Project: Driveway 4-Door

[olly22n]

Ok guys, after being inspired by Stu's marvelous posts on his mk3 capri, I am going to attempt somethin similar with my newly acquired rot-box. (although his writing is something I'll always aspire to!!)

Starting a week last Saturday I have so far managed to set the tappets, install a thermostat and drain most of the cars coolant over the driveway...

$200 down on new tools, this weekend I attemped to raise the front suspension by 1". After sorting one side I remebered to take photos which are on my camera. I haven't quite figured out how to transfer them from the camera to the computer yet!! Full write up tomrrow!

On the plus side I took the car down to see my uncle (the oracle on escorts) and got a thumbs up, so its not as much as a dog as I first thought!

I promise to get the pictures up tomorrow, along with my uncles RS1800 (standard road car!) and S2000 Grp4 rally car in progress.....

Project rot-box is under way and rattlin' and a whinin' like a good un!!!

[4drmatt]

RS1800 (standard road car!) and S2000 Grp4 rally car in progress.....

look forward to seeing pics of these!!!! and of your car too

good luck with your project and we like lots of pics

[Trevor_A]

good luck with your project, I notice your only in stamford not far from me!
Trev

[olly22n]

good luck with your project, I notice your only in stamford not far from me!
Trev

where are you then mate??

I haven't seen any osf's in the area for ages!

[olly22n]

OK – I have transferred the pictures! This is my first write up so I will try to get everything in the right order. Me being me I forgot to take pictures of the first side, so there are no before and after jobbies.

I always felt the car was too low at the front, so plumped for some 180lb, 2” lowering springs from Rally Design. Decided to get stuck in, I have lowered a car before – but never an escort!

Heres the o/s front before I started and a random collection of tools!





My girlfriend kindly lent me her gardening pad…



Car jacked up (pain when its that low) and wheel removed. First job was caliper off and tied up, and had completely forgotten to take any pictures!

Before removing the steering arm and bottom balljoint I cracked off the top mount bolts and the top mount retaining nut.

Again I forgot to photograph this but heres a picture of the other side!



Steering arm and bottom balljoint next, came off easily, but would budge so nipped down to halfords and picked up a balljoint splitter.



another picture from the wrong side!


Dropped the strut out…


Strut top doesn’t appear to be rotten which was nice!


All empty under the arch! Was going to go prodding with a screwdriver but decided ignorance was the best option and left it alone!!



Spring removed and new one installed, nice a loose, will try to wire it in if it rattles around when driving!




Reattached the balljoints and caliper, and shock horror I re-used a split pin!!
(again photos from n/s)


Dropped the car down, ensuring that the springs were located in the spring cups..

The afters…










caught in the act!



And one final one of my g/f who kept the brews coming and didn’t get too bored!




IF you spot anything I have done wrong or should change please shout up!!!


Olly

[dangerousdave]

I think you did let your mrs get bored.....shes asleep standing up in the pic

Good work, but i think i preferred it as low as it was

[olly22n]

I think you did let your mrs get bored.....shes asleep standing up in the pic

Good work, but i think i preferred it as low as it was

it did look good, but rubbed like fuck and wallowed about - the springs were so soft!

[4drmatt]

your car/gf are looking good

haha... seriously though, your car is mint... love the colour and stance!

[DanR]

only thing you did wrong was work on the car and not the GF lol

Nice looking motor!

[olly22n]

Thought it was a mistake to post that photo on here!

Anyway these should distract you.....












hmmmmm, this would go in my escort quite nicely....

[4drmatt]

[Dan]

cracking projects on the way and yours is looking plenty clean enough

keep the updates coming

[olly22n]

ohhhhhhhhhhhh, big parcel turned up at work today!!



I wonder what it could be??

[Scouse]

I love silver Escorts, did have a silver harrier............many moons ago.


And be careful when they ask for more photos that they mean the car and not the G/F!!!


And I like the bit were you say £200 down on tools! If I spent that much on tools my missus would kill me!!




Scouse.

[olly22n]

£200 on tools, that a; she doesn't know about (i had them for ages darling - as i rip the plastic off the box!!) and b; they can also be used in the errr, house!

[dannyayo]

Cars gorgeous, I will have one one day maybe.

[waynemk2]

Nice cars!!! how did you get the s2000 block so clean, mine is manky!!

[olly22n]

Nice cars!!! how did you get the s2000 block so clean, mine is manky!!

Well its not my S2000 engine so not sure, but from what i know its done less than 1000 miles and hasn't been cleaned!

Hows yours for bonnet clearance mate?

[olly22n]

Next Job:

Fit air filter, ordered one from ebay – think it was about 35gbp (don’t have the pound sign on my laptop??)





Racing only – perfect!


Looks like a good bit of kit, so out to the car to see if it fits!

Gasket fitted!


as did the base plate;


I presumed that this hole…….


was for this;


But seeing as my car came with no filter originally I’m not sure which pipe goes in there. I came up with this one; it attaches to the manifold and the brake servo, and is currently blocked off.


So I attempted to fit it, but as you can see it was never going to fit!


Seeing as the hole was going to be there anyway, thought it was best to fit the white tuby thing while the top was off




All fitted, started the car and runs a bit better now, although that could be me imagining it!!!


Now as we all know, nothing ever goes without a hitch, and I noticed my cam cover is leaking oil, upon closer inspection are there long rectangular washers missing?? Can anyone confirm this?





Also while digging around for the breather pipe I found this;


Whats this???

Anyway, thanks for looking again, probably the longest write up ever for fitting an air filter…..


Olly

[mk1matt]

That looks like the bit that goes in the top of the breather "pot" if that makes sence?

Car looks sweet and very clean Look forward to having it on the ts stand at cf show

[dangerousdave]

Yep that goes into the breather box on the side of the engine, then you would from factory run a pipe from that onto that white bit on the air filter so that it recycles the crankcase fumes, most people ditch that setup and either put a small filter on the pipe from the breather or run it to a catch tank

[olly22n]

So where is this breather box? TBH i have never heard of one! Where would I find it?

Olly

[sillymofo]

underneath the carbs on a pinto just behind the distributor you will see a metal cylinderthat is a push fit into the block and has another fitting coming from the top of it to put your breather pipe onto
nice looking car as well mate keep at it its amazing what you can teach yourself by working on osf's!

[olly22n]

So i put that black cylinder thing into the bigger metal cylinder under the carbs and then run that up to the hole in the filter?

The other end of the pipe is attached to the carb/manifold, ans looks factory (ie no jubilee clips, proper ford jobbies)

Should have just carried on in blissful ignorance

[olly22n]

That looks like the bit that goes in the top of the breather "pot" if that makes sence?

Car looks sweet and very clean Look forward to having it on the ts stand at cf show

Oh and I hate to disappoint you, its really not that sweet and clean up close

[dangerousdave]

Ah yea thats where it goes i was thinking of newer ones where they breathe to the airbox instead of the inlet manifold....its been a while since i have seen anything mechanical on my mk2

In which case block off that white pipe or run a nice line to the front panel of your car for a ram air style cold air feed to get you an extra 6000bhp

[Trevor_A]

car looks good- you won't see mine around the streets at the min as it currently has a rather large hole in the bulkhead! and no engine! next year it will be ready ( i hope)
Trev
Oh yeah I'm in Uppingham

[olly22n]

Yeah not far from me mate, remeber breaking my arm there playing rugby once upon a time!

by the time yours is ready mine will be off the road ready for a full resto!!

[Scouse]

(don’t have the pound sign on my laptop??)

Either change your keyboard (in control panel) to English.........sometimes set to American! or go to

Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Character Map

Even easier just press ALT key and type 0136 (make sure num lock is on, only works if you know the Unicode number)


ALT + 0163 is the number for the £ sign!!





Scouse.

[Trevor_A]

do you play for stamford then? I play for oakham at the min
Trev

[olly22n]

kind of, miss my free saturdays so packed it in this year, may play a bit next year but not sure really!

do you know any of the guys at stamford then?

[olly22n]

OK Small update!

Got the 5 spd in the car….


Ok well, not fitted exactly but we’re getting there!

Next job to fit the thermostatic fan switch, chose the revotec jobbie from Rally Design for this, 32mm id fitment.

Great bit of kit with clear destructions and plenty of wiring!



Moment of no return!



The “insert technical name here” alloy bit into the hose – taking 20mm out of the hose in the process!



My old fan switch did the job, but relied on me remembering to switch it on in traffic….recipe for disaster!


So figured out the best wiring routes, trying to keep the runs as short as possible, I mounted the relay near the radiator on the inside of the bonnet to keep it away from the elements


I ran the earth for the fan and relay to the battery and the switched ignition feed to the fusebox under the bonnet. All joined ‘neatly!’ soldered and heatshrinked together. Fingers crossed these will stand the test of time!



The switch required no setting up and turned on and off as it should.

Nice when something just works!

Next job was the quickshift for my 5-spd box.

Forgot to take any befores but a nice satisfying and fairly easy job to done, here are some afters;
This is the collar that raises the pivot point


And the nylon bush that takes up the slack (you have to grind off some retaining tabs to raise the balljoint bit;



Here is the finished item with the alloy base plate as well.


Good kit, only £15 from Rally Design too!

Last bit!

When trying (and failing!) to fix my blowing exhaust I found my first bit of grot! So immdieatily blanked it from my mind and bought an RS steering wheel off Ebay.





Next update soon! New manifold gaskets and 5 speed box!

[dangerousdave]

Nice update, may have to look into getting one of those fan controllers for mine, looks a nice bit of kit

As for the rust thats only the hardest bit on the car to replace IMO! Its the filler piece thats sandwiched between the inner and outer sills and is a pain to fix with the sills out as theres nothing nice to weld to near it as its all usually rotten

[olly22n]

wait for the next update tomorrow Dave, less rust, more rott and holes!!

Also a picture of a mint twany brown mex i've spied.

[biggy]

love the look of your motor mate, perfect stance, 1st 4door ive actually liked!!!!

[olly22n]

Thanks bud!

[olly22n]

Right for an update – got a few jobs completed, and uncovered some big ones that need sorting out!!

Exhaust manifold gasket was leaking, so sorted this out, nice and simple job, no surprises!!




This would be the blowing one then!



All back and bolted up – leak solved!




Talking of leaks after all the rain we have been having my carpets were wet, so as I had to strip to interior ready for the gearbox change I thought I would do some investigating!



Oh dear, I started poking with a screw driver!


And again


Whoops


At least the footwell was mint…


So I covered it all back up. The MOT runs out in August and I’m determined to enjoy the car for at least one summer!


Silver lining to every post, was round my uncles and found this,


Mint original Mexico, not his but bloody hell it was nice!

[olly22n]

Next job!

accquired some Gax rear shocks and found more holes!



got the car jacked up and on axel stands, then realise it would be better jacked off the chassis and not the axle!! But cracked the big nuts off while i had more ground clearance,





Used an FBH to carefully remove the bottom of the shock



Undid the top mount and it dropped to the floor




The new shocks needed some copper slip on the bushes so decided it was a good time for some liquid refreshment too;



Again with careful use fo teh FBH the shock was on enough for me to use the nut to wind it fully on


All done!

Nice job that went well with no major hitches, starting to like working on the 'scort!



TBH there was not a huge amount wrong with the billies that were on it, but free shiny shocks have just got to be better!!!

Thanks for looking folks!

[olly22n]

The attentive among you will have wondered where the photos of the holes were in the last post!

Only took the one shot and here it is!

[Dan]

good stuff nice to see some enthusiasm for getting stuck in and dont let the rust put you off, mine has the veneer of being 'ok' but thats only because ive resister the screwdriver urge to poke it... maybe next year

keep at it