Project Rustcort

[Marshall]

So yeah, after my better half putting the L200 on it's roof and the Saxo finally selling for no where near as much as I hoped I decided it was time to ressurect the Escort. For some reason I didn't get a huge amount of interest in it when I tried to sell it, must be fate.



I took it to the Test center over here to get it's MOT a couple of months ago, knowing for a fact it wasn't going to pass, although I thought it'd be handy to see exactly what work it needed doing. Well, Mr Test Centre Dude came back with quite an essay, a lot of it to do with the amount of leaks coming from the Diff, Engine, 'box and NS strut.... The rest of it was more to do with bushes, which is no biggie on a car this age.

Soooo, after a bit of head scratching and rubbing of the chin I've decided to ditch the Xflow lump and go down the Pinto route, it's not going to be hugely faster or more powerful, but it will give me a bit more low down grunt.


After scouring the net and scrounging of some mates here's what I've managed to get my grubby mitts on:

Petrol Filler neck
RS2000 engine mounts
RS2000 2.25" exhaust and manifold
4sp Quick shift kit
RS2000 single piece prop
RS2000 track rod ends
RS2000 Bilstein front struts +1"
RS2000 complete engine and 'box
Polybush kit for leafs and exhaust
Panhard Rod
Steering rack Gaitors
Mexico rear axle with 9" drums and RS2000 diff
Steering column bush

I had forgotten all about the rad, so I'm now on the hunt for a RS2000 radiator too.....

And here's what I managed to do yesterday afternoon:

Interior out, there's a few repairs in there, with quite untidy welding and the chap before me didn't even bother to degrease & primer before respraying..... so that's another job to do....but I'm tempted to do that over winter.





After removing the prop and Exhaust it was time for the engine to come out:







As you can see the wiring was put in by either Homer Simpson or Stevie Wonder, so that's yet another job to do.....






And that's pretty much as far as I've got. A mate came down with his rather nifty plasma cutter to cut the gearbox tunnel in preparation for the new 'box, but numpty forgot to take a photo of that. Not a huge amount of photo's I know, but I must say so far it's all be rather straight forward, old school cars are such a dream to work on....

Tonights job has got to be to sort out the dodgy wiring....

[tree]

LOl washing machine in road by L200.
Soudns like a good little project on tho go though!

[DaveM]

I decided it was time to ressurect the Escort. For some reason I didn't get a huge amount of interest in it when I tried to sell it, must be fate.

There has been an ad in the local papers recently, a fella called Ian is looking to buy Mk1 and Mk2 escorts all ages and conditions.
The numbers in the ad are 664444(day) and 611422(eve)

Thats if you still want to part with it

[Marshall]

Yup, tried him too, never called back. Obviously not that desperate for a car.... Anyways, after working on it over the weekend I'm quite glad no one came forward with the cash, I think I'd have missed the old thing.

I'm hoping to have her all up and running for TT, although we all know these things never go according to plan.....

[dodgy__tam]

had it been tested someone would of ripped your arm off at the neck for that sort of money!! if you've ever put a car thru manx test you'l understand why- its down to the testers, their reasoning is...... in the uk a car gets mot-ed every year in the iom theyre only gonna see it (hopefully) once so they may as well make sure its completely spot on, good in theory- and in practise i suppose, its just a nightmare if you happen to be the wrong side of it, id bet money on that most of your fails would have come under the advisory category in the uk, any hoo.... theres nowt worse than finding out your "nice" car is scruffily welded witha a birds nest of wiring- i know all to well, once i bought a "has been restored previously but needs a little tlc" mark 2 once..... what a s**t that was

[shagnasty]

thats ian corkill that owns 4wd and van centre he's always looking for escorts

[dodgy__tam]

thats ian corkill that owns 4wd and van centre he's always looking for escorts

best not tell his wife then??

[Marshall]

Managed to get an hour in last night to start sorting out this poor excuse for wiring. Managed to remove parts of it, including a wire that looked like it was due to go up in smoke any day. If I get some spare time I'll try and tidy the bay up too as previous owner has, believe it or not, wax-oiled it...... If I don't do it this week then it'll be on my list of things to do over winter.

Before:



After:





Some of the now redundant wires, including the remote solenoid and regulator





Below is what I'm looking at tackling tonight....I can see plenty of head scratching and swearing to come. The dodgy alarm (or whatever it is) is to be removed as it doesn't work






Also received this through the post yesterday too....

[DaveM]

rather you than me with all that wiring

is that an Ashley?

[Marshall]

No idea to be honest, the build quality of it looks totally different from the Ashley I took off so your guess is as good as mine.....

I didn't even think to ask when I ordered it.