[monley]

Hey guys,

I recently had issues with my Master cylinder in my 84' NT. When i went to remove it i knew i was going to have issues due to where my coil tower was. In the process of trying to source a new M/C that was shorter than 125mm from the mounting flange to the end, i discovered i wasnt going to find one that was shorter ( i only needed 20mm for clearance).

So i grabbed my tape and headed to the wreckers to try find a shorter booster/mc that would bolt straight in - Low and behold i did.

1995-1999 1.5L ford festiva will bolt pretty much straight in.



Stock sierra booster and MC next to the ford booster and MC



The ford booster had a spacer behind the booster - Perfect to check that the hole centers were going to be spot on



The ford gear upclose



Before it can go into the car the studs have to be cut down to around 25mm long as there is no spacer now.
Also the bracket that connects the pedal to the push rod needs to be used from the sierra booster.



New booster and MC bolted in(which now gives me the clearance i need)



The vac line almost lines up perfectly just have to trim of 15mm from each end of the festiva line




Is this a upgrade over the stock setup? No idea as i cant find the specs on the festiva MC

Does it work better? Dont know yet as i ran out of time to take it for a drive

Hope this helps someone, that for some silly un-known reason that might have the same issues i have

Cheers Monley

[Gwagensteve]

The bore should be embossed on the cylinder. It is on every mc I've ever seen, be it in mm or inches.

[mnemonix]

A quick google shows most Festivas of that era have a bore diameter of 13/16" / 20.64mm.
The NT I believe uses a 3/4" / 19mm bore master cylinder.

So with your Festiva unit you may achieve slightly better brakes with less pedal travel. Or perhaps more pedal pressure for the same braking force.

[monley]

Thanks for that that info mnemonix. I had a look at some parts catalouges and it said the festiva had a 3/4 bore.

Just did a search on here in regards to sierra mc bore size and 7/8 kept coming up. I assume that is for W/T?

[monley]

Just a update on this. I finally bleed the brakes yesterday (only been 3 nearly 4 months ) took it for a drive today and the breaks barley worked (could barley compress the pedal) - they felt like they were un-boosted and as it turns out they were. I checked the ford vac line to see if it was blocked and as it happens to be there is a small check valve inside line that cant be seen from the out side of the line. Flipped the line around and tested again and the pedal felt like something from a new swift.

Took it for a drive, got up to 50kph and jammed the breaks on hard! It locked up all 4 33s on dry tarmac and i just about face planted the steering wheel thats how much bite it had.

So to sum up this is a BIG bolt on upgrade over stock NT boosted breaks