I may as well show you my last two cars (which I'm sure some of you will remember) before I get into talking anymore about the ST.
First off I had a Renault Clio R27, this was a limited-edition Clio 197 which I'd tuned and modified quite*a lot. This was my first hot hatch and I loved the car for the four years I owned it.
Next up I had a Peugeot 208 GTI 30th Edition, this was pretty much what Peugeot were to later call the Peugeot Sport. The car was great handling and had the added bonus of a limited slip diff, but to get the most out of it you had to drive the car on the ragged edge all the time.
I was really enjoying the ownership of the 208, but I woke up one Saturday morning and decided I fancied a change. So, I started looking around to see what hot hatches were on offer in Northern Ireland and I quickly bumped into the Ford Fiesta ST's. There were a few high mileage ones on offer as well as a couple with very low mileage. So, I decided I would go for a test drive and see what I thought of them, that way I could decide it they were for me or a waste of time.
The first dealer I went to were a*complete waste of time, the sales man I spoke to couldn't decide if the car a ST3 in Spirit Blue was for sale or not (even though it was advertised) and eventually when he decided it was, he couldn't find the keys. So, I moved quickly onto the next dealer, where the salesman and staff*couldn't*have been more helpful. They were able to answer any questions I had and were quite happy to take me for a test drive. After a short test drive, I decided I liked the car and knew it was for me. When we returned to the dealership we talked the figures and I told the sales man, I would let him know it a couple of days what I wanted to do. I had another dealer to stop at on my way home, so we called in there to see what figures they were talking, because they had a car which was pretty much identical to the one I had just test driven. After quite a long wait I the dealership I finally got speaking to a sales man and told him what I was after. He was working his sums out when my phone rang and it was the second sales man again. He was keen to push the sale over the line so sharpened his figures a bit and the deal was struck.
Of course, as soon as the deal was struck I started reading through the articles on various forums and my shopping list for the car started to take shape.
A couple of days later I went paid for and picked up the ST, all of which went very smoothly. The car had 3005 miles on the clock when I was leaving the dealership.
Being new to the Fiesta I didn't want to push it too hard from the word go as I knew it would be different from the 208 to drive.
Soon after getting Monty home I gave him his first proper wash. I knew there were lots of areas that the dealer hadn't really paid attention to when they were getting the car ready for me, such as the wheels and brake callipers.
I started off by covering the car in BiltHamber Snow Foam to help break down what dirt there was on the car/wheels.
Of course, I use the two-bucket technique. The was bucket having BiltHamber Auto-Wash in and the rinse bucket having clean water to wash the wash mitt in.
As for the wash mitt, I was using my Microfibre Madness Incredimitt. This is by far the best mitt I've used to date.
As you can see, even though the car had been cleaned by the dealer, even after a short drive home the water didn't take long get very dirty.
I knew it was due to rain later in the afternoon so I wasn't too fused about drying the car off, but I'm still over the moon with how well its looking.
While cleaning the car I noticed that the tail pipe could do with a quick polish up.
I used Autosol and it didn't take long to get it looking how it should be.
I've been looking at the car a lot over the last could of days and I feel the ST badge on the back get a bit lost against the orange of the car, so I'll have to have a bit of a think about changing the colours of the badge.
When driving home from the dealership after picking the car up, I noticed the parcel shelf was vibrating a bit, when I got home I had a look at what was causing this and I found that one of the clips on the shelf was missing. I went onto eBay and ordered a replacement, within a couple of days it was here.
My first proper mod for the car has also arrived. It's a Black Ramair Silicone Induction Intake Pipe, purchased from RamAir on eBay.
I haven't fitted the pipe as yet, as I'm waiting for the weather to improve so I can spend a day give the car some care and attention.
Thanks for reading.
First off I had a Renault Clio R27, this was a limited-edition Clio 197 which I'd tuned and modified quite*a lot. This was my first hot hatch and I loved the car for the four years I owned it.
Next up I had a Peugeot 208 GTI 30th Edition, this was pretty much what Peugeot were to later call the Peugeot Sport. The car was great handling and had the added bonus of a limited slip diff, but to get the most out of it you had to drive the car on the ragged edge all the time.
I was really enjoying the ownership of the 208, but I woke up one Saturday morning and decided I fancied a change. So, I started looking around to see what hot hatches were on offer in Northern Ireland and I quickly bumped into the Ford Fiesta ST's. There were a few high mileage ones on offer as well as a couple with very low mileage. So, I decided I would go for a test drive and see what I thought of them, that way I could decide it they were for me or a waste of time.
The first dealer I went to were a*complete waste of time, the sales man I spoke to couldn't decide if the car a ST3 in Spirit Blue was for sale or not (even though it was advertised) and eventually when he decided it was, he couldn't find the keys. So, I moved quickly onto the next dealer, where the salesman and staff*couldn't*have been more helpful. They were able to answer any questions I had and were quite happy to take me for a test drive. After a short test drive, I decided I liked the car and knew it was for me. When we returned to the dealership we talked the figures and I told the sales man, I would let him know it a couple of days what I wanted to do. I had another dealer to stop at on my way home, so we called in there to see what figures they were talking, because they had a car which was pretty much identical to the one I had just test driven. After quite a long wait I the dealership I finally got speaking to a sales man and told him what I was after. He was working his sums out when my phone rang and it was the second sales man again. He was keen to push the sale over the line so sharpened his figures a bit and the deal was struck.
Of course, as soon as the deal was struck I started reading through the articles on various forums and my shopping list for the car started to take shape.
A couple of days later I went paid for and picked up the ST, all of which went very smoothly. The car had 3005 miles on the clock when I was leaving the dealership.
Being new to the Fiesta I didn't want to push it too hard from the word go as I knew it would be different from the 208 to drive.
Soon after getting Monty home I gave him his first proper wash. I knew there were lots of areas that the dealer hadn't really paid attention to when they were getting the car ready for me, such as the wheels and brake callipers.
I started off by covering the car in BiltHamber Snow Foam to help break down what dirt there was on the car/wheels.
Of course, I use the two-bucket technique. The was bucket having BiltHamber Auto-Wash in and the rinse bucket having clean water to wash the wash mitt in.
As for the wash mitt, I was using my Microfibre Madness Incredimitt. This is by far the best mitt I've used to date.
As you can see, even though the car had been cleaned by the dealer, even after a short drive home the water didn't take long get very dirty.
I knew it was due to rain later in the afternoon so I wasn't too fused about drying the car off, but I'm still over the moon with how well its looking.
While cleaning the car I noticed that the tail pipe could do with a quick polish up.
I used Autosol and it didn't take long to get it looking how it should be.
I've been looking at the car a lot over the last could of days and I feel the ST badge on the back get a bit lost against the orange of the car, so I'll have to have a bit of a think about changing the colours of the badge.
When driving home from the dealership after picking the car up, I noticed the parcel shelf was vibrating a bit, when I got home I had a look at what was causing this and I found that one of the clips on the shelf was missing. I went onto eBay and ordered a replacement, within a couple of days it was here.
My first proper mod for the car has also arrived. It's a Black Ramair Silicone Induction Intake Pipe, purchased from RamAir on eBay.
I haven't fitted the pipe as yet, as I'm waiting for the weather to improve so I can spend a day give the car some care and attention.
Thanks for reading.