Take one Capri 3.0S . . .
A muscular Series X car from Ford
Nearly two years and an inflationary £1,232 since the Motor Sport road test in August 1978, Ford’s Capri 3.0S still justifies the tag of the best value-for-money performance car on the market. This versatile, 120 m.p.h., four-seater hatchback is such a good basic package and so responsive to development that now, as then, it remains the car to beat in the Tricentrol RAC British Saloon Car Championship, although whether it will be later in the season if BL Motorsport’s new Rover 3500s can overcome their teething problems will be interesting to observe.
The standard car is both fast and fun. But if that isn’t good enough, or you want to make it different to your neighbour’s (and my neighbour loves his 3.0S!) then Ford offer a flexible seletion of Series X performance parts to uprate this 3-litre V6 Capri part way towards the Group 1½ racing specification. There’s the choice of modifying the car mechanically, using a selection of items from the X-pack or a combination of all, but leaving the bodywork standard, or modifying the exterior by adding flared wheel arches and front spoiler while leaving the mechanical side alone. The ultimate plot is to amalgamate the two concepts to make a very purposeful looking and sizzlingly fast road-burner.
This is what Ford had done to the 3.0S I have been trying, which incorporated just about everything available from the X-pack and would leave little change out of £10,000. The standard car now costs £5,825.
The bodywork changes are major and not a job for the do-it-yourself man unless he happens to have his own spray booth. Wide, glassfibre wheel arches are blended into the existing, but cut about, sheet steel and a big air dam added to the front. Virtually a complete respray is required. The result is far from boy racerish, for the curvaceous arches are beautifully and subtly blended into the Capri’s overall shape to create a very tasteful and exciting-looking package, the squat and purposeful appearance completed by the addition of 7¼ in. rim RS alloy wheels shod with 205/60 section Pirelli P6 tyres. I was very taken by the aesthetics, which are so well contrived as to lift this Series X car out of the realms of “just a modified Capri” into a very distinctive “poor man’s supercar”.
Except for some cheapness of finish, the standard 3.0S leaves little to be desired in its ergonomically excellent interior, so long as the optional Recaro seats are specified. Ford sensibly leave the Series X interior well alone, save for the Recaros.
It’s a different story under the skin, however, where this full-house X-pack car is radically modified. Triple, twin-choke, downdraught Weber DCMF carburetters replace the single item between the vee. There are bigger inlet and exhaust valves, special cylinder head gaskets, an electric fuel pump to cope with the increased fuel demands and a larger radiator. The result is a boost in power from 138 b.h.p. at 5,000 r.p.m. to 175 b.h.p at the same figure. Torque is hoisted from 174 lb. ft. at 3,000 rpm to 194 lb. ft. at 4,000 r.p.m. The drivetrain is deemed adequate to cope with the extra urge, though a limited slip differential is fitted to calm the wheelspin from which even the standard car can suffer. The final drive ratio is unchanged at 3.09:1.
To stop this extra “go”, big, 10.8 in. diameter ventilated front discs replace the normal 9.6 in. variety and are gripped by Granada calipers. The 8 in. rear drums are unchanged.
Gas-filled Bilstein front struts and rear dampers are fitted, along with uprated coil springs, a revised anti-roll bar and anti-dive modifications at the front and standard leaf springs and an anti-roll bar are allied to the live rear axle.
All this spells excitement and it does not disappoint, the noise of the exhausts alone — rising from a gruff rumble at low revs to a healthy bellow as the tachometer rises — being enough to stir the adrenalin. For possibly aesthetic rather than practical reasons the ends of the exhaust pipes are flattened like those of the fuel-injected Capri RS 2600 I tested in Germany several years ago. A manual choker fitted in place of the single carburetter car’s automatic item, but I found a few pumps on the throttle pedal were the best means of stirring the beast into life from cold. Apart from a few polite coughs it was reasonably well behaved on driving away from cold.
Not unexpectedly, the Series X is less tractable than the lazy and gentle standard 3.0S, yet it remains content to trickle along in the upper of its four gears in 30 m.p.h. limits. Squashing the throttle to the floor too eagerly in top with too few revs aboard will bring a flat refusal from the triple Webers, though they respond willingly to gradual progression. But this is a car for fast driving, not dawdling, and driven appropriately it responds in muscular fashion, bellowing its way ferociously through the speed ranges. Should you demand it, this 3.0S will scorch off the line to 60 m.p.h. in around 7½ sec. say Ford, against 8.9 sec. for the standard car, while the mighty top-end performance is shown by a 0-100 m.p.h. time of about 21 sec against the normal 27 sec. Top speed is 130 m.p.h. plus in favourable conditions.
It is in top gear at the upper end of the scale that the Series X car shows its true colours, for impressive though the acceleration figures through the gears may be, there is always the feeling that the engine should be revving a lot more freely than it does; a slightly “wilder” camshaft to take advantage of those six carburetter chokes would make all the difference and transform this characterful car into a real Porsche-eater. Alas, it might also make this Capri into rather more of a gas-guzzler than it already is. A combination of fast roadwork and fairly sensible town driving brought an average of only 16.06 m.p.g. though 20 m.p.g. might be expected on a run. To be fair, this is pretty good compared with anything of similar performance.
Handling and roadholding match the sporting performance characteristics, the P6s showing fantastic grip in all conditions. Gentle understeer characteristics can be changed to full blinded power slides if desired. The suspension feels taut and firmly tied down, the power steering beautifully positive and ideally weighted, whereas that of the standard car, with smaller tyre footprint, could be criticised as too light. Though the pedal is a little bit weak in feel, the brakes are magnificent and the anti-dive contributes greatly to the smoothness of progress without reducing feed back near the limit of braking adhesion. It feels a really thoroughbred chassis all round, tremendously rewarding and effortless to drive quickly, the only drawbacks being a firm ride and, in built up areas, an embarrassing graunching and rubber-squealing cacaphony when turning slow corners caused by the tightly set limited slip differential.
This Series X Capri is full of guts, a full-blooded, powerful sports car in the old style dressed up as a modern coupé, with a responsive chassis that adds exhilaration — and, alas, a fairly high noise level — to every journey. I was so taken with the test car, the next best thing to a Porsche, that I actually inquired about buying it from Ford, but COO 260T had already found a home — in the hands of Mike Wilds as the now somewhat more garish MCD course car. — C.R.