JonMad
Active Member
Feel free to tl;dr me 
This post is bought to you by a delayed train journey into work.
Stripped out W209 CLK55 AMG. The perfect blend of road and track? Or flawed at both?
Now I find myself without a modified car for the first time in 10 years. And with less than 100bhp for the first time in 16 - since I scrapped my Skoda Estelle and bought a 1992 Escort 1.8LX (105bhp and my introduction to power understeer).
Although I'd had half a lust for the n/a 55 engine, I wasn't looking for a CLK55, not least a modified one. Blame a friend on the evo forum for posting the PH classifieds link. That and the fact the seller took my MOT failure MX-5 for it's full asking price. So my headline 'buy at 9k, sell at 6k', could be considered, 'buy at 7745 (plus 1250 for the MX-5), sell at 6475 (I actually got 6125 for it, and another 350 for my spare set of alloys)'. Better though than the previous owner who bought it standard for 17k, stripped it out and sold it to me for 9. Though he did sell the std seats separately, which also made it harder for me to sell.
As a road car...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
- Great pillarless visibility on the motorway;
- A lot of, but not owerpowering, road noise - improved once a rattling heat shield was fixed. Smooth tarmac was welcomed though.
- Something of a harsh ride with the H&R lowering springs - added for a subtle drop and to counter the (weighbridge verified by me) 150kgs removed from the interior
- Gearbox was great with overrides in 'D'rive and 'M'anual available. It could do with a 6th gear though. Or as Merc later decided, a 6th and 7th.
- Bucket seats were surprisingly and genuinely comfortable. For those slim of hip anyway.
- I often turned the ESP off so it didn't bog down when pulling out of junctions.
- I never used 'S'port mode on the gearbox. It learned in 'C'omfort how I liked to drive, to the point that switching to S made no difference.
- Hill hold feature was cool. As were the seatbelt butlers and having built-in sat nav and the lovely quality of the dials. Also the auto wipers seemed to be calibrated just so, where in my Fiesta I'm always having to adjust the sensitivity up or down.
- Was great to open up the garage and see it in there. Though a shame the insurance meant it had to be garaged (see next point).
- Rust on the wheel arches, on the underside, and starting to bubble on the boot lid as well. I had the wheel arches stripped back and treated with rubberised paint but the rust is returning again. Didn't want that to grow over this winter - another reason to get rid.
- 27mpg on a run, up after a remap from 25.
- Lack of rear seats meant with anything in the boot you really didn't want to brake hard. A net covering the back of the boot aperture would have fixed this. Handy for trips to Ikea or B&Q though. But seeing as whenever I had something in the boot it was probably with my wife in the car, so I wasn't allowed to even brush the accelerator in those cases, braking hard would have been in an emergency only.
- The noise was glorious.
As a track car:
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
- It really suffered from a lack of traction at the rear. The weighbridge at a local brewery (going down and doing that turned some heads) verified the split as 56/44 which wasn't as front heavy as I was expecting. An LSD would have made it a lot more fun I think (probably stating the bleeding obvious). I did still manage to get it very sideways at Bedford and on a car control day, where I burned through a 2nd hand set of Eagle F1s in 9 miles.
- As an example, a dry lap round Colerne in my old MX-5 was 1m17. In the Merc in the wet, 1m18. And that was with the MX-5 on std fronts and ditchfinder rears, not 888s all round, which would have taken of a few more seconds for sure.
- Braking was very impressive, and the body control over crests, in direction changes and under braking. The ducting through the front fog light slots to the brakes definitely helped cooling, with no fade on std pads and fluid.
- The seat was very supportive and I added a CG-Lock. The seatback was really too low for me though.
- The gearbox was frustrating then kind of great. Frustrating that unless you were in a straight line, changing down from 3 to 2 would feel harsh and give a sideways leap. Kind of great in that those two unwanted features were removed once I left foot braked and blipped the throttle on each downchange. Which was satisfying to achieve. It remained easy though, to press a gear change button behind the wheel one too many times in a corner - not ideal.
- My extreme gearchange skillz, plus trailbraking into corners, made it fun to throw around a track. Though the trailbraking and modulting the brake with my left foot during corners was needed to quell (at least the impression of, if not actual) understeer when I was trying to go smooth rather than sideways.
- 8mpg in the dry.
- Lack of rear seats meant I could drop in four spare wheels and loads of gear.
- The noise was glorious.
Summary/stats
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
0-106 in 1/4 mile in 13.3s at Santa Pod. Might have been faster starting in 2nd. Was faster in M, changing gear myself, than in S.
172mph achieved at VMax. Two up. Same as a 996 GT3. Oddly, the speedo dial an ddigital readout both stopped at 160mph.
Costs including track days (from the properly geeky spreadsheet)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Insurance was £450/year for 2k miles with all mods declared with REIS. £80 more for 5k/year. I recommend them.
Mileage in my hands: 7863
Owned from August 2009 to November 2011 (27 months)
Total cost: £8255 Excluding depreciation from purchase price of £8995 to £6125
Cost/month £305.75
Cost/mile £1.05
Average mpg 20.0
Cost breakdown including track days
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Extras £51
Fuel - day to day £1385
Repairs £737
Running costs £2337
Servicing £1260
Track day £1238
Track day - fuel £775
Track day - parts £472
Grand Total £8255
Costs excluding track days entrances and parts, but including all fuel
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Total cost
£6545
Cost/month
£242.40 (of which, 80 is fuel)
Cost/month inc depreciation £348.70
Cost/mile £0.83
Cost/mile inc depreciation £1.20
What went wrong?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Not a lot. The accelerator pedal needed replacing because cutting out at the point of kickdown was not ideal. A few suspension parts at MOT times. The wheel arches treated. And a locking wheel nut sheared at Rockingham which took some tools, time and effort to get off. Other than regular servicing, some of which was preventative maintenance, and replacing the road tyres, that's it.
What next?
^^^^^^^^^^
Dunno.
If my wife's Hyundai i10 is too small for baby + associated stuff, I might get a chance to get something fast and family friendly whilst she drives the Fiesta. Am thinking 4wd, german, big diesel with two turbos, for a mix of overtaking pace, style, economy and to try out 4wd. Or a V8 petrol estate, if priced low enough compared to a big diesel for similar age and mileage. Or a <£1000 barge.
If the Hyundai does us fine I might get something fun and cheap in the spring. If I even have time to think about driving just for the sake of it. Or go three ways with whoever it up for it on track car hire - BaT 7 or similar.
When the Fiesta is replaced next December, who knows at the moment.
Cheers,
Jon
p.s. Big thanks to Olly for all his expertise and time looking after the car for me
This post is bought to you by a delayed train journey into work.
Stripped out W209 CLK55 AMG. The perfect blend of road and track? Or flawed at both?
Now I find myself without a modified car for the first time in 10 years. And with less than 100bhp for the first time in 16 - since I scrapped my Skoda Estelle and bought a 1992 Escort 1.8LX (105bhp and my introduction to power understeer).
Although I'd had half a lust for the n/a 55 engine, I wasn't looking for a CLK55, not least a modified one. Blame a friend on the evo forum for posting the PH classifieds link. That and the fact the seller took my MOT failure MX-5 for it's full asking price. So my headline 'buy at 9k, sell at 6k', could be considered, 'buy at 7745 (plus 1250 for the MX-5), sell at 6475 (I actually got 6125 for it, and another 350 for my spare set of alloys)'. Better though than the previous owner who bought it standard for 17k, stripped it out and sold it to me for 9. Though he did sell the std seats separately, which also made it harder for me to sell.
As a road car...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
- Great pillarless visibility on the motorway;
- A lot of, but not owerpowering, road noise - improved once a rattling heat shield was fixed. Smooth tarmac was welcomed though.
- Something of a harsh ride with the H&R lowering springs - added for a subtle drop and to counter the (weighbridge verified by me) 150kgs removed from the interior
- Gearbox was great with overrides in 'D'rive and 'M'anual available. It could do with a 6th gear though. Or as Merc later decided, a 6th and 7th.
- Bucket seats were surprisingly and genuinely comfortable. For those slim of hip anyway.
- I often turned the ESP off so it didn't bog down when pulling out of junctions.
- I never used 'S'port mode on the gearbox. It learned in 'C'omfort how I liked to drive, to the point that switching to S made no difference.
- Hill hold feature was cool. As were the seatbelt butlers and having built-in sat nav and the lovely quality of the dials. Also the auto wipers seemed to be calibrated just so, where in my Fiesta I'm always having to adjust the sensitivity up or down.
- Was great to open up the garage and see it in there. Though a shame the insurance meant it had to be garaged (see next point).
- Rust on the wheel arches, on the underside, and starting to bubble on the boot lid as well. I had the wheel arches stripped back and treated with rubberised paint but the rust is returning again. Didn't want that to grow over this winter - another reason to get rid.
- 27mpg on a run, up after a remap from 25.
- Lack of rear seats meant with anything in the boot you really didn't want to brake hard. A net covering the back of the boot aperture would have fixed this. Handy for trips to Ikea or B&Q though. But seeing as whenever I had something in the boot it was probably with my wife in the car, so I wasn't allowed to even brush the accelerator in those cases, braking hard would have been in an emergency only.
- The noise was glorious.
As a track car:
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
- It really suffered from a lack of traction at the rear. The weighbridge at a local brewery (going down and doing that turned some heads) verified the split as 56/44 which wasn't as front heavy as I was expecting. An LSD would have made it a lot more fun I think (probably stating the bleeding obvious). I did still manage to get it very sideways at Bedford and on a car control day, where I burned through a 2nd hand set of Eagle F1s in 9 miles.
- As an example, a dry lap round Colerne in my old MX-5 was 1m17. In the Merc in the wet, 1m18. And that was with the MX-5 on std fronts and ditchfinder rears, not 888s all round, which would have taken of a few more seconds for sure.
- Braking was very impressive, and the body control over crests, in direction changes and under braking. The ducting through the front fog light slots to the brakes definitely helped cooling, with no fade on std pads and fluid.
- The seat was very supportive and I added a CG-Lock. The seatback was really too low for me though.
- The gearbox was frustrating then kind of great. Frustrating that unless you were in a straight line, changing down from 3 to 2 would feel harsh and give a sideways leap. Kind of great in that those two unwanted features were removed once I left foot braked and blipped the throttle on each downchange. Which was satisfying to achieve. It remained easy though, to press a gear change button behind the wheel one too many times in a corner - not ideal.
- My extreme gearchange skillz, plus trailbraking into corners, made it fun to throw around a track. Though the trailbraking and modulting the brake with my left foot during corners was needed to quell (at least the impression of, if not actual) understeer when I was trying to go smooth rather than sideways.
- 8mpg in the dry.
- Lack of rear seats meant I could drop in four spare wheels and loads of gear.
- The noise was glorious.
Summary/stats
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
0-106 in 1/4 mile in 13.3s at Santa Pod. Might have been faster starting in 2nd. Was faster in M, changing gear myself, than in S.
172mph achieved at VMax. Two up. Same as a 996 GT3. Oddly, the speedo dial an ddigital readout both stopped at 160mph.
Costs including track days (from the properly geeky spreadsheet)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Insurance was £450/year for 2k miles with all mods declared with REIS. £80 more for 5k/year. I recommend them.
Mileage in my hands: 7863
Owned from August 2009 to November 2011 (27 months)
Total cost: £8255 Excluding depreciation from purchase price of £8995 to £6125
Cost/month £305.75
Cost/mile £1.05
Average mpg 20.0
Cost breakdown including track days
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Extras £51
Fuel - day to day £1385
Repairs £737
Running costs £2337
Servicing £1260
Track day £1238
Track day - fuel £775
Track day - parts £472
Grand Total £8255
Costs excluding track days entrances and parts, but including all fuel
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Total cost
£6545
Cost/month
£242.40 (of which, 80 is fuel)
Cost/month inc depreciation £348.70
Cost/mile £0.83
Cost/mile inc depreciation £1.20
What went wrong?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Not a lot. The accelerator pedal needed replacing because cutting out at the point of kickdown was not ideal. A few suspension parts at MOT times. The wheel arches treated. And a locking wheel nut sheared at Rockingham which took some tools, time and effort to get off. Other than regular servicing, some of which was preventative maintenance, and replacing the road tyres, that's it.
What next?
^^^^^^^^^^
Dunno.
If my wife's Hyundai i10 is too small for baby + associated stuff, I might get a chance to get something fast and family friendly whilst she drives the Fiesta. Am thinking 4wd, german, big diesel with two turbos, for a mix of overtaking pace, style, economy and to try out 4wd. Or a V8 petrol estate, if priced low enough compared to a big diesel for similar age and mileage. Or a <£1000 barge.
If the Hyundai does us fine I might get something fun and cheap in the spring. If I even have time to think about driving just for the sake of it. Or go three ways with whoever it up for it on track car hire - BaT 7 or similar.
When the Fiesta is replaced next December, who knows at the moment.
Cheers,
Jon
p.s. Big thanks to Olly for all his expertise and time looking after the car for me
yours was a std model wasn't it Peter (or at least, much nearer standard than mine)? What age and mileage?
