Fiesta ST review after road trips, mountain passes, snow, and off road

BRGT350 · 2013-11-04

The month of October is done, so time for another review! I put some serious miles on the ST in October and found out what the car will do in all sorts of driving conditions. Can it handle snow? What about gravel? Packed sand? Find out!

RodMoe

· #2 · Nov 4, 2013

Sweet Pennywise sells all season tires too !! Lol great review thanks for the time and effort ...

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #3 · Nov 4, 2013

Pennywise makes all season tires in the armrest and then sells them to people who think all seasons are a good idea. The result is a scary ride. You can defeat him by using proper summer and winter tires.

I would love to find out how the ST does on gravel tires or even on gravel with snow tires. I also wish I could share some of the footage from the rally roads with the ST. Some of the footage will be in the next mission video, but only the stuff that looked like we were not hooning around.

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WScottCross

· #4 · Nov 4, 2013

Great review by Bryan (as always)

All-season tires are no scarier than driving snow tires on dry pavement. Some of us get SOME snow but necessarily enough to require dedicated snow tires. Good all season tires such as the Continental ExtremeContact DWS are a decent compromise. I know some people are passionate about not running all season tires, but for some of us, they are an acceptable alternative. I noticed a huge difference in traction when I put the DWS on my ST and I can easily break them loose in first, second and third gears. Maybe even fourth. I'm pretty sure the same is true of most snow tires sold.

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #5 · Nov 4, 2013

we get about 120" of snow a season, with most of that coming from lake effect bands that dump snow at rates of 1" per hour. When it gets that bad, we park our AWD Escape and take my Fiesta with snow tires. In other climates, you could probably get away with an all season. I am just 100% against using 1 tire for all conditions. I also like keeping my summer wheels away from the salt, which keeps them looking nice. Going on 14 years next month of owning the same summer tires.

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moshaholic2

· #6 · Nov 4, 2013

:wideyed: 14 years on the same tires!!! drive faster

BRGT350 said:
Going on 14 years next month of owning the same summer tires.

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #7 · Nov 4, 2013

Wheels, sorry about that one. Must be getting late in the day!

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WScottCross

· #8 · Nov 4, 2013

The roads here are clear about 75% of the time in the winter so all season tires work for the winter. I still switch back to the summers once the chance of snow is over. That part I definitely agree with!

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9

· #9 · Nov 4, 2013

WScottCross said:
Great review by Bryan (as always)

All-season tires are no scarier than driving snow tires on dry pavement. Some of us get SOME snow but necessarily enough to require dedicated snow tires. Good all season tires such as the Continental ExtremeContact DWS are a decent compromise. I know some people are passionate about not running all season tires, but for some of us, they are an acceptable alternative. I noticed a huge difference in traction when I put the DWS on my ST and I can easily break them loose in first, second and third gears. Maybe even fourth. I'm pretty sure the same is true of most snow tires sold.

I bought performance snows for this exact reason. Better on dry pavement that ordinary snows, but much better snow/ice traction than an all season. Plus they wear slower.

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WScottCross

· #10 · Nov 5, 2013

cinderbike said:
I bought performance snows for this exact reason. Better on dry pavement that ordinary snows, but much better snow/ice traction than an all season. Plus they wear slower.

What did you get?

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9

· #11 · Nov 5, 2013

Pirelli Snow Control II's. It's also the only snow tire I could find in the Ford recommended size of 195/45/16.

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eRic

· #12 · Nov 5, 2013

wow... someone really does not like all-season tires

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #13 · Nov 5, 2013

there are those who are against having summer performance tires on the ST and they are in positions to make that happen. I think it is 100% the wrong move for a performance car.

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T

takuarc

· #14 · Nov 5, 2013

Off road!!!

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #15 · Nov 5, 2013

takuarc said:
Off road!!!

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When in doubt, flat out!!

What went on in the ST while going to the different rally stages will remain classified. A little of the footage will show up in the next Fiesta Movement mission video. I can say that the ST required a lot of time with a high pressure washer, a number of hand washes, power spraying the bottom of the chassis, and removal of 12 large dust pans of debris. Not a single mark on the exterior from all of the hooning.

DirtieST #fiestamovement #timeforacleaning by Bryan Redeker BRGT350, on Flickr

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takuarc

· #16 · Nov 5, 2013

BRGT350 said:
When in doubt, flat out!!

What went on in the ST while going to the different rally stages will remain classified. A little of the footage will show up in the next Fiesta Movement mission video. I can say that the ST required a lot of time with a high pressure washer, a number of hand washes, power spraying the bottom of the chassis, and removal of 12 large dust pans of debris. Not a single mark on the exterior from all of the hooning.

DirtieST #fiestamovement #timeforacleaning by Bryan Redeker BRGT350, on Flickr

And I just found out I got a minor chip on the fender from normal driving...

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WScottCross

· #17 · Nov 5, 2013

BRGT350 said:
there are those who are against having summer performance tires on the ST and they are in positions to make that happen. I think it is 100% the wrong move for a performance car.

I'm with you on that. Even though I use all seasons as my winter driving tire, I will still switch back to the summer tires as soon as I reasonably can. I agree that delivering the car with all seasons would be a mistake on Ford's part.

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #18 · Nov 5, 2013

You are still making a good choice by removing the summer tires for winter use, even if not going to a full blown winter tire. If I was in Detroit or even the center of Michigan, the amount of snow would be much less and you could probably be ok with all seasons in the winter. I will stick with full snow tires since the lake effect snow we get here can get really bad. I have only been stuck once in the snow, and that was a few days before my snow tires arrived and I was on the OE Goodyears that came on my 2000 ZX3. After switching to snow tires, I have not had any issues. I took my 2011 Fiesta into some really deep snow on 2-tracks at the Sno*Drift rally and had no problems. My friend did the same with his Focus ST on snowies. Ground clearence was more of an issue than anything else.

Takuarc, most of the off road was on highly packed sand/dirt, so not bad in terms of rocks. If it was gravel, things would have been bad. We did some filming on a gravel road, but speeds were really slow for that part. I wanted to install my mud flaps to protect the car, but marketing says no modifications.

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mcummings182

· #19 · Nov 5, 2013

I live in northeast Ohio, so we get a lot of snow/ice. I ordered Blizzak WS60 in the standard size for the ST (205/40/17) from tirerack.com. They were the only snow tires I could find in the standard size for the ST. I didn't feel like paying an extra $200 for steelies for the alternate 15" and 16" tire sizes. I'm scared to drive this car in the snow, so I'm hoping the Blizzak tires do as good as everyone says.

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BRGT350

Discussion Starter · #20 · Nov 5, 2013

I priced out 14" General Artic Max with wheels from the tire rack and that was a cheaper route than going with new 16" snow tires using existing wheels. This was on my 2011, so I could use 14" wheels. I had not planned on buying new wheels and figured I would just run on the 16" wheels I already had. The price difference was enough to justify the change to 14" wheels, which saved money. I am planning on doing the same for my ST, except jump to a 15" wheel. The General tires are fantastic in the snow and a fraction of the cost of the Blizzaks. I have run Blizzaks in the past and they are an amazing tire, but pricey. I went with a cheaper option for my 2011 after talking to a few rally guys about what they use. I am 100% happy with the General tires and now my brother, sister-in-law, and a lot of my friends run the tire after seeing how they performed.

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