RE: SOTW: 1988 Ford Granada Ghia 2.9 V6
Discussion
grahamw48 said:
grumpy52 said:
I used to pick these up from customers for a car hire company in the day the trick was to see how low you could get the MPG reading on a run my best/worst was 11mpg on a late night run between Gatwick and Heathrow !
But then you grew up ? 
Anyhow, 11 is a bit ordinary - single figures is where it's at.
grahamw48 said:
But then you grew up ?
ha beat that - i stopped for fuel one day at the bottom of telegraph hill in exeter - then went for a drink in the pub next door (times were different back then), came out and booted it up the hill with aircon on, and it showed 8mpg for a while !!Oh, and were you with the same hire-car company ? 
My sarky comment was directed at the sort of immature and irresponsible character who enjoys f
king up vehicles for businesses and future customers.
Most high capacity cars will show silly low mpg figures when 'enthusiastically' driven from cold...so what ?
My sarky comment was directed at the sort of immature and irresponsible character who enjoys f
king up vehicles for businesses and future customers.Most high capacity cars will show silly low mpg figures when 'enthusiastically' driven from cold...so what ?
grumpy52 said:
I used to pick these up from customers for a car hire company in the day the trick was to see how low you could get the MPG reading on a run my best/worst was 11mpg on a late night run between Gatwick and Heathrow !
Looking back at my spread sheet for my V6 Ghia, I averaged 27 on a long run, cruise control, and 22 around town.My ownership covered 6 years and I put 40k on it, average over that period was 34 mpg
How did you manage 11
Dad had a twin Turbo Scorpio 4x4 which had been done by Turbo Technics for a previous owner. About £5,000 conversion cost and somewhere north of 300bhp!
Used to boil the brake fluid in traffic and the paint on the front end had faded from the heat but it flew along like a scalded cat!
Used to boil the brake fluid in traffic and the paint on the front end had faded from the heat but it flew along like a scalded cat!
LuS1fer said:
Horrid cars. My father had a 2.8 Ghia and it had rubber steeering, a coarse engine, 16mpg and it was just awful. The interior space was huge but to be honest the Princess 2 did a far better job.
I liked my 2.9 Scorpio. Ok the interior looked odd but was supremely comfortable. I would still feel good after 300 miles. As it was from the days before sporty was fashionable it had a excellent ride too.I do agree that a six cylinder Princess is a much better car for everything except towing; it's just so much smoother.
I used to enjoy driving the 24v "Cosworth" versions when I was selling Fords for a living in the early 90's. Not stunning off the mark, but once rolling, I reckon they were easily as quick as an original Volvo 850 T5, despite the woeful (and unreliable) 4 speed Ford autobox. That engine had loads of guts, sounded fantastic, and was super smooth.
The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
Limpet said:
I used to enjoy driving the 24v "Cosworth" versions when I was selling Fords for a living in the early 90's. Not stunning off the mark, but once rolling, I reckon they were easily as quick as an original Volvo 850 T5, despite the woeful (and unreliable) 4 speed Ford autobox. That engine had loads of guts, sounded fantastic, and was super smooth.
The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
The 2.9 12 valve engine is much better than the 2.8i, the 2.8 is the model with the (incredibly stupid) siamesed heads.The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
The 2.9 does respond well to conventional tuning methods, without too much loss of mpg, unless you go silly with the specs. Still fairly low poer outputs for its size, but its a 2 valve per cylinder pushrod V6
Limpet said:
I used to enjoy driving the 24v "Cosworth" versions when I was selling Fords for a living in the early 90's. Not stunning off the mark, but once rolling, I reckon they were easily as quick as an original Volvo 850 T5, despite the woeful (and unreliable) 4 speed Ford autobox. That engine had loads of guts, sounded fantastic, and was super smooth.
The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
Thanks for illustrating how much the average car salesman knows about his product The 12v version was a different kettle of fish altogether. Under-endowed, breathless and ridiculously thirsty. They used siamesed exhaust ports on the heads for installation compatibility / cost reasons, which wrecked the breathing efficiency at higher engine speeds, and 150 bhp from 2.8/9 litres wasn't competitive, even back then. Cosworth gave a whopping 54 bhp hike basically by allowing it to breathe properly.
The injected 2.0 Twin Cam gave near identical performance to the 2.8/2.9 12v with pretty much half the fuel consumption.
A 'too cheap to ignore' Cosworth would get my attention, but otherwise not really my bag.
As the previous poster has pointed out...totally different heads on the 2.9, AND different injection system.
Obviously the Cossie is different again (2.9 based of course).
Blimey, there's an awful lot of unjustified hate being aimed at this old Granny....
Look at it this way: If you bought it for the 550 bin price, and it lasted 500 miles before terminally breaking down, it would still have been cheaper than taking a taxi... if you squeeze a couple of thousand miles out of it, then you're laughing.
As for this 16mpg thing - that was posted by some fool who obviously just hates Fords, or who had an extremely broken one. The Mk3 should easily return mid-20s, so long as you don't drive it like you stole it.
Personally, if it looks like it'll go for less than half a monkey, I'd be tempted just to drive it to a track day & thrash it until it dies. Or, if it doesn't die, take it to the next track day.... then sell the bits.
Look at it this way: If you bought it for the 550 bin price, and it lasted 500 miles before terminally breaking down, it would still have been cheaper than taking a taxi... if you squeeze a couple of thousand miles out of it, then you're laughing.
As for this 16mpg thing - that was posted by some fool who obviously just hates Fords, or who had an extremely broken one. The Mk3 should easily return mid-20s, so long as you don't drive it like you stole it.
Personally, if it looks like it'll go for less than half a monkey, I'd be tempted just to drive it to a track day & thrash it until it dies. Or, if it doesn't die, take it to the next track day.... then sell the bits.
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