SPEED World Challenge Focus.........Restoration

EDIT Sorry. pics are gone. Album here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/team_illuminata/albums/72157675062456295

We'd like to introduce our latest project car. We recently purchased this ex-SPEED World Challenge Focus. Some of you may recognize it. As you can see it was sponsored by FOCALJET for a while. here's a thread that documented the involvement. http://forums.focaljet.com/focus-road-racing/522387-focaljet-teams-pdmc-motorsports-oakland-univ-speed-world-challenge.html HISTORY This is what we know about the cars history. We assume it was built by 3R Racing in Colorado for the Speed World Challenge in maybe 2005 or 2006. Robb Holland drove it at Infineon Raceway in 2006 but we haven't found any other races. It may have had FILA decals before the FOCALJET ones. In mid 2007 it was sold to PDMC Motorsport, a race team associated with Oakland University in SE Michigan. The team had plans to run the final three rounds of the Speed World Challenge at Mosport, Road Atlanta and Laguna Seca. It was to be piloted by Jeff Nowicki who happens to live round the corner from me though I have yet to meet him. It did run at Mosport and qualified 23rd and finished 17th. It also won the B&M Holeshot Award; whatever that is. Story here . It is unclear whether it ran at Road Atlanta or Leguna Seca. I suspect not. After this, from word on the street, the program ran into some legal issues and the car sat for awhile. it was then purchased by a local car collector for his young son to race but that never happened so late in 2013 it was sold to another local car enthusiast who passed it on to a friend of mine who then sold it to us. So it's been passed around a lot but seems not to have been abused, too much. CURRENT CONDITION As the car sits it does not run. It seems as if it has been pillaged of a few of it's parts but not what you might expect. It is missing axles, the throttle body is not bolted on but the wires are connected. Apparently it had no intake manifold when it emerged into the local community but one of the previously mentioned owners put a Cosworth unit on. that is why the throttle body is and intake are not connected. They don't fit. It is missing a window net too and all the fluids. It does turn over but pisses out fuel from the fuel filter. The battery is fully charged and seems to hold it. The ECU (PECTEL) seems to have a tune in it too. COOL STUFF Make no mistake, this is a proper race car. I can't imagine what it cost to build but maybe more than my house. We didn't pay house money for it though. Here's a quick run down of some of its highlights: Gutted interior, Cage Lexan windows, CF tailgate Composite splitter Fuel cell, Air jacks Motec dash and data logger Composite rear wing (used to be on the tailgate) Forgeline RS wheels, AP brakes Custom exhaust manifold Cosworth intake manifold ] Composite dash Pedal box Proflex dampers Custom wiring harness, Brake bias adjuster Racetech seat Pectel ECU Quaife gearset LSD? Side exit exhaust Composite hood 12.8:1 compression ratio PLANS So what shall we do with this beast? Well, we feel the car deserves to run again, hopefully flat out. So we’d like to get it driving once more. It’s going to need some axles, fluids, intake and probably a tune to achieve that goal. Of course we can’t run Forgeline wheels on the car, excellent thought they are, because we are the North American importer of BRAID wheels. We have some Fulrace As on their way as we speak. 17x8, +27 offset, 4x108. Just like the Forgelines. Yes, they will be white. We also need to get some yellow vinyl on the car to make it match our others. It's uncanny how close to the BRAID blue the car is right now. Just needs some yellow and big BRAID stickers on the side and it will look like it's always been part of the family. If we are successful restoring it to a running, viable race car then maybe we’ll run a few autocrosses and track days with it this year. That would be nice. What would be really nice would be to see it race on the track again. It is a race car after all. Apparently it should be legal for SCCA STU class if we tweak a few things. The intake manifold will need to be stock but we have one of those on the way. Not sure what else we need to do. Oh, and we'll have to find a driver. Mr. Nowicki, are you reading this? There is even the possibility of running it in a hill climb, in Michigan! If there are suitable car shows in the area we might take it there, but of course we'd have to trailer it. Woodward Dream Cruise would be fun for instance. Maybe the Ford dealer in Royal Oak would host it. Any other suggestions would be welcome. So what do you think? Subscribe to this thread and let us know. Look out for updates and to answer all our dumb questions. There will be plenty.

AWESOME.

Can't wait to see how this goes. There's a certain race car i've had my eye on for the last year or so that i keep hoping i can buy if we win the lottery or something.

Cool. Will be watching the progress.

Swank Force One wrote: AWESOME. Can't wait to see how this goes. There's a certain race car i've had my eye on for the last year or so that i keep hoping i can buy if we win the lottery or something.

Just buy the berkeleying thing already. You have sold the miata, yes?

Thoroughly badass.

teamilluminata wrote: Oh, and we'll have to find a driver. Mr. Nowicki, are you reading this? There is even the possibility of running it in a hill climb, in Michigan!

O-o-o Pick me!, Pick me! Over here!!!!!

LOL

Looks like a great project! Can't wait to see it finished!

Do you need help making those Forgelines disappear?

Yowsas, that is such a great looking car! Best of luck to you guys.

Dibs on the Cossie intake???

This thing is serious. I saw it on Wednesday night and was blown away with the level of detail in the prep. Those panels weigh absolutely nothing. I really cant wait until it's running

I would love for you to do a side by side comparison between mine and this monster.

Mitchell wrote: Do you need help making those Forgelines disappear?

Forgeline RS are my favorite wheels. They do everything well.

petegossett wrote: Dibs on the Cossie intake???

FYI: that manifold is for a Duratec not a Zetec. And if you don't want it I might be interested in it for my Transit Connect.

Looks like all of the Focus vultures have shown up

Hal wrote:

petegossett wrote: Dibs on the Cossie intake???

FYI: that manifold is for a Duratec not a Zetec. And if you don't want it I might be interested in it for my Transit Connect.

Damn, Duratec does me no good... :(

Thanks for all the positive feedback. It's really encouraging to hear. We were a bit nervous buying this as we didn't know if others would appreciate it. Looks like we found our audience. We are now even more inspired to get it up and running again.

Adrian_Thompson wrote: This thing is serious. I saw it on Wednesday night and was blown away with the level of detail in the prep. Those panels weigh absolutely nothing. I really cant wait until it's running

Good to see you and Dan the other day. How can I get hold of that axle you have?

Mitchell wrote: I would love for you to do a side by side comparison between mine and this monster.

You have one of these Mitchell?

teamilluminata wrote:

Mitchell wrote: I would love for you to do a side by side comparison between mine and this monster.

You have one of these Mitchell?

Can I put mine in the competition?

We got it up on stands and took the wheels off:

Which means we can now offer the wheels for sale:

They are Forgeline RS in polish aluminium. 17x8 +30 approx. (measured) 4x108 63.4 17lbs

No tires, straight, clean and look like they should polish up nicely. Complete with lug nuts M12x1.5

$1200 obo.

:)

teamilluminata wrote:

Mitchell wrote: I would love for you to do a side by side comparison between mine and this monster.

You have one of these Mitchell?

World Challenge Focus? Hah, no; just a humdrum SVT Focus. I would find the difference between street and track versions of the same model interesting.

I would give my left nut for those wheels if they were 5x114. They're perfect in every way for my uses.... except for that damn bolt pattern.

So sad.

teamilluminata wrote:

Adrian_Thompson wrote: This thing is serious. I saw it on Wednesday night and was blown away with the level of detail in the prep. Those panels weigh absolutely nothing. I really cant wait until it's running

Good to see you and Dan the other day. How can I get hold of that axle you have?

Swing by my place one evening or this weekend and grab them, or I'll swing by your house this weekend. P.M. me your phone #

P.S. the cost is driving the 911 around the block BTW

Does this have the D20 or D23 engine? I assume D20 unless I missed something.

Great looking car. I'm a huge fan of touring cars and own a former pro car that I race in STU.
Besides getting it running and updating safety equipment, it should be ready for SCCA STU. The Focus Coupe is a an approved World Challenge classified STU car at 2677 lb. Based on the photos, the only thing that I question concerning conforming to STU spec is the rear wing can't exceed 48" in width. Air Jacks may need to be removed or disabled.