AU XR8 220 FTE upgrades

[tjr351]

Hi, I recently purchased a late Series 2 XR8 220kw manual. The books contained a number of receipts from Titan Ford, the WA “Ford Tickford Expieriance” dealer for:

- Stage One FTE induction modification
- Stage Two FTE exhaust modification
- Stage Four FTE engine modification

Engine modification included “head work” and fitting a larger camshaft (Crow 286) and exhaust modification was a full stainless pacemaker exhaust including headers.

This was all done within 3 months of the cars purchase and there is no mention of voiding of warranty.

Just seeing if anyone knows if these upgrades were offered to all new XR8 owners and if there are more details FTE may have been publishing in terms of what Stage One etc. means in terms of power and torque improvements.

Any help would be appreciated.

[russellw]

While the FTE theory suggested that these sort of upgrades would be part of what FTE did, that never actually eventuated so I suspect this would be a dealer options pack.

Cheers
Russ

[FTe342]

Agreed Russ. Maybe some WA guys can throw some more light on it but I suspect Titan were one of the dozen or so FTe dealers Australia wide nominated to sell the T Series and were offering some aftermarket mods via their dealership on Tickford cars

[tjr351]

So what your saying is that Titan did these modifications to the car, charged the original owner $4000, called them FTE Stage 1, 2 & 4 upgrades, but most likely they were one-off dealer upgrades which were not part of a broader FTE upgrade program i.e. if you walked into a Melbourne FTE Ford dealer and asked for the Stage 4 engine upgrade he wouldn’t know what the hell your talking about.

Makes sense on one level. The one I’m struggling to understand is why Titan would expose itself to the liability of something going wrong by endorsing these as FTE upgrades when in fact they were just responding to a customer wanting to hot up his new XR8. You’d think there would be pages of disclaimers and that it’s being done at the customers request etc. etc. Maybe it was a less litigious back then

[FTe342]

Hopefully a WA member will chime in to confirm one way or the other. Or a member from east coast with any knowledge of it being offered over here can add anything but I was not aware of it as a dealer option.

IMO opinion the upgrades are fairly minor in nature and unlikely to cause a significant failure so for the tidy sum of $4k they were prepared to risk it

[FTe342]

I have asked the question in the T Series Clubs FB page if any WA members know of the upgrade and details if known

[FTe342]

Spoke with a mate who thinks that some FTe dealers operated as agents for Herrod so that may be the case for WA due to distance

[tjr351]

Here are the invoices

[BLU-220]

Having look at the invoices that's the Herrod upgrade packages
as Herrod used that crow cam #621371 in his packages [250kw] iirc
Has your XR8 have the herrod build plate it should be on the shocker tower I think it's next to the Tickford option plate ??


Cheers Dean

[tjr351]

No it doesnt have one, but maybe as FTe342 mentioned earlier, the WA dealer passed it off as a FTe package when in fact it was a Herrod upgrade. I have sent Herrod Perfomance a message and a copy of the invoices to see if they can shed some light.

[tjr351]

Herrod Performance responded... they know nothing

[Edxr6]

Hi,

The 621371 Crow camshaft is the 351 Windsor camshaft that Harrods used for their upgrades for the 220’s as well as mt357 springs and 11700-xr8 spring retainers. If the springs have been changed it’s a good chance it may have been done by Herrods. Your receipts don’t indicate any change to your valve springs, therefore it’s difficult to ascertain origin of the work. Whoever has done the work would have consulted with Crowcams who would of suggested that Herrods use the above camshaft for their AU XR8’s. By the way, does it run well with this camshaft, from what crowcams have mentioned it brings the 220’s up to at least 250kw.


Cheers

[tjr351]

Yes, runs mint, my son has a 245kw LS1 CV8 and it kills it. I would say that the “custom cylinder head modification” on the receipt deals with the springs and retainers. It would be unlikely the dealer removed the heads and did anything to them for the cost of the work invoiced, whereas changing a set of springs could be done with the heads left on the car.

[Edxr6]

Yes, totally agree. That’s good know, I may do that in the future with mine. Sounds like it’s the right combination, without a major cost, with good power gains.

Cheers and enjoy, they are great cars for what they are.

[Brendo71]

you may even be able to track down the owner at the time as he's on the receipt and ask him directly, if your successful in finding him, he may even be able to provide you with even more history, like a dyno sheet!!!
The receipt also states that your xr is a series 3, not a series 2 like you said?

[FTE217]

Garlicks in Sydney did plenty of Herrod upgrades.
They used to carry stock of full exhaust systems for eg and whatever else.
I used to walk in the service area and they had stock in plenty.
I doubt they would have put a Herrod decal on the car everytime for not everyone wants that.
Some just got air induction upgrades and exhaust fitted.
Some head work incl above and Unichip tunes.
So Titan could have done just the same - as said someone from there who was a regular buyer at Titan could give some clarity hopefully.

[tjr351]

Its a Series 2 on the compliance plate (Aug 01 build), Im assuming as it was sold in Feb 02, the service guys acidentally wrote it up as a Series 3 on the invoice

[raised by monkeys]

Seen you post this question on FB. I would assume the same that Titan (in conjunction with a dealer) offered a package which they called the FTE experience for those who couldn't afford an FTe car but wanted more than factory power. Good price compared to these days, would be nice to see a dyno print from the time of this too.

[tjr351]

Yes, tried the Ford forum on FB but most of the replies were telling me what was written on the invoice, given that I learned to read back in Primary School, it was’nt very helpful.

Titan Ford was the WA FTe dealer, but at this stage it appears that they did the mods as a one-off and tried to pass them off as something to do with FTe. Maybe they thought they could provide additional service under the FTe banner to their XR8 customers, but it never took off (or someone higher up told them to stick to selling TE’s etc.)

I’m guessing it never went on the dyno, the car drives great so not too fussed on its horsepower, was more of a historical curiosity for me around what Ford was doing at the time

[tjr351]

Went through the paperwork I got with the car, turns out dyno does exist 201rwkw, pretty much dead on 250kw at the engine if you assume 20% driveline losses

[BOTTLEDUP]

It was probably work carried out by Titan in conjunction with A1 Hi Performance. They were looking to offer similar packages to Herrod at the time but with a more personalised and better attention to detail. The cam used was a popular choice particularly in an auto in the days before the ecu could be tuned properly. I know a few mechanics who worked at Titan at the time, I'll see if I can find out more.

[tjr351]

I recall A1 being known for Ford performance engine builds as I used to get parts from them on ocassion and same suburb as Titan, so that would make sense

[crakrz]

I used this cam in my xr8 220 as well. I machined the heads to allow the fitting of the Crow 7333 dual springs to go with it. It pulled 205 rwkw before I tuned it with the Quarterhorse, so the above dyno sheet is a fair indication. Good to see the “super rich” stock wide open throttle afr’s down into the 10’s. But that’s normal too.