Also,i think its worth a mention that the inlet and exhaust are on opposite sides,it has a chain drive on the cams instead of the belt of the early type.It seems Ford messed around with the the bell housing pattern and it wont fit straight onto the early/common gearboxes.It is true that the internals are of good quality and look like race items,but pistons are cast,rods are generaly ok for moderate tuning.The rods are longer than early engines with corrected pistons heights.All in all it has light rotating components,large valves and ports as standard and with not a lot of extras will produce 200 magic ponies.its not bad when you consider the (very) early turbo Ford cosworths were around 204bhp and even the last escorts were 229bhp ish.Now thats development…
Paul, you may be talking about the Ford Mazda Duratorq engine (what with it’s chain drive, opposite porting for inlet and exhaust etc).
The Blacktop Zetec was introduced with the Focus, circa 1998.
Regards
Gerry
This thread is very interesting for me as I am currently trying to resurrect a 1971 +2 which I acquired without an engine but with the original gearbox that I would like to retain. I was thinking of getting hold of a Zetec(I assume that will be a silvertop) powered Escort and using the engine with twin 40?s and an aftermarket ignition unit; as an alternative I was wondering about using a large capacity xflow Ford unit for ease of installation, has anyone tried this or am I wasting my time? All comments and ideas are welcome.
Regards
John
John, hi where do you live?
If in the UK, a silvertop Zetec installation mated to the original “Bullet” gearbox is a tried and tested recipe, should be very straight forward. There’s lot of advice and discussion on this website; DJ Pelly has posted a lot of advice and photos of his installation.
My own personal recommendation is to stay away from the Blacktop Zetec if you want minimum of fuss and can source a good Silvertop Zetec.
There’s a small amount of fabrication work involved; the front chassis cross member needs a half moon cutout to clear the Zetec crankshaft pulley (take precautions against petrol explosion risk), new engine mounts to match the different block holes, plus you may need to rework a sump depending on how you address the roll bar and exhaust manifold issues.
Regards
Gerry
John,
I was typing this and Gerry beat me to it, but I will basically reinforce his advice.
I wouldn’t say you were wasting your time ressurecting a +2 with a crossflow engine, it would at least be an interesting alternative especially if you already have a donor engine on the shelf doing nothing, if you don’t already have a donor I personally think you would be better off with a zetec engine as you wouldn’t necessarily need to spend lots of money tuning it to get reasonable power, although you will need a few parts to make it work longitudinally rather than transverse and there is the modification to the vacuum tank/front crossmember thats needed to clear the crank pulley. For the Zetec There is a good knowledge base to do what you are proposing, at least 2 very active members of this forum have converted to zetec whilst retaining the 4 speed box and using a standard Spyder chassis rather than the dedicated Zetec chassis, so they will be able to tell you the pitfalls.
Good luck, you can never waste time ressurecting a Lotus, no matter what you do to it.
Thanks Gerry and Alan for the information, I think that I will take your advice and continue along the Zetec route and look for a doner car in the near future.
Gerry I live near Rugby, Warwickshire.
Regards
John
Hi John,
I’d like to mention that fitting a Zetec is not so difficult as practically everything you will need is now available off the shelf.
A decision will have to be made about the condition of the existing Chassis.
Fitting a Spyder one makes most kinds of mechanical work on an Elan or +2 a lot easier.
If you stick with the original then RichP is one of the few if not the only one to have gone down that Route.
It’s also worthwhile considering a 2 Liter rather than a 1.8 Liter engine for that bit extra Torque.
However The Escort Engine has a Water pump that runs in the right direction, having the simpler drive triangle (Crank, Water Pump & Alternator Pulleys)
I also understand that the Escort sump can be retained without modification.
To be safe some of the Drive train ought to be beefed up i.e. Diff Output Shafts, Drive shafts & Hub shafts.
Sticking with the Twin Cam G/box is not a problem but if you buy an Exhaust Manifold you should make sure it will fit around the Clutch Slave Cylinder, which is elsewhere on the MT75 Box that they use in their conversions. See also my comments on the Spyder Chassis, this also provides more space for the much fatter Manifold needed.
Cheers
Another John
Great looking car, Rich. That installation looks like it belongs! What were the ballpark costs for the installation?
Thinking Zetecs, I?m wondering why the ST170 Focus engine isn?t used more often in the conversion (if injection is required). With a very strong bottom end and 170bhp out of the box, it would seem to be an attractive package. My misses has an ST170, and it really is a superb thrashable engine! I guess that the variable inlet valve timing may put some off as the Focus ECU would have to be used, but that sounds like an advantage to me?am I missing something?
The engines are always available on eBay for ?500 ish.
Mark
Hi Mark,
Thank for the positive remarks about the conversion.
The main reasons for using the Zetec engine is that it will bolt straight up to the existing 4 speed box making everything very straight forward, I dont know if the ST170 Focus engine will do that ? also the Zetec is very similar in size to the original Twin Cam unit. Regarding the fuel injection system, this had to be removed from the Zetec unit because of the big space that it takes up, there is very little room under the +2 bonnet, also tuning is very much more open if aftermarket fuel injection kits complete with specific ECU’s are used. Also alot more special components are made to convert the Zetec to rear wheel drive spec such as Water Rails, Sumps,inlet manifolds and flywheel assemblies etc.
Best Regards
Rich
Rich…the ST170 is a Zetec, which is why I wondered why it wasn’t used more as the base lump. It may well be that aftermarket injection / ECUs can’t be made to control the valve timing aspect though, and if the std injectors / rails / ECUs can’t used due to size, then the ST is pretty much ruled out. I doubt the ST could be used with carbs either.
Mark
Mark the ST170 engine can be used with megasquirt like john clegg has done with his +2 using one of the programmable outputs to switch the variable valve timing solenoid at a settable rpm. A friend of mine run an anglia with ST170 on carbs no problem & as you say altough badged duratec it was a marketing ploy & is a zetec with big valve head & VVT
Ian
I don’t know the ST170 engine but the last Ford Engine that I looked at closely was the all Alloy 4 Cyl, Duratec, with Morse chain driven Camshafts, which replaced the Zetec.
Problems like G/box adapters are relatively easily solved & a good ECU Man could manage the variable valve timing easily.
The Duratec presented major problems for installation in an Elan because Ford had adopted the European standard Cylinder Head configuration of having the exhaust ports on what we in GB would call the “Driver’s side”.
The Chain driven Oil Pump is also on that side & (obviously) right at the front of the engine.
This also places the Oil filter there as well.
All of that really leaves no space for the Elan Steering Column & the front of the Engine would, I think, need a very big piece of the Chassis cross member (Vac’ Tank) removing in order to fit.
I suspect that Ford have now continued to develop engines with the Inlet & Exhaust ports the “wrong way around” & subsequently made them almost impossible to fit into our cars.
Perhaps you could pop your head under the Bonnet of “her indoors” car & check my suspicions Mark?
Interestingly the Japanese who also drive on the “correct” side of the Road still develop their Engines with the exhaust ports on the “Passenger side”, even though the engines are not fitted longitudinally.
Similarly you may have noticed that European cars have their Exhaust Pipes positioned on the left, pavement side of the vehicle whereas Japanese Cars position them away from the Pavement (Sidewalk) again talking in GB terms.
As RichP has mentioned the Ford production intake system of even the Zetec would be much too big to fit into an Elan so an intake Manifold for either Jenvey type throttle Bodies or Weber Carbs would need to be made. Not at all difficult compared to the problems mentioned above.
Cheers
John
John, as Ian says, it’s a Zetec even though it has Duratec on the engine! Ford management decided that all the top-of-the-range cars should have Duratec, so just stuck the badge on the plug cover to comply.
After a quick look on the www it seems like there’s a lot of info on the Zetec, mods to do etc. Very interesting stuff, but I must resist! Too many other projects to complete. Hmmm, perhaps another quick look won’t hurt though…
Mark
Thanks for the Pic’ Mark,
that’s a healthy bunch of Bananas under the bonnet, not surprising that it goes well, especially with VVT as well.
Cheers
John
Hi Rich,
My dad used to own this car. I?d be curious to speak with you about possibly coming up to see the car, take some photos etc to show him? He really adored that car and I know it would mean a lot for him to see it again - even just in photos.
Not sure if you even own this anymore but I thought it was worth a shot.
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