The Ford Sierra was a large family car that was built by Ford Europe from 1982 to 1994. It was designed by Uwe Bahnsen, Robert Lutz and Patrick le Quément. The code used during development was "Project Toni". It was named for the Spanish word for mountain range. This car was used in the movie Octane in 2007.
The Ford Sierra was first unveiled on 22 September 1982 at the British International Motor Show hosted at the NEC in Birmingham. with sales beginning on 15 October 1982, replacing the Ford Cortina. Its aerodynamic styling was ahead of its time and as such, many conservative buyers (including company car drivers) did not take fondly to the Ford Cortina's replacement.
It was mainly manufactured in Germany, Belgium, and the United Kingdom, although Sierras were also assembled in Ireland, Argentina, Venezuela, South Africa and New Zealand.
Assembly for the Ford Sierra in Ireland was located at the Marina in Cork City, which became the first European vehicle plant for Ford Motor Company outside of the United States in 1932. After an investment in the plant of £10 Million in 1982 to upgrade it for KD kit assembly of the Sierra, it briefly had a relatively small production output of the car, which was assembled mainly for export until the plant's closure two years later in 1984. The former plant at the Marina is now a distribution point for imported Ford Cars to the South of Ireland. The Sierra was the 1983 Semperit Irish Car of the Year in Ireland, although it missed out on the European Car of the Year award to the Audi 100.
In 1985, at the Geneva Motor Show, the four-wheel drive Sierra XR4x4 was shown. It had two viscous differentials with two thirds of the power directed towards the rear wheels. This allowed for an extra margin of security on slick or snowy roads, while retaining the car's rear-wheel drive comportment. This model originally only came equipped with the 2.8 litre V6 engine.
During the life of the car, two different styles of 3-door body were used; one with two pillars rear of the door, looking very much like a modified 5-door frame, as used on the high-performance XR4i; and a one-pillar design used on standard-performance 3-door hatchbacks and also at the other end of the scale as the basis for the very high-performance RS Cosworth. At the time of the car's launch, both styles were already envisaged, and a demonstration model with one style on either side was displayed at a Sierra design exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
The Ford Cortina had been manufactured in saloon and estate bodystyles but after the switch to the Sierra, combined with the redesign of the Escort to Mark III level in 1980 and the introduction of the Granada Mark III in 1985, Ford had changed its saloon-based line-up into a hatchback-based one.
The company launched the Ford Orion in 1983 to fill the gap in the saloon range between the late Cortina and the new Sierra. Ford found that customers were more attached to the idea of a saloon than they had expected, and this was further addressed in 1987 by the production of a saloon version of the Sierra. In the UK, this model was called the Ford Sierra Sapphire. This differed from the other Sierra models in having a traditional black grille, which only appeared in right hand drive markets. The 3-door Sierra was dropped in the UK in the mid 1980s, although the Cosworth version continued. Production of the 3-door Sierra continued in Europe, including after the Sierra range was given a facelift in 1987. The remodelled 3-door was never offered in the UK.
Sporting models utilized the 2.8/2.9-litre V6 engines coupled to a four-wheel-drive system (XR4x4) or a rear-wheel drive 2.8 XR4i. Both the 2.8/2.9 litre engines gave 150 bhp. And, more notably, the well known Cosworth model, which was powered by a turbocharged 16-valve 4-cylinder engine known as the YB which was based on the Ford 'Pinto' block. The Ford Sierra Cosworth was first introduced in 1985 as a three-door hatchback, with a 2-litre DOHC turbo engine producing 200 H.P. and a top speed of 150 M.P.H. - a speed normally found only in sports cars from prestige brands like Ferrari and Porsche, at much higher prices as well as with less practicality. At the time Ford wanted to compete in group A touring cars and therefore eligible to produce a limited run of 10% of the initial production, therefore this would be 500 cars. This was known as an 'evolution' model. Ford employed Tickford to help with the development. The Sierra RS500 as it was known sported a small additional rear spoiler, and larger front chin spoiler, extra cooling ducts for the engine, brakes and intercooler. Under the bonnet a larger turbo and intercooler was fitted along with an extra set of injectors, so instead of the standard four injectors it was built with eight, although in road trim these extra injectors did not function. These modifications produced 220 H.P. in road trim and around 550 H.P. in race trim. They were very successful in motorsport and are highly tunable road cars with a very large following.
In 1987, Ford introduced a four-door saloon (marketed in the UK as the Sierra Sapphire), which was sold alongside the hatchback and estate until the Sierra was replaced by the Mondeo in early 1993. The last Sierra rolled off the production line in December 1992.
The Sierra Cosworth switched to a saloon bodystyle in January 1988, again with rear-wheel drive, before the four-wheel drive version replaced it two years later.
In South Africa, the Sierra range featured both the five-door hatchback and station wagon bodies and production began at the Silverton (Pretoria) plant in January 1983. The restyled Sierra range differed from its European equivalent by featuring the traditional black grille of the Sierra Sapphire sedan (known simply in South Africa as the Sapphire) on the hatchback and wagon. Later, the grille would feature on these models in Europe.
Uniquely, the South African market also saw the introduction of a 5.0 litre XR8 between June 1984 and 1988. A limited number of 250 Sierras were made for the purposes of homologation, as this model was the premier Ford used in Group A racing. The XR8 was fitted with the 302 cubic inch engine from the US Ford Mustang, and the Borg Warner T5 heavy duty transmission. Front brakes were AP Racing four-piston calipers on 280 mm discs. A top speed of 140 M.P.H. was claimed. The XR8 is easily recognized by having four cooling slats between the headlights, whereas lesser versions were sold with the original smooth front.
The Sierra was eventually replaced in South Africa by the Telstar in 1993. Samcor, which assembled Ford models under license after Ford had divested from the country, was already assembling the smaller Laser and Meteor, alongside the madza 323, on which they were based, as well as an earlier version of the madza 626. The Telstar was finally replaced by the Mondeo in 1998.
Whereas British buyers rued the absence of a saloon version of the Sierra, in New Zealand, it was the absence of an estate (a "station wagon" there) that customers missed, when Ford New Zealand replaced the Cortina with the Ford Telstar range. This led to Ford importing CKD ("completely knocked down") kits of the Sierra wagon for local assembly in 1984. The wagon was offered in 1.6- (base) and 2.0-litre "L" and "Ghia" models initially, and proved to be a strong seller. In one month in 1987, the facelifted Ford Sierra, by then a single station wagon model, was the country's top-selling car range.
However, Ford cancelled the Sierra once madza, which developed the Telstar, could offer a station wagon. The Telstar wagon, while popular, never reached the Sierra's heights, especially its competition successes overseas. Further reasons could be customers' knowledge of the Telstar's japanese roots, and that the equivalent madza 626 wagon offered a considerably longer warranty at a similar price.
Relative rejection of the Telstar forced Ford to import completely built-up (CBU) premium models built in Genk, Belgium from 1990: the Sierra 2.0 GLX Wagon, the Sierra Sapphire 2.0 Ghia and the XR4×4 were part of this range. The advertising copy read, "Introducing the new car that needs no introduction." However, a relatively high price did not help – the wagon began at over NZ$31,000 – and production errors in the launch brochure showed cars with no steering wheels. Furthermore, any marketing boosts Ford could have gained through Group A touring car racing were over with the Escort Cosworth becoming the company's standard-bearer in competition (and the Escort, meanwhile, was absent from the New Zealand market). 1990 Ford Sierra Sapphire (New Zealand), imported CBU from Belgium.
The Sierra was withdrawn from the New Zealand market in 1992, and it would be another five years before its European successor the Mondeo would arrive there. Sierra Cosworths remain sought-after performance cars.
By contrast, the Sierra was never sold in Australia, as there was less demand for a medium-sized wagon than in New Zealand, although the RS Cosworth/RS500 was used in the Australian Touring Car Championships from the late 80's and early 90's.
In Argentina it was offered as a five-door hatchback beginning in the summer of 1984. A station wagon body style was added in September 1985. The sporting XR4, with three-door bodywork arrived a couple of months after the original introduction. The face-lifted post-1987 model was built in Venezuela, but did not reach the Argentinian market until 1989, where the range continued with a Merkur XR4Ti-like grille until 1991 for XR4 and 1992 for five-door models, when it was replaced by the Volkswagen Santana-based Galaxy. Argentinian Sierras can be distinguished by a more sculpted front bumper with an extra cooling inlet.
The 1.6L was offered in GL model only, while the LX, Ghia, Ghia S/SX and XR4 were available with a 2.3 litre inline-four with some differences in specs. Both engines, as for the preceding Taunus TC3, were from the "Pinto" family. Some Ghia models also featured automatic transmission as an option. The station wagon was called the Sierra Rural — "Rural" being used for station wagons in Argentina in the same way "Turnier" is used in Germany.
In Venezuela the locally assembled Ford Sierra was launched in 1985, the 2.8L V6 engine was standard is versions sold there, including the 4 door sedan (280ES), 3 door hatchback (280GT) and station wagon (Ranchera). In 1990 A face-lifted version of the Sierra, powered by the 2.9L V6 engine was offered as both a hatchback and a sedan, the latter being known as the Sierra 300 Sapphire. Also launched in Venezuela was the XR6i.
In North America, the Ford Sierra and the Ford Scorpio were offered under the now defunct Merkur brand. The Sierra was imported as a three-door only, and called the XR4Ti (similar to sub-model designations in other markets).