but without the extra width that could cause fitment issues or the price tag that is attached to something of that heritage. To complete my “RS wannabe” look, there was a few more small things to change. Another eBay purchase lead to a new set of headlights turning up on the doorstep. I decided to go for the Ultra black design headlights. These were a straight replacement for the old units but the Ultra headlights do away with the amber indicators and have a much meaner looking black backing. And to finish it all off, my friend Brian broke out the rattle cans, painted the wheels in a matt anthracite, put the bottom of the front bumper back to black and turned the upper grille from chrome to black. All done, so we’re finished right? Far from it.

6 months into this love affair, tragedy struck. After striking a pothole during the Christmas holidays, a loud ticking noise developed. After an inspection by a mechanic, he discovered that part of the plastic tensioner for the timing belt had broken off. At this one point it hadn’t effected or damaged the engine but it was dangerously close to tearing the timing belt. A fairly rapid trip to a motor factors was made for a timing belt kit to save my low mileage engine which at the time had sub 50,000 miles. With the mechanical knowledge I had at the time, there was little I could do to help so all I could do was hand over the keys and wait. When he had the timing belt kit fitted, the engine was fired up and to our delight it sounded healthy with no more tapping noise. At this point he still had to tidy back all the parts that were in his way to get the timing belt fitted so I gave him a bit of space. I returned hoping to hop in my car and

drive away into the sunset but it wasn’t to be. As we turned the key to start the engine, there was nothing. Just silence. Frantically we looked around for maybe a loose wire, a dodgy earth, something silly that we’d forgotten.
Everything looked to be in place. We were all thinking it but no one wanted to say it. Jackie was jacked back up so we could place a breaker bar onto the crankshaft. Turning the bar on the crankshaft had confirmed our fears. The crank was only doing half a turn before stopping. Refusing to believe it, the head was stripped. And as soon as we lifted the head from the block, there was the nails in this engines coffin. Eight of them to be precise. All eight exhaust values had hit the pistons, breaking each one of them off. Some even embedded into a piston. Between the time we tested fired the engine and the time I went to leave, something had happened. Had the belt jumped a tooth? We don’t know and at that point we didn’t really care. The damage was done.

After that it didn’t get much better. These Fiesta’s are not very common in Ireland but I actually happened to come across one in a scrapyard very local to me. The engine was salvaged and was taken back to my friends shed we were borrowing to have it fitted by a mechanic friend. After a couple of days it came time to finally take her home. Turned the key. Success, she starts! Select a gear and release the clutch. Yes, she moves again! As I start to drive it down the road, I start to get the feeling I’m being followed. A cloud of blue smoke trailed behind me. A cloud that would put James Bond’s smoke screen to shame. What was wrong now? Driving it around, I was hoping a spirited drive would maybe clear it out. Unfortunately I was then greeted by a light on the dash. I pulled over to try turn off the engine and turn it back on to see if it was something that could just be reset. But it never started back up again. I had to be towed back up the road and pushed into my drive. The salvaged engine had failed piston rings among other problems and now it had taken the fuel pump with it.

About 8 months had passed and Jackie was still sitting in the driveway. I continually debated what to do with her. At this point, I still didn’t have much mechanical knowledge and my mechanic friend had moved away. It was looking like scrapping it was the only option because getting a garage to fit another engine was not financially viable. During this time I had spent many hours on the online forums and discovered quite a number of ZS owners in the UK where doing Puma conversions. They were taking the engines, gearboxs, mounts, wiring looms and ECUs from the 1.7 Ford Pumas and fitting them in their ZS Fiestas. There was so much information on these conversions with even Fast Ford magazine doing a full feature giving step by step instructions on what was needed to complete it. With the help of my brother Niall and friend Brian, was this the answer? Did a few lads with minimal mechanical knowledge dare take on an engine conversion? Before we could think about it too much, the hunt was on for a full running and driving Puma. After being stunk the last time buying an engine at the scrapyard, a full car with safest and most cost effective option as we would know we definitely have everything I needed. Also we would be safe in the knowledge that all the hardware was working fine before it was ripped out and if it didn’t work, we could only blame ourselves.

A full Puma was found up in County Louth. It was battered, paint didn’t match between panels and it was starting to rot. But it started and besides every wheel being completely out of balance, it drove perfectly. Now we had the donor, we needed somewhere to do the work. After a chat with a friend who had told me about a unit he had got in a disused factory, a quick phone call was made and before we knew it, we were moving the cars to their new home.

With a starter toolbox for Halfords we started dismantling the Puma. Close to hand we kept a photocopy of the Fast Ford feature to guide us along the way, letting us know which parts we needed to remove with care and which parts we could just bate out of the way. Progress was slow but we were learning along the way. And if my starter kit toolbox didn’t have the right tool for the job, we made the investment and got said tool. The motto being “If we needed it once to fit it, we’ll need it again to fix it”. So much confidence in what we were doing. Getting everything stripped out was the easy bit. Now we had to put everything back together carefully. We again took our time, checking everything we did twice and started feeling very proud of ourselves when we had the engine fully mounted without the aid of the engine crane. It was a milestone alright but we still had to fit the wiring loom and still plumb everything back in. The wiring loom was the job I was initially scared by as I had to replace all of the wiring from the Fiesta that went from the engine bay to ECU inside the cab and onto the rear axle for the ABS sensors with

that of the wiring from the Puma. It turned out to be one of the more easier jobs, almost therapeutic, like working on a jigsaw puzzle. Most of the plugs that went to different components in the engine all had unique plugs so it was difficult to go wrong. As we neared the end of the conversion, I decided now was the best time to make a few small changes. Another feature I had spotted in Fast Ford was how to upgrade your brakes on a budget using OEM parts. Using their wisdom, I took the calipers from the much bigger mk3 Mondeo and fit them to my tiny Fiesta. If these brakes were stopping big heavy motorway munchers, they were going to be like anchors on my light hot hatch. And there wasn’t much to installing them either. Take the calipers and carriers straight from a Mondeo and pair them with the discs from a ST170 Focus to give you the 4 stud fitment and hey presto. The only adjustment to be made was to drill the holes on the Fiesta hubs to take the bigger bolts of the Mondeo calipers.

The night had come. We had everything plumbed in, everything was plugged in and the battery was fitted back in. To say we were nervous was an understatement. As I held the key in the ignition ready to turn, the thoughts ran through my mind. Had we done the impossible? (for us it was). Turning the key fulled us with mixed emotions. It was turning over, wanting to start but it never happened. We looked around trying to find something we may have overlooked before it eventually dawned on us. The old engine had blown the fuel pump 9 months back. We accepted defeat for that night coming to the conclusion we would need to go get a new pump in the morning from a motor factors. We returned home and over a cup of tea, told the story of our near victory to my parents only for my mother to reply “Would you not have one of those pumps in the Puma you bought?”. We couldn’t believe we had forgotten there was a working fuel pump only a few feet away in the same garage. The tea was abandoned. We returned to the garage and after a while of messing with Fords awkward and fragile fuel pipes and connections, we were ready to go again. There was no dramatic pause this time. Just crank it and see. YES YES YES. IT LIVES. It was running again but this time WE did it. Three lads who only a few months previous, could barely change a set of pads had just done an engine conversion successfully.

Delighted in our little victory, we were happy it was now running, driving and stopping but the rusty arches and scuffed bumpers were letting it down. Jackie was booked into a local bodyshop to have all these issues sorted but I made more additions to the list of jobs. I wanted to remove the rear wiper and keyhole to make the boot one flush clean piece. The bodyshop wasn’t too sure how it was going to turn out but I was confident it was the right decision. She returned a week later to me with a stunning mirror finish but I wasn’t ready to show her to the world. To finish off the rear end, I needed to get rid of the one sided white reverse light and add a bit of symmetry. I needed a passenger side rear lense from a left hand drive Fiesta as they had their fog lights on the left. With the main dealer being the only place I could get one, I dug deep and hoped this was one of the finishing touches I needed. Since the last time the car was on the road, I had slightly out grown out of the “Cossie Look” Mondeo wheels. Taking inspiration from the mk2 Focus RS, I thought a set of flat-faced multispoked wheels would work a treat the fresh paint. Once again the Ford parts bin came to the rescue. The Zetec model of the mk6 Fiesta came with a set alloy wheels that were perfect for the job. Big enough to accommodate the new brakes but not too big to ruin the driving experience. And the perfect look I was looking for. To complete the mk2 Focus RS inspiration, the rear windows were also tinted.

Jackie was back. Back on the road, back in everyday use and back putting a smile on my face everytime I went to get in her. The real test of our work was to come. For the last couple of years I wanted to get over to Ford Fair in Silverstone but there was always something that happened to stop me from going. This year I was going and that was it. The test for Jackie was not only the 800 mile round trip but also, you could not drive all the way to a grand prix track and not have a go. Winding through the hills of Wales, across the English border, down to Northampton, all in convoy with your mates. Pulling into a hotel car park full of classic and modified Fords from all around Europe, the trip was worth the wait. Even on the morning of the show as your watching the cars take their places all around the Silverstone circuit, filling every square inch, you notice how much of a variety there is. Cars ageing from the Model T’s and A’s right up to the cars that are straight off the dealership forecourt, all either restored or modified in so many different styles catching the interest of men and women of every age group. I don’t think there is another single car manufacturer in the world who could pull off something like this. Even for my 20 minute track session, I will still distracted. Not only taking in all the corners you’ve spent years watching F1 or touring cars battle it out on in video games or on TV but also being passed by cars you’ve only ever seen in magazines. I had definitely made the right choice by keeping this little Fiesta, fixing her up and becoming a member of what can only be described as the world’s biggest and friendliest car families.

Since then Jackie has gone on to make a returning trip to Silverstone for Ford Ford the year after, pick up a small trophy for Best Zetec S at an Irish Ford show and in 2015 made the kind of trip that would have most petrolheads making a few ticks on their bucketlists. Travelling across England and Wales to meet up with other participants of the EuroRally then circling Europe. Crossing 8 countries, taking in the sights of Paris, Reims, Monaco, the Alps, Lake Como, Switzerland and of course, fitting in a lap of the legendary Nurgburgring. Jackie took this 3,200 round trip all in her stride. The high altitudes of the Alps, the twisting and turning mountain roads of Switzerland, temperatures that topped 40C, the Nurgburgring and the Autobahn, none of which even phased my little Ford.

With everything we’ve been through, everything she taught me, everywhere we’ve been to and having never left me down (except for the whole tensioner thing, I know), I don’t think I could ever find it in me to leave this car go. I think when I finally find a permanent home for me and my cars, this car will still be there, with her own space in the garage putting a smile on my face whenever I open that door.