New Focus....from NH. :)

Hey guys/girls...figured I'd introduce myself on here as I'll be done in mid-june to visit a special someone. Figured it'd be nice to let you guys know in advance to watch out for my POS

Heres the dealio...no power numbers yet, but I'll give you the mods.

Engine/tranny/car:

'05 Duratec 5 Spd ZX3
D23 swap
Bored .020" over, forged Supertech pistons and Eagle rods, 11.2:1 compression ratio
Custom ported 2.0L head (flows within 5% of FRPP 2.3L head)
Stock cams, Crower springs and titanium retainers, CFM adjustable cam gears
K&N Intake, FSWerks header, 2.5" SS flex, 2.5" race exhaust w/ 18" Vibrant resonator (yeah...it's f***ing loud. :/ )
Braille 11.2 lb race battery with HTPerformance bracket (Shaved 35 lbs off the front end)
VF Engineering passenger mount, Steeda driver mount, CFM dogbone
Balance shaft delete

Quaife LSD
Exedy stage II clutch w/ lightweight flywheel (that I'm in love with)


Suspension:

D2 coilovers front and rear, currently riding on cut FC rear springs/bumpstops (til Wednesday, when I swap my D2 rears back in)
Koni Yellows in the rear, fully adjustable
Prothane rear bushings, bump stops
HTPerformance adjustable rear toe arms

Rox Racing RT2 wheels, 17" x 7.5" +48mm, running 205/40/17 tires
SVT front brake conversion

Interior:

Steeda STS
AEM wideband air/fuel
Soon to be S2 edition seats when I buy them friday and reupholster them



That's about it...I'm sure I'm missing all kinds of stuff, any questions just ask.

Heres a few pics, though I know most of you have seen the car at some point:













And a little about myself:

My names Justin, I'm 19 and I run/co-own a detailing business (C & C Detailing). I've gone to school the past few years for mechanical engineering as well, and plan to put my skills to use making some parts in the near future. My life consists of working 30+ hours a week and going to school full time, or working 70+ hours a week when I'm not in school. Busy lifestyle, can't say I don't like it though. I look forward to meeting many of you during my visit in June!


---Justin

Sweet where u from in NH I was just in Keene back in march n nice ride

Damn your 19!

haha, nice focus dude and welcome

Keene is about an hour from me man, I live ten mins from the state capital (Concord). Only uh...1,215 miles from Florida :p It's alright though, the Focus needs a good drive!

Thanks guys! (And yes, I'm 19 haha...whats so surprising bout that?)

welcome! dreaming of better weather being on this site with us Floridians?

Actually been good weather up here so far! But it'll be nice for a weeks vaca down there


PS anyone wakeboard on here? I'm itching to go when I come down, it'd be nice to have warm water for a change haha

Welcome to the site! Car's looking great as always

PS -- I'm SVT3658 on the Jet

Hey, I know you

Welcome!

h0lmes wrote:Welcome to the site! Car's looking great as always

PS -- I'm SVT3658 on the Jet

Thought the car looked familiar :p Thanks for the welcome man!

Armanduhx3 wrote:Hey, I know you

Welcome!

True dat.

NHFocus wrote:Keene is about an hour from me man, I live ten mins from the state capital (Concord). Only uh...1,215 miles from Florida :p It's alright though, the Focus needs a good drive!

Thanks guys! (And yes, I'm 19 haha...whats so surprising bout that?)

Yeah I'll be making the drive down from their in August after the wedding when I help my girl move all her stuff down here unfortuantly we'll be riding in the chevy cavalier no focus for that trip lol

And that is probably one of my favorite looking Focus' ever. Good stuff.

Thanks man

I try to keep it clean...if money rolls in this summer the front end will get cleaned up a little, but other than that no major changes in store. Maybe some rear camber arms and fender rolling.

Your car just replaced Joshs. Now Josh needs to step his game. Keep it up dude.

*cough* Get some Schmidt TH-Lines or Modern-Lines. *cough*

I know I'm going against the grain here, but...




Needs less low.

Nice car though.

^ No worries man, rear is getting raised an inch tomorrow when I swap in my koni orange shocks and put my D2 springs back in.

eurobloke, if I buy wheels they'll be something epic, but I don't have money now. Running a business out of pocket for now and it's not exactly cheap...not to mention my car is a money pit as is.

so why are you putting the uncut springs back in?

I need camber arms OR rolled fenders to continue running the FC's. The drivers rear tire rubs on the fender, and I REALLY don't want to cut a tire. I like to throw the car into corners and not have to worry about it.

The cut springs will go back in at some point...I need a break from them, I live in NH and the roads here are terrible.

dude yer car is smokin!!! and

gotcha.

and see vdubers, beeing soo low isn't practical.

My handling is back on par with where it should be

EXTREMELY happy with the koni's! And being back on the D2's, ride is about 5 times smoother.

BigRed03 wrote:
and see vdubers, beeing soo low isn't practical.

Yes and no. You have to remember, dubs have been going loooow for a long while. This "low" movement is a new thing for the Focus and it's still somewhat being figured out. From what I've gathered, dubs go stupid low MUCH easier than a Focus does and it's pretty much a cut and dry process for them.

Once more people do it and more parts are made and the knowledge gets out there it'll be "easier." But "practicality" is all in the eye of the beerholder

Nice car and welcome

Josh, if I roll the fenders I can go significantly lower in the front. The rear is where the problem is. At the height I was at, the control arms had about 1 inch of movement upwards (if there was no bumpstops). The only way to get much lower us to make some different lower control arms.

Yeah that's what I've found to be the limitation. You could always buy a set of these



I really wanted to buy a set but I didn't want to be a guinea pig. I saw a set in person at our beach meet, and they look great. If you can get Dominic to make more, theyd defintely be a nice addition to your lowness

I can make my own, I go to school for engineering...and that is NOT the design I'd go with... I don't trust that for a number of reasons. It MAY be fine, but from at least a quick glance I can tell you they won't meet the criteria I'd be designing for.

Who knows, maybe I'll make some this summer. I plan on going full time with the detailing and doing design work on the side, so we'll see!

What kind of engineering? I'm going to school for mechanical

I can definitely see where that design could not be the best, but if the right materials are chosen it has the potential be problem free forever.

What design are you thinking? (I understand if you don;t want to share )

Mechanical as well. I was thinking tubular like that, but having two arms with the spring seat welded between the two. And a cup to hold the spring in place...my small springs are only 4 coils tall, if i got a little air or hit a large bump they'd like go flying.

I would just want to use the two arms so that the spring seat is held in two directions rather than just vertically. You never know what kind of forces you're going to encounter on a car...so you kind of need to design for as many as it's feasible to do so for.

And if you ever have any intentions of using that idea, do me a favor and involve me I'll probably look into it later this summer.



My buddy and I that run the detailing business have consider moving down south to officially open a shop (as we do stuff mobile/on location or we pick up the vehicle currently), we were thinking the Carolina's but we'll see how much I like Florida. The detailing is our stepping stone to an engineering business, so we will have to see what the near future brings. I want warm weather and modified cars...and thats only available 4 months out of the year here.

Your car is way too low to be considered for a detailer's job down here. If you ain't on 24's, you ain't s***!

Rob speaks the truth

They all drive Crown Vics and have at least 24"s. Biggest I've seen is 28"s, it was redonkulous

when steeda had their race springs on the bumblebee, they went around a corner and the spring popped out....so their solution was to weld a few links of chain so the swing arm wouldnt go that far to allow the spring to pop loose.

That sounds sketchy

Yeah I wouldn't be using chains, if anything some braided stainless lines would work well.

what? weld one end of a 8-12" length of chain from the LCA to the subframe...keeps the LCA from dropping too far and allows all suspension travel without interferring with spring...

I wouldn't use chains because they bind easily. I don't want it to bind and hold the arm higher than need be after a rapid compression of the suspension.