JULY-August Festiva of the Month

Joseph's Customized 93 Festiva

Since I used to be in a lot of plays and have written bio's for playbills a few times I'll save you a bit of work and do the write up in 3rd person. "Joseph's love affair with festivas began in April of '04 when he bought a little red '93 5 speed with 158,000 miles on it. The first mod ever done to the car was the addition of racing stripes on the hood.

Since then the car has undergone several different looks. First it was painted blue and lit up with over 15' of blue neon lights:

The neons where later removed and sold to help offset the cost of the new 13x5 wheels and 205/65/R13 Mastercraft Avenger A/Ts wrapped around them:

After that the real modding began. A B6 from a 1989 Mazda 323 was installed for a little extra pep. Then came the summer of '05. Joseph had considered the possibility of removing the top after observing that most guys who drove convertibles had an easier time getting girlfriends (he later found out that this does not work with festiva convertibles). Since it was summertime he decided that it was finally time. After about 20 minutes with a sawzall and a couple of extra blades the car looked like this:

At this point the car was a "fair weather only" vehicle, and it was necessary to form some kind of top. Joseph came across a great deal at a fabric shop on some purple vinyl that matched his seat covers he had made a while back, so he decided to try his hand at convertible top building. The result was a PVC frame and purple vinyl roof that looked pretty rough, but it kept the interior dry at speeds up to 40MPH. At higher speeds the whole roof started flapping as though it wanted to part with the car.

Shortly after the top was made the B6 died in a tragic accident involving Joseph not tightening the radiator drain cock properly after a radiator flush, resulting in a loss of coolant and ultimately a blown head gasket and cracked cylinder head. The car's powerplant was reduced from the mighty B6 back to the dying B3, just to get it back on the road and save gas compared to Joseph's other car, a 1995 Chevy Astro with 4.3 Vortec... which puts out a huge amount of torque, but also takes in a huge amount of gas. And so the search began for a new B6 to get the car really moving again. After 3 months of searching and not finding anything with under 150K for less than $300, Joseph was ready to give up the idea of a B6 and just rebuild the B3. At the last junkyard he checked he decided to ask if they had any BPs... just in case. They guy said "sure, I got one with 28K on it that I'll part with for $250." That had to be a mistake! A 28K BP for $250! So they went back to the motor and looked at it. It was beautiful:

Needless to say the motor was purchased and promptly installed

(Click here) for the forum thread detailing the weld-free passenger side motor mount Joseph used for his BP install.) Other mods to the car include painted tailights, Escort power mirrors and an Escort console.

Joseph has also been blessed recently by the addition of a new festiva to his family of cars:

His current project is getting the new festiva up and running. Right now it has the B3 from the little blue (completely rebuilt) and is awaiting a new fuel pump and cleaning of the gas tank. Future plans for the little blue are a complete soft-top on a copper tubing frame and a custom backlit instrument cluster combining the stock festiva fuel and temp gauges, a 140MPH speedometer from a 1991 Protege, and a 7000RPM redline tach from a 1987 RX-7. Joseph is a senior at North Georgia College and State University and he hopes to graduate with a Bachelor's degree in Business Management in the spring of '07. At that time he intends to start a residential construction or remodeling company and make even more money to fund his Festiva fantasies!"