Burnside

Also a cool book arrived…..

Thats lovely and reminds me of all the mk1 & 2's that used to litter the streets and cul de sacs when i was a lad, when i really wanted one as well. Im now jealous

Bought this in the mid 90s, I was still a teenager. Did lots to it but eventually it went on eBay. Still out there, last pics that popped up were someone proposing they use it as a drift car


Run to the Sun 1998 in my 1600 Ghia auto

The previously midnight blue 1300 Ghia I ended up with. Drove like a sack of shite

Signal amber 1300 Ghia I co-owned with my mate. Awesome colour

1600 Sport I bought out of the Basildon Evening Echo, fitted with a 2.0 Pinto using all the proper RS2000 mounts, bellhousing etc.
I ended up scrapping it before realising it was registered alongside some of the works rally cars

A random wide arch 4 door that turned up at work

My friend's 1300 Ghia (same silver/red colour combo as my 1600), that had been his mum's when we were at school. He spotted it for sale in the local paper years later and bought it back. Was a low mileage car and everything felt tight, best driving Escort I've experienced 

Should be black behind the grille though

Not many, because pre digital and all that - here's when I bought it from an ad in the Sporting Escorts owners club magazine

The whole reason I bought this one was because my parents had an identical T-reg (local FN registered) from 1980-until the mid 90's

As mentioned before, when dad sold it, I kept the Serck plates, which to this day are in the shed

This one (still with the first owner when I took this photo back in 2015!) went to the UK as well. Solid car, despite living near the coast its entire life. 

yeah it had the F O R D lettering instead of the Ford badges,  some kind of crest on the key and on the blank in the dash where the fuel/temp gauge go on a rev counter model, an  orange oil pressure light and different script on the instrument markings 

Yes they definitely last well in eu land.      This one was the very first car bought and collected from Germany and popped in yesterday for coffee and still with the mate that bought it after all the work I did on it, still looks just as good as the day I first set eyes on it on the guys drive all those years ago.  Can't be arsed to hunt for the collection thread to see how long ago it actually was.

My first car was an N reg Mk2
 

I remember that! My mate used to change the colour of his badges on his red Cortina P100 pickup every other week. Yellow seemed to be a favourite from what I remember. While I'm reminiscing, the boss at the garage at the time bought a white mk2 Escort on an N plate for the forecourt. I remember stuffing a load of p38 in the front wings to cover his shonky plates. It was an unusual one though - it was on an N plate. Has anyone seen another on an N? I remember mk1s were still being registered on N plates. 
The Escort looks really solid - well bought. I see the sticker tells the story of its Portuguese past - that would explain the rogered paint but lack of rot. 

That is awesome! Well bought that man👍
Goes to show what a decent climate does for cars. Hopefully it’ll not rust into the ground in this wet cold salty shit hole!
 
Back when I got my Capri in 2001 all these old Ford’s were at that point of being deeply unpopular. I got loads of shit off my peers for having it. How the tables have turned! Which is a blessing and a curse in some ways.

Ah, it's great. Well bought. The only thing I prefer about the earlier models is the older style 2 spoke steering wheel.

Am I right in saying you used to be able to sand the back of them down to get rid of the blue paint and then spray them whatever colour you wanted?
Car looks ace BTW!

So the paints knackered, and its a bit accessorised. So very 1990. But then again its unwelded and original- not very 1990 at all.
 

However- 
this one can stay

And this one ive added….

But first matter of business…. lets just turn the orgy of stickerage down a bit….

 

 

 

Once off loaded….

1990 just arrived with someones first set of wheels…..

Slapped the new nearside caliper on. Quality is definitely not as good but it fits and seems to work fine. Drag feels the same on both sides.
Bled the rear brakes on both sides for good luck. Fluid seemed pretty clean - I think because the rear lines have been replaced at some point recently. Fluid in the brake fluid chamber is a bit manky so I might bleed the front brakes in time. 




 
Noticed someone attempted to stop a heat shield rattling with hot melt glue. Nice choice of glue on an area that gets hot 🤣

 
Air con panel arrived too, so fitted that to see if that sorted the fan issue. Reasonably easy to get to.


Stereo doesn't fit properly, looks like someone broke the screw holder that goes into the plastic. Crazy thing this plastic considering its supposed to be holding the radio in. I think someone forced this plastic piece in the wrong way around and broke it. I can't say the design of this car doesn't have the feel of durability as a priority.

Discovered that someone has fitted a Aux port for the stereo which is neat.


Also a whole load of extra wires and connectors hidden behind there. I think it might have had an ancient car phone mount at some point in it's past. The mic looks like a 2000-era Nokia hands free mic.


 
Test fitted the new panel. Fan still doesn't work properly. Damn, parts darts fail.

 
So dug into the glove box to see if I could find the hedgehog resistor pack.

Connector wiring doesn't look very promising. Screw was loose so someone has been in here before.

Single screw and connector it was out. 2014 date code suggests it's been replaced. These are NLA new and don't seem to have any aftermarket options available either.

Connectors definitely had too much heat through them.




 
So what caused that?
I think two things.
Firstly, despite being a genuine part, that terminal doesn't look like it was soldered properly. I don't think overheating has melted it as the solder hasn't flown elsewhere. 

Compounding the issue is the pollen filter is filthy and full of leaves. This will cause resistance to the airflow and make the fan work harder. (I don't know what that random yellow wire goes to yet!)

 
So what next? 
Second hand units can be had for £80 or so. More than I want to pay really. Plus I need to sort that connector. There is one with a loom snipped at the resistor which could be an option.
First thing I'll try is cleaning all the contacts up. However cleaning crimp terminals isn't easy and often doesn't really work as you can't get any mechanical cleansing tool in there. As this is a high current connection, if it's not clean then it'll just happen again.
Another option could be to drill a hole through the case and put a fly lead from that terminal directly into that dodgy melted terminal. Either soldered directly or with a bullet terminal/similar. However that said the other terminals aren't in great shape either.
So the next thing could be snipping the connector and soldering directly to the terminals. While bodge tastic, it'll work. Given that if this every needs replacing again will need a new loom connection anyway, perhaps isn't so bad thing to do? Plus lets face it, this isn't a low mileage minter. It's a scruffy high miler that is unlikely to be around for another decade. 
Or of course pay out for a second hand resistor pack and a loom connection. But that's something that could be done if the above doesn't work.  

This evening I had a few hours to put these new rear pads in. 
Apart from the E320, pretty much every car I've bought in the last year has its rear or front end in the air soon after I've bought it. 🤣

 
This is the offending side.


There certainly isn't much meat left on this pad! (More in a moment)

 
Slider pins are covered in white grease. Now I'm never sure if you should grease these pins? I thought you did but I have read that BMW say not to.

Pulled it all off and inspected it all.
Disc looked reasonable. It's had some heat through it but no massive scoring that I could see.

Slider pins were covered in grease. The bottom one I'd already started cleaning up (then remembered to take a photo) hence why it has less on it in this picture.

Piston doesn't look too bad under the boot from what I can see?

Carrier was crusty and filthy. I cleaned this up and greased the pad touch points. 

Piston went in but did take a fair bit of force with the spreader.

Now those pads...
Bottom is the inner and top is the outer.

I don't know what the pros think but my view is that I bloody luckily got away with not damaging the disc! There is a wafer thin amount of pad material left and the top just started kissing the raised lip of the disc.


I reckon the disc will be perfectly okay to reuse and isn't damaged? Incredibly close to doing so though.
I'd rather not change it if I don't have to, as they're not that old. Doesn't feel to have any high or low spots either.
Bloody lucky though!
The other side has loads of meat on the pads still. I didn't take pictures as I wanted to get it finished. The caliper piston and carrier were actually in far worse a state than the passenger side. Yet it span more freely. 🤷‍♂️

I put it all back together with new pads, cleaned up sliders and carrier. After pressing the brake pedal, the drivers side rear rubs ever so slightly but you get a tiny bit of spin after letting go. The passenger side however is really stiff and you need the wheel on for enough leverage to turn it. 
To me I definitely need a new passenger rear caliper. But tbh I think I might need both and be done with it. My thought is also that the drivers side might either be or become soon seized if the other side already has. 
I should also say while I think about it, I did try some hard braking on the way back. It didn't brake straight and true. More squirrelly and needed a fair bit of correction to keep it braking straight. Hopefully two new rear calipers will sort it all out properly.
Also noticed the passenger side has an older (rusty) Bilsten damper while the drivers side had a shinier newer looking Sachs damper. Tempting to lob a new one on that passenger side to have a matching new(ish) pair. Depends how much they are though.

That's brilliant.  Tatty and honest - just the ticket.
I remember in 1999 I was 16 and me and my mate knew another guy who was a year older than us and he'd just passed his test.  Lovely guy - Christian family - and his NAN insisted that her car went to him.  Robert therefore had a brown Mk2 Escort on a V plate and everyone (other than me) felt sorry for him.  His contemporaries had Clios, Fiestas, the odd 205 and Novas - and he had to park his Mk2 Escort around the corner to avoid getting RINSED by his mates.  
Nowadays, he'd be everyone's hero.
Same with Cortinas.  Our caretaker had a brace of MK5 Cortinas and by 1999 I remember marvelling at them in the school playground thinking 'Fucking hell they look shit nowadays'.  They were both 17 years old, my daily is now 25.  
Crazy how things change so quickly.
Anyway, enough bumbling of the insane - well bought @HMC

No, but as many non-native English speakers I guess my vocabulary was pretty much shaped by US pop culture from early on. I do try to adjust once in a while but I just don't agree with the UK spelling most of the time 😂
Some more bonus content. The Corona is still a lovely car to drive. It rides so well considering it's roots.

Should anybody be bored from looking at the Celsior by now, great news! The Alfa is back! It actually didn't go anywhere for months. 166 are anything but resistent to rot so it hasn't seen the road since October unfortunately. Which sucks as its so fun to drive!
First up was a wash, it turned a little greener than usual in the time it didn't move much:

Took a little while but much better. I just can't get enough of looking at this paint. The color absolutely makes it, I don't think I feel that way about any of my other cars, so well done Alfa.


I've also finally put the wheel arch liner back on the car, it's been off since probably a year ago when I replaced the alternator. I'm not sure if I showed this before but the wooden steering wheel, shifter and center console trim from @sdkrc's old 166 are now installed and really improve things inside.

People keep complaining about American manufacturers and fake wood but that center console trim is by far the least convincing faux wood I have ever seen in any car. Still better than boring matte silver with broken clips though.

I still need to find a replacement switchpack for the fuel door release that also has the sports throttle response button. Harder to find than I imagined. At least the cigarette lighter surround lights up now, its the little things etc. etc. Hopefully some more progress in the next few days.
And since I can't leave a recent post without a Celsior photo, have a size comparison between Toyota's second biggest and its smallest domestic luxury car offering back in 1992.

There's a bit of of fish eye lens distortion going on here but the difference isn't as big as you'd imagine. The Celsior would be 7 series-sized while the Corona Exiv is more of a 3 series, although officially based on something one size smaller (Celica).

Ordered a replacement gas pedal for the BMW for 18 quid. It's probably the throttle body that's the actual issue but its worth a shot.
In Celsior news, the car finally received fresh brake fluid, pads, hoses and wear sensors this weekend. I've also done a few other minor jobs while in there and unfortunately revealed a little more carelessness by the bodyshop. Let the wrenching commence!
Front brakes first. I actually didnt end up using the caliper piston rebuild kits on the left, the pistons were still sliding back in nice and smoothly.

Well, I think we can say I got my money's worth out of those pads. I don't know when these got changed the last time but it certainly been a while considering the car didn't do that many miles in the last 15 years.

The loose wire in the left photo is the wear indicator sensor btw, for some reason whoever replaced the pads didn't know how to or didn't bother installing it again. This is also what I originally expected to be a cut ABS sensor wire a few years back btw, the sensor plugs into the wiring loom of the ABS sensor, bit of an odd design on early Celsiors.

Can't say these are the worst pads I've seen but we haven't had a look at the rear ones yet.

Quick look underneath to see where the minor exhaust leak is coming from. Like the exhaust shop said, one of the exhaust temp sensors is blowing, they tried to goop it up but no luck. Unfortunately impossible to buy now, not sure if it could get welded? I've also had a look at the O2 sensors and tried to measure their resistance. Well, it seems like there is infinite resistance which of course isn't right, it should be somewhere between 5.1-6.3 ohms at around room temperature. I unplugged them to see if it would make any difference to the way the car runs. It doesn't so new sensors it is!

The 135 quid Maxpeedingrods which I only bought to get the car through the MOT are holding up surprisingly well. I've greased them up before installing them so everything is still moving nicely. Unfortunately I just remembered while writing this that I should have put some fresh grease on them... I also found the source for my very noticeable front suspension clunking. I originally blamed the coilovers but its actually the front swaybar bushes that are so worn out that the swaybar can freely move from left to right. So new swaybar bushes are added to the shopping list. I've also fixed the messed up passenger side bumper corner I accidently caught on a wall. No photos yet but some hot air, a tactical ziptie and reinstalling a bumper bracket did wonders.
The rear is next. Working on an incline lifting a rear weel driven car is always fun.

If you are wondering why Im using different brands for pads and hoses compared to the front, so do I. I think they just ended up reducing the combined shipping costs when I ordered them from Rockauto like 2 years ago. Motul RBF600 is probably some of the best brake fluid you can get if pedal feel matters to you.

Yeah, I think its about time to replace those pads...

The disc is getting very thin as well so rear discs are added to the shopping list...

Certainly cutting it thin with these. The rears actually had the wear sensors properly in place, replacing this one finally got rid of the last (permanent) dash warning light. Unfortunately the passenger side rear caliper piston was really struggling getting pushed back in so I might need a new caliper there. I'm not sure how much extra I paid for the Bosch pads compared to the Beck/Arnley ones but they were certainly much more neatly packed and actually came with a sachet of brake grease. I used copper grease on the sliders for the front calipers instead.
About the bodyshop's carelessness mentioned further above:

The rear trailing arm bolt is completely loose, the nut was never tightened after the sill got welded there. Mistakes can happen but I'm really starting to get the feeling that things were just slapped together in the end to rush the car out the door. Something like this is pretty dangerous. I had to replace the nut (with a Mercedes one no less) as it wouldn't properly tighten anymore, I'll have to have another look the next time its on a lift though.

While having the wheels off I finally had a chance to raise the rear coilovers by 20mm to level out the car a bit better. I don't think its perfect yet but lowering the front should result in a nicely balanced stance.

Let me know what you think! The rear discs, swaybar bushes and O2 sensors will hopefully be the last few bits to make it mechanically solid. Being 32 years old now it'll probably always need something but any MOT relevant work should near with these 3 things soon.
Some bonus content, the Cadillac is finally moving again and received a wash. That immediately revealed the various paint defects it has, the photos are hiding them remarkably well fortunately!

Another big blue landyacht that will receive some more attention this summer.

While I'm there, I might as well listed the rest ! 
Malaga models.
1.2 cc variants: L, LE, Touring, Special, XL, GLX. 
1.5 cc variants: GL,  Nov 86 Primero edition based on 1.5 GL, GLX. 
Also 1.7 Diesel, no spec given for 1990 only?
Ibiza models up to 1990.
900 cc variants: Disco 3dr, Comfort 5dr. Special, Designer.
1.2 cc: Junior 3dr, Crono, Designer, Special, LE 3dr, L, XL, XLS, XLS, GL 3dr, GLX. 
1.5 cc: Special, Crono 3dr, GL, GLX, GLX Injection 1990 5dr, SXI 3dr.
Special edition June 88: 1.2 Del Sol based on 1.2 GL 3dr.