Ownership Verified: I bought a more or less practical car - 2017 Ford Fiesta ST

That's really neat :clap: and made me realize I've still got dangling wires two years in... oh well, it'll survive the final year now too I guess :dunno:
 
And I thought the Fiesta was a small car

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CrzRsn;n3551821 said:
And I thought the Fiesta was a small car

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First oil change

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Some impaling was involved.

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New shoes arrived

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15 inch steelies wrapped in Michelin X-Ice XI3s
 
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UPS dropped off another just-in-time-for-winter box today.

Before:
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After:
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Was recommended the Husky Liners over the OE Ford ones because these go back under the pedals and are bowled in whereas the Ford ones are flat and stop short of the pedals so you'll still be dripping slush and salt on the carpet. Oddly enough Weathertech doesn't make anything for manual trans Fiestas.
 
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I got the Huskys as well for my RS following your recommendation :yes:
 
CrzRsn;n3554962 said:
Was recommended the Husky Liners over the OE Ford ones because these go back under the pedals and are bowled in whereas the Ford ones are flat and stop short of the pedals so you'll still be dripping slush and salt on the carpet. Oddly enough Weathertech doesn't make anything for manual trans Fiestas.

I think they may not have had a manual trans Fiesta in for laser scanning yet - or maybe they think they're the same as the automatics/don't care enough about the difference. I ended up with a Husky cargo bay liner for the 4Runner, but that's mostly because I saw someone selling one cheap on local Craigslist before someone listed a Weathertech. :p


LeVeL;n3555015 said:
Since Weathertech does make mats for my Acura, that's what I got as soon as I bought the car. They've kept my carpets cleaned but they do tend to slide forward a bit - not enough to cause an issue but my OCD can't stand it.

The Westhertechs I've seen will take a mat retainer hook if your vehicle was equipped with one.
 
CrzRsn;n3554943 said:
New shoes arrived

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15 inch steelies wrapped in Michelin X-Ice XI3s

Nice! We can compare notes since I have blizzaks on 16” Steelies for my Golf GTI.
 
CrzRsn;n3555025 said:
Speaking of lighting, I'm doing 2 lighting mods on the Fiesta in the near future. The first will be done early next week and photos will be posted then.

The second will take a little while longer since I need to make a custom wire harness and figure out some added details on which bulbs to get and whatnot. Will post WIPs in my FiST thread when I start the project.

First and easier of the two down.

Installed a set of Morimoto XB LED fog lights.

First unboxing impressions:

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Very impressed with the quality of the assembly. If you didn't know better, you could almost mistake it for OEM. All the materials feel robust, everything looks sturdy and sealed nicely. There's a proper adjustment screw, something most of the Chinesium aftermarket doesn't bother with. Box says these were made in Thailand, which is pretty up there as far as overseas manufacturing goes. Lenses were marked with both SAE and ECE markings meaning these should be complaint to US and EU lighting regulations, which is pretty impressive if true. Wires shipped naked as shown since there are different configurations possible depending on how your car is wired, but after taking out my OE fogs, it took 5 seconds to get the Morimotos set up with the provided connectors.

Installing them was pretty easy. Just needed to peel back the wheel liners, undo 2 screws and the whole fog light assembly just comes out. Service manual for Fiestas says to take the front wheels off, but with the steering at full lock, there was enough clearance to not need to do that (I'm sure my 185 width winters helped add room). Was a little bit of a pain on the drivers side since the windshield washer fluid reservoir blocked direct access to one of the screws, but with some fumbling around, I got it. Overall install took me about 40 minutes from laying tools out to packing everything up, including aligning them.

Before photos:
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After:
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Driving impressions: There was no fog today so can't really tell you how they preform at their intended activity, but just driving with them on there is significantly less scatter with a more focused beam as would be expected. It was hard to tell if they're actually brighter than the OE halogen bulbs/reflectors, but the color temperature was significantly whiter (5500K) so you could make out the light much better. I'll report back again after I get to drive through some fog.
 
It seems like fog lights don't help you see any better in fog but they make you easier for others to see. I use mine when it's raining and in on the highway (with lots of mist) for the same reason. That said I also use mine on dark backwards sometimes because the wider beam is nice.
 
LeVeL;n3555163 said:
It seems like fog lights don't help you see any better in fog but they make you easier for others to see. I use mine when it's raining and in on the highway (with lots of mist) for the same reason. That said I also use mine on dark backwards sometimes because the wider beam is nice.

Not entirely. A properly aimed fog light pattern is designed to light the road under the fog without reflecting off the water droplets suspended in the air. With that being the case, I can totally see how these Morimotors will be very helpful in fog, but I'll need to wait for a foggy morning to fully comment on it.

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Ideally lights should be fairly low on car and should be aimed so that the beam drops 4 inches at 25 feet away. After reading a lot about foglight aiming over the last few days in preparation for this, I question the effectiveness of fogs that are right next to the headlights (like in the case of your TL and my old A6) since in my mind I imagine they'll mostly be shining the fog right back at you or have such as sharp drop to hit the road that the max beam distance from the car will be very small.
 
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CrzRsn;n3555166 said:
Ideally lights should be fairly low on car and should be aimed so that the beam drops 4 inches at 25 feet away. After reading a lot about foglight aiming over the last few days in preparation for this, I question the effectiveness of fogs that are right next to the headlights (like in the case of your TL and my old A6) since in my mind I imagine they'll mostly be shining the fog right back at you or have such as sharp drop to hit the road that the max beam distance from the car will be very small.
Was going to post basically this, I also wonder about the fogs in our Mustangs for that reason.
 
prizrak;n3555169 said:
Was going to post basically this, I also wonder about the fogs in our Mustangs for that reason.

Guessing those are just to complete the S197 retro look since the 1968-69s had lights there. SN95s and S550s have fog lights where it makes sense.
 
CrzRsn;n3555171 said:
Guessing those are just to complete the S197 retro look since the 1968-69s had lights there. SN95s and S550s have fog lights where it makes sense.

More or less in line with what I was thinking myself, though they coulda gone for the GT500 look with the two fogs in the middle in the air damn
 
CrzRsn;n3555166 said:
Not entirely. A properly aimed fog light pattern is designed to light the road under the fog without reflecting off the water droplets suspended in the air. With that being the case, I can totally see how these Morimotors will be very helpful in fog, but I'll need to wait for a foggy morning to fully comment on it.
Agreed but I've never noticed fog lights actually helping my visibility in fog on any of the cars that I've driven. Maybe fog needs to be extremely dense before there's a noticeable difference but I just haven't experienced it. I also use my fog lights in heavy rain on the highway when there's a lot of mist in the air and still my own visibility doesn't seem to improve. Hence why I'm more concerned about my car being visible to others through fog, hence my choice of yellow fog lights.


CrzRsn;n3555166 said:
Ideally lights should be fairly low on car and should be aimed so that the beam drops 4 inches at 25 feet away. After reading a lot about foglight aiming over the last few days in preparation for this, I question the effectiveness of fogs that are right next to the headlights (like in the case of your TL and my old A6) since in my mind I imagine they'll mostly be shining the fog right back at you or have such as sharp drop to hit the road that the max beam distance from the car will be very small.
That describes my TL.
 
CrzRsn;n3554943 said:
New shoes arrived

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15 inch steelies wrapped in Michelin X-Ice XI3s

How did your winters perform? Did it change your life? Are all seasons dead to you?
 
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