Ford Mondeo ST220 Estate

[SebringMan]

Memories can be a funny thing really, The same can be said for circumstance.

Many years ago now, I had a Mondeo 3.0 V6 Ghia X Estate. This was not the car to have for if you were doing 5,000 miles a year. However, with diesels back then seeming to have a plethora of issues from dying injectors, fuel pumps, and EGR issues, especially in the Mk3, the V6 was chosen and it converted to LPG when my dad and I used to carry out such conversions.

It was great. OK, it wasn’t the most economical and certainly not the most powerful 3.0 out there with a wopping 201BHP, but it was creamy smooth, made a decent engine note and had a great response about it. The fact that it was an estate meant it was super practical, especially with the high(ish) roofline continuing to the back. It had a lovely gearchange that could shame many Germans, and it went down the road well. A good memory of mine was thrashing it down from Warwick to St. David’s in around 2.5 Hours I am told. I personally cannot believe that, but I did really enjoy the drive down there, especially once I got past Newport. It also did a few LeMans trips too, before finally doing a trip to Lille for NYE shennanegans, before it got written off at 262,000 miles.



On the flipside, my dad had a green 2.5 Ghia X 5 speed Auto Estate. That was a great car when it was working, but he made a mistake in buying one that had been cooked hard before, but disguised with K Seal and being sold during spring. I did learn alot about how well these V6s can go however, and what can kill a Ford V6. After all, this one had almost everything go wrong on it! It meant that my 3.0 would be kept in good condition and not suffer the usual issues these Duratec V6s are associated with.



Fast forward 5 years on, and it seems many cars I now want are very expensive. A £3k Mini is now an £8k one, Z3s seem to be firm on price, even for a 1.9 139BHP narrow body, and alot of hot hatches from the 80s are no longer £2k for something reasonable. I won’t even go into W124s! My S124 E320 5 speed Estate went for £5k 2 years ago, and it seems those days are gone. OK, I may be tight and like a moan, but who doesn’t. But there is something getting a cheap car, and making something of it. Not financing yourself to the eyeballs to get something cool and investorworthy. After all, you still have to maintain it

That’s what appealed about classic cars before the investors entered the game. However, it seemed my chance would appear.

Without even really looking for a car, a familiar car popped up on Facebook Marketplace. An ST220 estate that sat for a year at my local garage. I recalled this car being in quite good condition. I even took a shot it next to my 2.5T a couple of years ago.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B-pT9IrDC93/?utm_sourc...

I didn’t know much about the car, other than the owner died who owned it, and from there it was moved on to another garage. How much was this thing up for? £1,000. Would I resist buying this, or would I go and take a look?

I think we all know the answer to this one!

[stevemiller]

Watching.

I always thought the Saloon/Hatchback?/Estate were handsome cars. I also like the standard cooking versions when dressed properly.

[Cambs_Stuart]

Watching with interest. I loved my ST220, until it broke my heart by eating it's crank bearings at 59,000 miles. Since then I've had an impreza WRX wagon, Legacy GTB turbo and 3.6 V6 VW CC, all good cars (especially the impreza), but i don't think any had the all round ability of family transport amd back road fun of the ST220. The impreza was faster, but not nearly as practical.
None of them drank fuel as fast as the ST220 either...

Edited by Cambs_Stuart on Saturday 30th January 15:33

[Squishey]

I shouldn't have sold mine. I really miss that car

[Benmac]

In for this. Have fond memories of my mk3. It was a diesel auto Ghia x estate so a long way off a 220 but drove so, so well. A particular memory is having it pinned for about an hour through France one summer holiday.

[spaceship]

SebringMan said:

Fast forward 5 years on, and it seems many cars I now want are very expensive. A £3k Mini is now an £8k one, Z3s seem to be firm on price, even for a 1.9 139BHP narrow body, and alot of hot hatches from the 80s are no longer £2k for something reasonable. I won’t even go into W124s!

I’ve noticed this too. Even cars which you’d think most people wouldn’t be that interested in are now going for prices that seem high for what they are. Must be an age thing.

Good luck with the Mondeo. Always liked them.

[SebringMan]

Cambs_Stuart said:

Watching with interest. I loved my ST220, until it broke my heart by eating it's crank bearings at 59,000 miles. Since then I've had an impreza WRX wagon, Legacy GTB turbo and 3.6 V6 VW CC, all good cars (especially the impreza), but i don't think any had the all round ability of family transport amd back road fun of the ST220. The impreza was faster, but not nearly as practical.
None of them drank fuel as fast as the ST220 either...

Edited by Cambs_Stuart on Saturday 30th January 15:33

That is bad!

That sounds about as bad as my 944 S2! I bought it with a shot bore on 130k! The worst thing was it was on its second engine then! It seems that I would resolve why the engine went, albeit with help from EMC Motorsport, who had the equipment to diagnose that the bore was gone. and what else was wrong with the cooling setup.

I'm not expecting the MPG to be great on this. It will be interesting to compare it with my M3, but I suspect the M3 will be better in all honesty. That can do around 24MPG average and around 30-33 on a motorway, depending on how careful you are with your right foot.

Benmac said:

In for this. Have fond memories of my mk3. It was a diesel auto Ghia x estate so a long way off a 220 but drove so, so well. A particular memory is having it pinned for about an hour through France one summer holiday.

Our family has fond memories of Mk3s.

We've had a few. My sister had a hand-me-down last of the line 2007 1.8 LX with 300k on the clock. It's fair to say that when she took her driving test in that, and passed first time, the tester was surprised to see such numbers on the clock, but also be shocked at the conditon of the car ; it really wasn't too bad! Until very recently, she preferred that to the Saab 9-3 1.8t Convertible we got her, in part down to how well that Mondeo drove. Even with its lacklustre 123BHP, it really did make the most of what it had.

[SebringMan]

spaceship said:

I’ve noticed this too. Even cars which you’d think most people wouldn’t be that interested in are now going for prices that seem high for what they are. Must be an age thing.

Good luck with the Mondeo. Always liked them.

I suspect it is! It seems that given where wages and other prices are, car prices have seemed to have gone a little crazy!

Anyway, back to the ST.

As I said, this car was at my local garage for some time. It went in as the clutch pedal kept on dropping to the floor. The owner was hopeful that it was the clutch master cylinder that was gone. With this changed, the pedal was no different. It was obvious that it was the concentric slave that had gone.

In that time, the chap got taken into hospital with a brain aneurysm, and sadly passed away. This is why this car was moored up at my local garage for quite some time. In the end, the family got in contact and basically gave the car to Mick (my MOT tester/garage owner), who then kept it for some time before selling it on to another garage locally.

Fast forward 5 months ago. In that time, Gaz, the second garage who bought this car would have fun and games with the car.

Firstly, the interior was cleaned out by a valeter. Unfortunately in that time, the bumper took a knock while being parked up too. He would then proceed to change the clutch. This is where the problems would start.

With the first clutch in along with the new concentric, or as far as he told me, the clutch was slipping badly. This apparently came with the car, but at the time I didn't notice it being in the car, along with a couple of other parts. Obviously, this acheived nothing. After this, another clutch was put it, but without the concentric being renewed. After all, that concentric was only 3 weeks old! After this, the pedal was fine for a week, but then, it started going bad again. It was mad! After two clutch changes, the car was no different! This is where I would enter the equation.

The car was advertised on Facebook Marketplace as I said for £1k, with a basic description around it, and with the offer of it being broken up for spares. Maybe that line and me knowing the car vaguely made me want to rescue the poor thing. After speaking with Gaz, he mentioned that the bumper had one crack, and that the clutch pedal was poor, but that he saw a puddle form on the driver's side With this, I cycled down to the garage and took a look at the car.

It was a bit of a dissapointment. The interior despite being cleaned did not look great, the exterior was quite flat on the paint, and the car looked a little unkempt, especially with that cracked bumper. That's before I get to the hideous wheels! To top this off, the bellhousing and sump were damp in that area, with an occasional drip. Great, the concentric looked to be gone! But then again, it's an 18 year old ST220! The car however, did have a number of good points beneath the rubbish.

-It wasn’t too rusty at all underneath, after briefly looking it. This is surprising, given that the car originally lived in Devon!
-The interior had no rips in it at all, and it all looked to be working. There is a chalky surface on the leather which comes off by hand. I'll deal with when I clean out the interior and nourish the leather
-The engine sounded very sweet!
-The car had 97k on the clock, with a FFSH up until 60k, and servicing until 88k.
-It was on a private plate. I do not intend to keep this, as you’ll find out later

With this in mind, I went away to think about it, and what to do. I wasn't going to give over £1k. If it was tidier, I would done. With this in mind, I called the seller back, stating that I'd have to assume the worst case scenario; it would need another clutch. With me lowballing him hard, and us two agreeing on a price quickly, a deal was done. All I had to do now was collect it.

With it being Covid times, and the hassle of driving a car back with no clutch, I decided to have Mick, the MOT tester, trailer the car back to my unit on a low loader. With this, I could borrow a 4 poster and really check the car out.

It became apparent that this car really is very solid underneath! It's also apparent it's a little tarted up too with rubbish! But anyway, let's not muck around, let's show some shots.











Oh yes, I forgot to say, the mirror baseplate is cracked too, and not repaired very well.

With this in mind, I set about acquiring a set of mirrors for the car, wheels, bumper and a clutch.

While I’d get a set of mirrors for £40 delivered to my door in Stardust Silver, I would struggle more with a cheap set of wheels, almost give up with the bumper, and run into serious issues with finding a clutch. More will be revealed next time.

[Usget]

Love the red leather in these. Looking forward to seeing it coming back to life.

[Cambs_Stuart]

Love the red leather, less keen on the wheels. From memory the ford alloys on the ST220 weren't great, prone to buckles and corrosion. Might be why they've been swapped?

[RichGault]

Good to see another 220 being brought back from 'breaker only' ....I've had my '04 PB hatch for nearly 6 years now....getting a bit tired so money will be spent soon but it's doing sterling service on a 34 mile round trip commute(if anyone is familiar with Cambridgshire it's pretty flat so if not driven WOT everywhere I'm seeing some quite remarkable mileage on fuel....(averaging 32mpg) for the last 7 months and 5000 miles.....

Anyways, good luck on the recommision my man, and also check out the ST220 Enthusiasts group on Facebook....great for knowledge etc...

[SebringMan]

Cambs_Stuart said:

Love the red leather, less keen on the wheels. From memory the ford alloys on the ST220 weren't great, prone to buckles and corrosion. Might be why they've been swapped?

The leather isn't bad eh? It seems to be a bit Marmite but with folks on the thumbs up side of the fence . The heaters work very well in this!

Yup, the wheels are terrible! I plan to ditch them. The ST alloys are susceptible to corrosion on the faces. My 2.5T wheels were awful, where like the ST wheels, the faces were diamond cut. Diamond Cutting them back then was also an expensive process, but like now, carrying very little in the way of a warranty. But yes, they could crack and buckle due to less sidewall on the wheel. The green 2.5T above had two dented wheels, and one of them cracked the edge of the rim! This is one reason why the beige 3.0 in the first post of mine was on 16s. They looked crap, but Michelins were only £75 a corner vs £140 in the 17s, and the diamond cut faces caused corrosion on the bead, so they leaked like crazy.

RichGault said:

Good to see another 220 being brought back from 'breaker only' ....I've had my '04 PB hatch for nearly 6 years now....getting a bit tired so money will be spent soon but it's doing sterling service on a 34 mile round trip commute(if anyone is familiar with Cambridgshire it's pretty flat so if not driven WOT everywhere I'm seeing some quite remarkable mileage on fuel....(averaging 32mpg) for the last 7 months and 5000 miles.....

Anyways, good luck on the recommision my man, and also check out the ST220 Enthusiasts group on Facebook....great for knowledge etc...

Cheers!

It's been good to try and save it. It seems to have good bones and it is worthy of being saved.

32MPG? How? I don't remember my 3.0 ever getting that . Was that doing 56MPH or normal 70MPH speeds? While mine is a 5 speed, I'd be happy if it could do that kind of speed.

It’s fair to say the car could look better. Someone has obviously customised this with the wind deflectors, colour coded foglights, darkened rear lights with fly eye wrapping, in addition to the wheels! Obviously alot of this will go. However, the car would need one thing to go forwards. A clutch

Stupidly, when I bought the car, I thought I would be able to get a clutch. However, this foolish mistake would soon become apparent. I suspect this is why the car has seen a number of clutches. This is one case where I wish I checked the Facebook groups a little more. You wouldn’t have thought a Mondeo would have a rare clutch, would you? It seems the MTX-75 gearboxes do!

I searched and searched and searched to no avail. This included the following

Ringing up Schaeffler UK (Umbrella company of LuK)- They confirmed that they do not list a 5 speed clutch
Checked Sachs Catalogue. Only a slave cylinder for a 5 speed
Speaking with Helix Motorsport – They knew of the problem, and due to no demand, they would not make one. This issue also affects the ST200
Speaking with ATS Speed. They could get one, which I suspect was a TTV item, but the clutch and flywheel which come as one would be £1.2k. Ouch!
Rang up South East Lotus Parts ; They could not believe that I couldn’t get a clutch for an ST220. I explained that the gearbox was not used for long. I went with the Noble Angle here.
Searched eBay ; A Ford clutch was £300 without the slave cylinder. Upon calling Ford with my discount, that was £240, albeit with an £80 slave cylinder. Great!
With this, I admitted defeat and went to Ford. A shame as I wanted to keep the budget reasonable with this car. But I guess relatively rare cars will always have parts issues. I’d imagine there are less than 400 5 speed ST220s left, given that 50% of ST220s appear to be no more.

Further searching since then has revealed that Schaeffler have never sold a 5 speed ST220 clutch in the aftermarket Today, I have learned that one chap has fitted 2 5 speed ST220s with 6 speed DMFs and clutches with no ill effects. This does open up a potentially pricey but a good avenue.



The message no one wants to see.
Thanks to the clutch, the spend of the car would now stand me in at around £1k. This however would not stop me finding other parts.

Bumpers now appear to be very hard to find in good condition. I’ve seen repaired ones offered for £150, which are not much better than mine! Decent bumpers appear to be held on by folks who break the cars. I did debate buying a tired ST TDCI for parts, but it seemed I’d be spending decent money to buy one with good bodywork. As a result, I’ll be repairing this using a plastic weld kit of sorts. A first for me, but I have done bodywork before with good results, so this will cost me time, and probably alot of it!

Some money would be saved however. The broken mirror baseplate? £40 would secure me a set of Stardust Silver powerfolding mirror in great condition. I would also see some wheels locally too! £160 would secure these with the all-important centre caps, and them being straight. Sure, they need a refurb, but £80 at City Powdercoaters in Bright Sparkle Silver will have them looking great in no time. With some Goodyear Eagle F1s, it should be spot on!

Obviously these parts being fitted on will not finish things on this car. Not by quite a way. But at least it is getting there.

While rummaging through the boot, I found the old clutch. Annoyingly, the clutch part numbers do not cross reference into another LuK kit for a Ford. However, I did find some floor mats for the car, which are always welcome.

Oh another thing. The LuK box in the car? That’s for a 6 speed clutch. It seems this is the reason why the release bearing may have failed. Cars. They can be fun and games eh?

[RichGault]

Indeed! You read that correct my good man...couldn't believe 32 mpg either....however it is a good average 50-60mph cruise 80%of the way on completely flat and level roads out into the fens....there are a few guys on the group who say you're not driving them correctly if you're getting over 19mpg 😆😆

Sorry to hear about the clutch issues, never really considered it would be so much of a ball ache on the pre facelifts....

If you do need parts, the Facebook group have a few guys on there who break them and people on there are always willing to offer advice...I found I was wallowing a bit in terms of correct part numbers etc but the info given bu some is pretty much always spot on.

Considering what to do with mine to be honest, it needs suspension work so a few people have recommended and are running Vogtland Spring/Shock kits which are actually cheaper than OE items....

Roose Motorsport do complete silicone Coolant hose kits along with ancillary hose kits....(pricey but may be tempted)

On the wheels front there are some guys running 19in Focus RS wheels(with a 30mm drop,looks 👌)

[B'stard Child]

I recognise those pics from elsewhere.............

I thought you'd given up on it seems I was wrong

[SebringMan]

B'stard Child said:

I recognise those pics from elsewhere.............

I thought you'd given up on it seems I was wrong

I thought you might . In two minds about a thread for there. Some folks have said do it, but I'm going to give it some time.

I came close to giving up on this with the clutch issues, but in truth, I'l need something to keep me occupied during lockdown. The M3 can't really move at the moment unfortunately.

Oddly, I also have a list of folks who want to drive this car once it is roadworthy or even buy it off me. Very strange indeed! Not a bad position to be in mind you . Despite acquiring parts, it's going to be a slow(ish) project this.

[Bobberoo99]

A great write up, keep it up, watching this!!!

[anonymous-user]

Enjoying this thread so far. I used to a very similar spec 220, but mine was a hatch. Silver with the red leather 'boudoir' interior. It had a few expensive factory options too, cruise control, sunroof, xenon headlamps and satnav. Hunted for a good one for 6 months. Then took a job 50 miles away and the hassle of filling up twice a week soon got very tedious. I put on 12k miles in 9 months though and sold it for what I paid.... shame I had to replace the alternator

With the cruise on at 70mph I would just about get 30mpg, but I loved it. Had Yokohama Parada Spec 2's and cornered like a dream, probably one of the most fun cars I've owned and hugely practical too.

Look forward to seeing yours being reborn!

Edit: prior to that I had a V6 Zetec S which I also loved, but that never ever got about 25mpg. No idea how the 2.5 was less efficient than the 3.0

[Chris x]

Would a 5 speed, 2.5 V6 clutch not fit?

I picked up one of these in September for £1500, delivered. 64k miles. Has optional sunroof, satnav and rear heated seats!

Always fancied another since selling my performance blue estate in 2014.

Must get a thread up, have done a fair bit to it.

My god it was rusty underneath however!! Newcastle car all its life!

[SebringMan]

MrBig said:

Enjoying this thread so far. I used to a very similar spec 220, but mine was a hatch. Silver with the red leather 'boudoir' interior. It had a few expensive factory options too, cruise control, sunroof, xenon headlamps and satnav. Hunted for a good one for 6 months. Then took a job 50 miles away and the hassle of filling up twice a week soon got very tedious. I put on 12k miles in 9 months though and sold it for what I paid.... shame I had to replace the alternator

With the cruise on at 70mph I would just about get 30mpg, but I loved it. Had Yokohama Parada Spec 2's and cornered like a dream, probably one of the most fun cars I've owned and hugely practical too.

Look forward to seeing yours being reborn!

Edit: prior to that I had a V6 Zetec S which I also loved, but that never ever got about 25mpg. No idea how the 2.5 was less efficient than the 3.0

Cheers! Almost a spitting image of my car then. I don't have a sunroof, which I wanted, but beggars can't be choosers, and the car did have alot else going for it. It's a solid old girl underneath .

I loved my 3.0 V6. That was a very capable car. I always fancied taking that to the 'ring, but never quite my MkIV 2.5T, Who knows? Maybe in the future I'll take this! With a friend's place out there, it would double as a handy hauler of stuff over there, as well as the Booze run . The M3 has been to Germany twice now .

I have a suspicion the M3 would be more frugal however! No idea how!

Regarding the 2.5s and non-ST 3.0s, Ford fitted 3 cats to these. No, really! 2 pre-cats, with one per exhaust manifold, along with a main cat. The third cats never quite heat up, especially on cars which are never truly warmed up and taken out on regular runs. They'll collapse, but the car will run fine, albeit not be a ball of fire. Eventually, the exhaust will begin to hit the car, due to the flexi expanding as the cat completely collapses and stop the car running well.

Bash the cat out and it's like another car. How much of another car?

That green V6 I showed earlier? That was 2.5 5 speed Jatco Auto car. It was appalling when we got it in all honesty! It didn't seem much faster than a 2.0, but it had a slightly nicer engine sound, and cruised OK. I thought at that time the autobox ruined the car, and back then I was more of a 'manual or nothing' man.

From 120k to 170k it was the same until one day, the car refused to move quickly at all. It wouldn't even climb inclines going up the M6! As the car was slowing down, the 'box would go from 5th to 4th, in an attempt to get more power out of the engine, being unaware that the engine was gutless! So we drove the car in manual. A Mini 850 would have been quicker, no joke!

We then diagnosed that the 3rd cat had gone. After paying a man to remove it, we then drove it. The car was much much much better! Honestly, it was like someone had performed a remap on the 'box and the engine. From it struggling to do 22MPG on the motorway, it was now doing that in town! Motorways had the car doing 30+ thanks to the low gearing! Finally, the box an engine combo made sense! The 5th in that was very tall!

The V6 wasn't as bad, as I knew what to look out for, so the difference when that cat began to die in the same way was not a surprise.

Why did Ford fit 3 cats? Who knows? My guess would be they sold so few outside of the US, they carried over the exhaust system outside of the 'states.

Chris x said:

Would a 5 speed, 2.5 V6 clutch not fit?

I picked up one of these in September for £1500, delivered. 64k miles. Has optional sunroof, satnav and rear heated seats!

Always fancied another since selling my performance blue estate in 2014.

Must get a thread up, have done a fair bit to it.

My god it was rusty underneath however!! Newcastle car all its life!

I did check this out. In short, I don't know. Ford have a different part number for the 2.5 and those clutches are now also hard to get in the aftermarket, again due to low production numbers. With the ST220, I suspect the issue is the 50BHP increase over the 2.5, bar the ST200, which again, you can't get a clutch for either, and those run an SMF.

I've joined ST220 enthusiasts and it seems you can make a 6 speed clutch work on a 5 speed, albeit with a 6 speed DMF. It's not a cheap way, but it's certainly an avenue to consider if the DMF has had it. It's rare on these V6s, but not unheard of. Oddly, the 5 speed is more awkward to change the clutch on! But it does have the factory dual air intakes, so you can't have everything eh? It's a nice shifting 'box too to be fair.

Yours does sound cheap! Not a bad buy at all!

Mine was surprisingly good underneath. I was shocked.

[B'stard Child]

• coughs

Must give up smoking........