Thanks for all the kind comments, will really see some progress this summer
A very quick update, unfortunately i haven't touched the car for about 2 yrs and its been tucked away in my brothers garden under a cover.
I have been through a fair few landrovers and now have an off road defender, i have just sold the mid-terraced house and am now hopefully moving to a semi with room for a double garage / workshop.
I'm hoping that by the end of summer i'll have the escort back in my own garden ready to begin again
Just done a 3 hour round trip picking up the front chassis rails that were in the 'for sale' section, the missing piece of the puzzle.
Cant wait to get them on the car
Well the car is home and its been amazing to work on it in the comfort of my own garage with tools, lighting and a nice comfy carpet to kneel on.
Been doing a few odd bits after work and unfortunately i have been reminded where i left off which was uncovering terrible repairs by the previous owner covered with copious amounts of filler.
I removed the around 10mm of filler covering the entire rear quarter to discover a very badly fitted outer sill, fortunately these are only cheap and i was considering replacing them anyway as they looked like a bit of a bodge
no updated pics.
I'll see if i can get some up over the weekend, we have only recently moved house so i'll have to try and locate the wire to move pics from my phone to the laptop
I was hoping to get a good amount of time on the escort this weekend but its been busy so didn't get my chassis rails fitted,
I did manage to get one side all cleaned up and 'kind of' clamped in place.
I now remember how long it takes to carefully unpick each of the rusty layers before spending even more time trying to get aftermarket panels to fit, i had to unpick one section which will be modified and added later.
I'm now regularly getting an hour or so on the escort after work so should start to progress a little quicker, I made the O/S rear panel over the weekend and cut and swaged some homes in it this evening, i'll hopefully get the holes cut and swaged in the N/S after work tomorrow.
i also tack welded some filler panels over the holes in the rear firewall
Last edited by 5tox; 08-02-2017 at 19:59.
getting there.
Surprising just an hour a day can move a project along..
Not a huge update but have been slowly chipping away at it, O/S floor is fully seam welded to the Prop tunnel and the seat brackets are made up.
The brackets where the sliders bolt on are only tacked in place for now until the passenger side is all mocked up, having said that the seat position feels good with the pedal box and steering wheel
Nice keep chipping away m8
Im not sure if i dare admit how many hours/days i spent messing about with the seat positions before i was completely happy, i actually ended up completely revising the design of the seat brackets in the end, i'm very happy with them now.
I started to clean up my cross member today and cut off the old engine mounts as my duratec will be chassis mounted, should i plate over the gap which has been left or would it be ok left as it is, it still looks plenty strong enough but i'd like to do it right
Seats are looking good... Better to spend lots of time and be happy rather than rush them and always think you could've done better.... All the x members Ive seen have been plated over. And if I was doing my own I'd plate over it too...
Last edited by rallyrob; 12-03-2017 at 20:28.
Love the seats .... Looking good
I would def plate the x member as rallyrob said an easy job as your getting dab handed at your repairs
Cheers guys, i'll plate over the holes to stiffen it all up.
Cross member is done, cut off the engine mounts and plated over the hole, cut off the old rusty bottom plate and replaced with new metal and trimmed the back lip down for more sump clearance.
I was going to lower the steering rack but then decided against it, without the engine and gearbox mocked up it's just too early to say if it's required or not.
Another step forward ... Keep up the good work
The next big job is to replace both A pillars and try to weld in some new door hinges where mine are damaged, to make the job easier i have removed the dashboard panel.
This is the first time i have used spot weld removing drill bits and i dont know how i managed this far without them.
Having the dash panel out also allows me to sort out the mess behind it.
Having trouble uploading pictures from photobucket, will have a look at this tomorrow evening
Last edited by 5tox; 27-09-2017 at 20:59.
I started a job this evening which iv'e been putting off for ages which is replacing the A posts, from reading up on other peoples threads i worked out that there are 3 panels, an inner door jamb panel, an outer A post and a hinge panel which is sandwiched inbetween.
From what i can see the hinge panel is spot welded to the outer panel, is it welded anywhere else?
I started unpicking the outer panel but if its going to come away with the outer panel then i'll need to make a jig first, can anybody confirm?
there arent many detailed images of this process online that i can see.
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its coming on nicely
Which bits are you replacing, inners outers or both?
If you're doing the outers you really benefit from taking the windscreen scuttle corners off aswell.
It just means you can get to the tops of them nicely, and you never what horrors you'll find underneath till you get them off aswell anyway.
If the inners arent too bad you can probably just get away with adding a repair piece at the bottom, thats where mine are not very good. As for the sandwiched hinge plate itself just try and add in repair pieces into that aswell.
Last edited by rallyrob; 29-09-2017 at 10:39.
The inner panels arent too bad, one side required a small repair.
i was hoping to get one side A post done today but uncovered a nasty multi layered section of rot which i cut out and replaced instead.
im hoping to get a few more hours in Sunday so should have the Splash panel on, create a jig for the hinges and then chop the outer panel out.
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Last edited by 5tox; 29-09-2017 at 21:46. Reason: double post
I have decided that i'm going to work backwards starting with the flitch panel, the reason is that the car has already been repaired badly by the previous owner and the panels were all over the place.
The splash panel was dead straight where i think its supposed to kick up at the back towards the windscreen, subsequently i dont have a good starting point to take measurements from,
Could somebody please take a measurement between the two lines i have drawn (with arrows) i need to know how far down the flitch panel comes from the edge of the scuttle corner.
Once i have that measurement i can make the rest line up
Cheers
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Can you not hang the wing on with a few self tappers or similar. That will give you the measurement, it's the back edge of the wing that will determine what height that will need to be anyway.
ta mate, i spoke to my brother earlier who suggested the same thing, ill fetch the wing out of the loft tomorrow and see how i get on
I have had a really productive day today.
Re- worked the bulkhead corner that i fabricated a while back as it sat approx 20mm too low where the flitch panel joined, then welded it all up and tacked in the flitch panel.
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I then quickly knocked up a jig as i expected the hinge panel to come away with the outer skin, to my surprise it didn't, there are 3 layers along the edge where the door rubber goes so if you are carful removing the outer spot welds then the hinge panel remains spot welded to the inner skin.
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All seemed to go very well, i'll hopefully try and get an hour in the garage after work tomorrow so i can get the outer sking spot welded in, i can then stick my new splash panel on and look at fitting the wing
Sweet another job out of the way.. just keep plugging away and before you know it your be on the home run.
Thats the plan buddy, little and often.
I really wasn't looking forward to this job but it actually wasn't too bad, i reckon fitting the wing will be a right pain though.
Next job is the outer sill
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