Wednesday 17th September 2008

Mountune Performance Focus ST

Ford offering 35bhp upgrade for ST for £1,120

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Ford is offering dealer-fit performance upgrades for the Focus ST which take it interestingly close to the hotly anticipated RS model. The Mountune Performance package will retail at £1,120 (plus fitting) and consists of a larger intercooler, a high-flow air filter and revised engine calibration.

Together, this lifts power output from Ford’s potent 2.5-litre Duratec ST engine from 225bhp to 260bhp at 5,500rpm. The upgrade reduces the 0-60mph sprint by 0.6sec to 5.9sec, and the 0-100mph  time by 1.9sec to 14.1sec. The Focus RS, which is due early next year, will have a ‘sub six-second’ 0-60 time from a slightly higher 300bhp, thanks to a tuned version of the same 2.5-litre engine. The RS is expected to retail for around £25,000.

Developed by Mountune Performance in association with Ford Team RS, these packages will only be available at selected specialist Ford dealers' from Sept 2008. The upgrades carry a minimum of 12 months/12,000-mile dealer warranty up to a maximum of three years/36,000 miles. The upgrade kit does not affect the vehicle warranty.

[f111lover]

Not a bad upgrade, prices are pretty good as well, I only wish the car looked better, this new generation of Focus/Impreza/Lancer clones just look ugly.

[steebo888]

very good price and comes with warrnty. this cant be far of the pace of the rs to say st's you can get them for 9k on trader

Edited by steebo888 on Wednesday 17th September 11:39

[White-Noise]

Sounds like a decent price to me, wonder what they charge to fit and could you do it yourself? Guess that voids the warranty though...?

[german tony]

So, 260 BHP & no trick diff required but 300 (remoured) needs 1?

Does that suggest that the RS's diff can cope with more & is there going to be a Mountune conversion authorised for that too?

[FWDRacer]

Sub 20mpg?

[DAVEVO9]

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

[Mr Whippy]

There was a good review of this package in Performance Car, with some actual before/after test times through the gears etc...

It seems to perform much better than they actually officially say it does, with a massive mid-range performance!

Dave

[rob.e]

Very interesting.. i'm surprised more manufacturers aren't doing similar things.

VED & Co car tax is based on official c02 figs before any dealerfit options - so that car will be taxed on its original output, not the output after the mountune tweaks.

In fact taking that to its logical conclusion you could presumably make an ST with a "tax friendly" ecu that gives minimal c02 output, then charge a small fee for a dealer fit replacement that gives you the full beans.

[Pingman]

Odd move by ford to offer an upgrade on the ST that brings its power just a cats whisker away from the new RS.

The ST will still be just as boring to drive though, that thing drives like a bog standard Focus that Ford added harder suspention and a bit more power too.

[Welshbeef]

DAVEVO9 said:

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

Well the same engine with an auto box in the much heavier Volvo V70 T5's average much higher than what owners claim they achieve on PH.

hmm.

[Mr Whippy]

rob.e said:

Very interesting.. i'm surprised more manufacturers aren't doing similar things.

VED & Co car tax is based on official c02 figs before any dealerfit options - so that car will be taxed on its original output, not the output after the mountune tweaks.

In fact taking that to its logical conclusion you could presumably make an ST with a "tax friendly" ecu that gives minimal c02 output, then charge a small fee for a dealer fit replacement that gives you the full beans.

Yep, they would be sensible to get in on the aftermarket tuning market themselves, rather than letting some random tuners do the business and make a profit doing it instead!

It's nice to see it being quite a good general package too. Would be cool to add some sportier cats, not sure the air filter will do much (I've never seen a "performance" filter actually do anything except hurt filtration of finer particles)!?

Dave

[Buzz word]

Welshbeef said:

DAVEVO9 said:

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

Well the same engine with an auto box in the much heavier Volvo V70 T5's average much higher than what owners claim they achieve on PH.

hmm.

I belive the ST fit of that engine saw the EGR system deleted though so any cruising situations will see the ST drinking more like for like. If you drove in a way that never activated the EGR in the volvo you should be able to make it in the ST ballpark.

[Bungleaio]

rob.e said:

In fact taking that to its logical conclusion you could presumably make an ST with a "tax friendly" ecu that gives minimal c02 output, then charge a small fee for a dealer fit replacement that gives you the full beans.

I'm sure if all the maufacturers start this the government will move the goal posts

[missing the VR6]

That looks like really good value for money.
Wonder how fast thr RS will be if those are the figures 260 bhp will make.

[Mr Whippy]

Buzz word said:

Welshbeef said:

DAVEVO9 said:

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

Well the same engine with an auto box in the much heavier Volvo V70 T5's average much higher than what owners claim they achieve on PH.

hmm.

I belive the ST fit of that engine saw the EGR system deleted though so any cruising situations will see the ST drinking more like for like. If you drove in a way that never activated the EGR in the volvo you should be able to make it in the ST ballpark.

That doesn't sound right, EGR essentially just closes the throttle without doing so, so a small reduction in pumping losses in the Ovlov vs the ST...

If EGR really added that much economy benefit it'd be fitted on every car and operate at 100% duty cycle with wide open throttles!

Dave

[german tony]

You can see it, can't you? Standard Range Rover Sport will be available with 100 bhp & as soon as you've bought it the dealer re-maps it for you at marginal cost under their factory approved re-mapping scheme & bingo, back up to whatever it should be & the tax band remains at a low level.

The Govt will be working on this even as I sit here typing.

[BlueSei]

Never seen anyone less than 40 driving one of these cars, doubt the more mature drivers I have seen will want to opt for more performance.

[bales]

BlueSei said:

Never seen anyone less than 40 driving one of these cars, doubt the more mature drivers I have seen will want to opt for more performance.

People can still be into performance cars above the age of 40 you know....

[Buzz word]

Mr Whippy said:

Buzz word said:

Welshbeef said:

DAVEVO9 said:

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

Well the same engine with an auto box in the much heavier Volvo V70 T5's average much higher than what owners claim they achieve on PH.

hmm.

I belive the ST fit of that engine saw the EGR system deleted though so any cruising situations will see the ST drinking more like for like. If you drove in a way that never activated the EGR in the volvo you should be able to make it in the ST ballpark.

That doesn't sound right, EGR essentially just closes the throttle without doing so, so a small reduction in pumping losses in the Ovlov vs the ST...

If EGR really added that much economy benefit it'd be fitted on every car and operate at 100% duty cycle with wide open throttles!

Dave

The idea with EGR is that it allows the exhaust back into the inlet but the gas is essentially inert. The effect is like reducing the capacity of the engine. You only run it at part throttle so when the car doesn't need the power to cruise. If you open the throttle wide up it means you want some performance and the EGR shuts off. That allows the full capacity of the engine to be used and let it munch through more fuel. Its quite a good system really and people tend to deactivate it on road cars as they claim it ruins throttle response. I can see the point slightly as whatever gas is past the EGR throttle and in the inlet system needs to be processed before the clean air can come in and it uses the full capacity again.

The other thing it does is lower NOx emmissions but if you run the EGR too aggressivly it will push up particulates. The good thing is they can be delt with by particulate filters. The bad thing is particulate filters need a rich cycle to burn the mess off and clean them.

The big issue with EGR on petrol cars is that NOx emissions are generally low so its not really necessary to fit something so expensive. Diesel cars tend to get them to help the NOx so have to get them to meet emissions.

[matmoxon]

DAVEVO9 said:

FWDRacer said:

Sub 20mpg?

ST's drink fuel anyway so I would have thought below that

I average 24 - 25 mpg on V-Power, day to day use, on a non tuned ST (mixture of urban and extra urban and 30mpg on a 0.8 lepton M-Way cruise). If you drive it around town allot your mpg will suffer. After a 1 hour "spirited" drive around some back roads the meter still showed 18 - 19mpg, Use higher gears, that T5 lump has plenty of torque to throw around, and I doubt that Day to day the performance upgrade would hurt the mpg too much. But if you want mpg you wouldn’t be buying a hot hatch anyway.

this performance pack will simply be a re-map, you can easily get more than 260bhp out of the ST engine with just a re-map of the ECU as far as I am aware. So I doubt this upgrade package will be much more than that. But I have been told that the extra horses really transform the car, If I keep mine I will be getting it tuned.

Matt

Edited by matmoxon on Wednesday 17th September 12:43