First on the list were fuel and brake lines. We had decided to run these through the interior of the car, rather than using the factory lines which ran underneath.
This would provide better protection to the fluid lines as they were not at risk of damage when blasted by rocks on the gravel stages this car would see.
Alloy lines were chosen for the fuel lines, coupled with AN fittings to safely and efficiently transfer from the tank to the interior, and then from the interior into the engine bay.
In the engine bay, flexible braided lines were chosen to transport the fuel on the final journey to the injectors.
This was an expensive task, as AN fittings (and the accompanying braided lines) are 'pricey'. It was a hit we were happy to cop, with it being so vital to the functionality of the engine.
When dealing with such a flammable substance within the cabin, we wanted to make sure it was as high quality as it could be.
Routing them was simple, as we used a bender to get a tight radius to follow the lines of the body where it was needed.
For brake lines, the same idea was struck.
Going through the cabin also enabled us to plumb in the hydraulic handbrake that was already in the car when we bought it.
Further, the use of aftermarket lines gave us more options in what we could do routing-wise.
The decision was made to remove the factory brake booster – an upgrade that is well used across the motorsport industry – and provides the driver with much more responsiveness and feel in the brake pedal.
This caused a problem in itself.
Due to where the roll cage comes through to the front strut tower, it meant that we could not use the factory right-hand drive brake reservoir.
The left-hand drive reservoir is shorter and generally smaller, but uses a remote reservoir.
With our updated spatial requirements, we would have to use a LHD one, and finding the right part proved to be difficult and expensive.
We decided to find a universal remote reservoir, but this failed pretty epically, so we had to fork out another $120 to get a LHD remote reservoir from the United States.
Having done this, we were now faced with the decision of what brakes to run.
The Fiesta runs a sliding front caliper and a drum rear – a setup we were not all that excited about when we thought of driving it through the forest.
We therefore chose to convert the car to use the same brake setup as a Ford Fiesta R2.
It is a proven setup, but it created another hurdle.
We had to convert the car from the standard four-stud hub to the Ford Focus five-stud hub.
The standard Focus sliding caliper would then go onto the rear and we'd have a free choice of calipers for the front.
After much deliberation, we landed on choosing the same AP Racing calipers that the R2 ran with.
It was a hard pill to swallow, as the set of calipers and rotors hurt the bank balance, but we knew that it was a ‘one and done’ solution for brakes that should be more than capable for whatever we do with the car both now and in the future.
With brakes sorted, we needed something to hang them off, and the Reiger Suspension we had acquired earlier was more than capable.
In the Fiesta package we purchased from Peter Taylor early in the process, a Reiger Suspension set was included. This saved us a lot of money and time searching for a compatible option.
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