cort16's Cortina Crap - Suspicious Sill

[cort16]

Cheers mr b. It's a year since the last mot ran out, it'd probably be another year if it was down to me doing the work.  Actually driving the old crocks reminds you why you actually bother you arse pissing around with them. I'll be living ford fanboys dream once I get these fishnets in it.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

The combo of paint colour, wheels and black trim on it really looks the tits.

 

These old shitters just hate sitting about don't they. If you get it on the road and start doing some reasonable miles in it a few times a week you'll soon have it in a reliable 'jump in and drive' condition. It looks like you dont have any mega problems to sort, rather you're on the point of just de-snagging and getting it 'comfortable' to use for whatever journey you might need to do.

[cort16]

You're right it doesn't really need anything now, what ever I do to it'll just be tinkering to make it a bit more drive able and comfy. It still runs a bit hot for some reason but doesn't seem to head into the red or anything. 

[fordperv]

Was it you who I'm thinking of that was asking about mk4 2 door, doors? I spotted these on ebay and I'm racking my brains who it was.

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Ford-Cortina-Mk4-Passenger-Door-Nos-For-2-Door-Model-Also-Will-Fit-A-Crayford-/261950317726?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&clk_rvr_id=863426693273&hash=item3cfd74a49e&rmvSB=true&ul_ref=http%253A%252F%252Frover.ebay.com%252Frover%252F1%252F710-53481-19255-0%252F1%253Fff3%253D4%2526pub%253D5574629005%2526toolid%253D10001%2526campid%253D5335900709%2526customid%253D%2526mpre%253Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.ebay.co.uk%252Fitm%252FFord-Cortina-Mk4-Passenger-Door-Nos-For-2-Door-Model-Also-Will-Fit-A-Crayford-%252F261950317726%253Fpt%253DLH_DefaultDomain_3%2526hash%253Ditem3cfd74a49e%2526srcrot%253D710-53481-19255-0%2526rvr_id%253D863426693273

 

 

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ford-cortina-mk4-drivers-door-for-2-door-model-from-a-crayford-/261950316280?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&clk_rvr_id=863456707697&hash=item3cfd749ef8&rmvSB=true&ul_ref=http%253A%252F%252Frover.ebay.com%252Frover%252F1%252F710-53481-19255-0%252F1%253Fff3%253D4%2526pub%253D5574629005%2526toolid%253D10001%2526campid%253D5335900709%2526customid%253D%2526mpre%253Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.ebay.co.uk%252Fitm%252Fford-cortina-mk4-drivers-door-for-2-door-model-from-a-crayford-%252F261950316280%253Fpt%253DLH_DefaultDomain_3%2526hash%253Ditem3cfd749ef8%2526srcrot%253D710-53481-19255-0%2526rvr_id%253D863456707697

[cort16]

It was. I'm too tight to buy new ones mind you.

Those must be as rare anything I don't think I've ever seen 2 dr mk4 doors up for sale before.

[fordperv]

Hens teeth definitely sprung to mind when I saw them

[cort16]

You're right it doesn't really need anything now, what ever I do to it'll just be tinkering to make it a bit more drive able and comfy. It still runs a bit hot for some reason but doesn't seem to head into the red or anything. 

 

 

So I took the carpets out to clean them and prepare for the fancy space age sound deadening I bought. I saw a hole, I dug deeper like an itchy scab I couldn't stop picking at.

 

After some time with a wire brush and a heat gun.

Rotina by cort16, on Flickr

 

After some time today with a wirebrush and a 1mm cutting disc.

 

Rotina by cort16, on Flickr

 

Not a world ending amount of welding for an old ford but getting all underseal gunk off the back of the panels is a right 'orrible job. It's either that or be paranoid your setting it on fire not helped by the fact the burning of it is making your IQ drop by 10 points for every 10 minutes you spend on it.

 

After this I need to get the new seats fitted as the current ones are chronic.

 

There'as also a shit load of surface rust. Anyone any recommendations for shit hot wire wheel as I'd like to tidy all this up and re-paint it. The boot is the same

[cort16]

I took the wing off to make it easier to weld up the floor. You shouldn't be able to get a screwdriver in there.

 

Oldcarcrap by cort16, on Flickr

 

I'm on holidays and after seeing the above I negotiated a day release to go and biff this with some hammers. 

 

Remember this just went through it's mot a couple of months ago. All I was trying to do was fit some new seats FFS.

 

Weld by cort16, on Flickr

 

I cleaned it up a bit and it isn't looking much better.

 

Weld by cort16, on Flickr

 

This bit has come pre-migged

 

Weld by cort16, on Flickr

 

I decided to ignore this until I could formulate a plan of rescue so started on the floors. I jacked it up so I could get it on a stand to clean the underseal off the backside of the gearbox tunnel. Fuck, what I'd forgot was i'd cut the guts out that crossmember so when I jacked it up the whole floor bent inwards as there as no support. Once I let it down I mashed the poop out it with a big hammer and bit of wood and it mostly went back into shape.

The chassis rail has squished quite badly at the front so once I'm done with all this I'm going to bend a bit of 2mm steel and plate the end of the rail so I've got something to jack on.

 

Weld by cort16, on Flickr

 

I'd say I'm 50% done but there are some tricky bits left to do.

 

Can't afford to buy an oldskool Ford? No problem buy in installments via post for 20p a week. Dustpan and brush required.

 

Weld by cort16, on Flickr

[cort16]

P.S The gold paint is weld through primer I'm not decorating it for Christmas.

[danthecapriman]

That rusty A post and door hinge area looks similar to the ones on Granada's. My mk2 was utterly rotten in the same place, both sides.

 

The outer wing covers most of it up though so unless you take that off it's hard to see just how bad it is. Mine was totally rotten from the bottom near the sill right up to the windscreen lower corner.

It was a bit of a twat to make a repair for. The worst bits were the recessed bits where the hinges bolt in, but I did mine from lots of small bits all welded together, it took ages to do it.

I flooded the whole are with cavity wax afterwards to stop it happening again!

[cort16]

Oof, nasty. Mine doesn't look quite as bad as that. There's a strengthening plate for the hinges behind the outer skin that has partially rotted out.

I'm not sure the best way to fix this and tie it back in. Hopefully I can do it without cutting out the bolt holes.

[danthecapriman]

From memory I chopped most of it away on mine and had to make new. It's a double skinned panel on the Granny, probably why it rots so badly. If yours is good enough hopefully you can keep most of the original 'important' bits, like the bolt areas. It'll certainly make things a lot easier!

I think the thicker bits behind the hinges are meant to be floating. They moved around a bit until the hinge bolts were tightened up fully for adjustment of the doors position. Of course the Cortina may well be different and have fixed hinge mounts.

 

Here's mine after it was all replaced, seam sealed and primed.

You can see the top two hinge holes are not aligned with the inner floating mounting plate where it's moved.

[cort16]

Yes so I'm a right lazy bastard. I did actually get a day on this about a month ago and did quite a lot of welding. Then did nothing for ages then went down last week and tried did a bit more but then ran out of wire.

I'm now re-filled and at the annoying stage of chasing around holes in 0.2mm steel.  I was quite interested to see that when I went to the Nissan factory the outer panels fitted to the car all 0.6m steel, which my shitey mig would blow through even at it's lowest setting. I'd better put the plans to fit forest arches to my Juke on hold.

 

Broken

 

Cort by cort16, on Flickr

 

Self assembly

 

Cort by cort16, on Flickr

 

Weld

Cort by cort16, on Flickr

 

Mandatory old Ford Rust pile

 

Cort by cort16, on Flickr

 

 

I recon I'm still a couple of days of solid work away from getting it back together. When I do it's getting sold to fuck I'm totally pissed off with it. It's horrible to drive compared to the P6. It's got all new bushes, spring, track rod ends on it so it probably drives better than new but it's still pretty horrible. 

[trigger]

That's the spirit! Is it fully polybushed? My mate done his Mk4 and said it drives like shit now.

[cort16]

Yes it's all polybushed now. I've also put -1 springs on it all around. It drives better than it did but it's still quite horrible. I think the fact all the sound proofing is out of it makes it worse. I've got fancy new stuff to go in it once all the welding is done. 

[cort16]

Other than being one bit of metal again I recon this car needs the following to make it okay. 

 

new seats (I have fishnet recaros for it)

a short shift kit and cut down gear stick (the gear stick hits off the handbrake

capri vented discs

electronic ignition

electric fuel pump

a working rev counter

a working speedo

a diff that isn't from a 1.3

a heater

a stereo

 

I just can't be bothered to all this stuff right now. The rover kind of works and is generally more pleasurable thing to bumble about it when it's not over heating so I'm going to finish this then concentrate my efforts on getting that tidied up a bit. I'm also on the look for a ZT260 but nothing has come up.

I'm currently mulling over buying a Citroen C6 but the 500 quid a year car tax is making my eyes water a bit for a 3 or 4th car. Plus it's a diesel auto french car the words that should strike fear into anyones heart but I really fancy one and wonder if I'd regret the chance given how much I wanted then enjoyed having the Avantime. Third world problems people.

[cort16]

Hello. I've spent 1/2 of today  attempting to weld up the a-piller on this crust cortina. I made a bit of progress but eventually lost the battle due to a failing mig welder then finally running out of gas.

I've decided for my sanity to start looking for a 2nd hand mig. I spent 40% of my time taking various bits of it apart before I could do any welding.

The main problem seems to be the thing doesn't want to pull through the mig wire as it's not sitting the indent in the pulley wheel properly. The issue is every time I do something to alter the setup I need to dismantle the torch as the wire won't make it's own way up through the swan neck without manual intervention. This mig really has been shite.

 

Anyway it's getting closer although I'll have to  address the welder issue before I can do anything further. it'll probably need another mot on it by time I've finished. Ho hum.

 

image by cort16, on Flickr

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Unreliable migs SUCK ASS 24/7

[Taff]

Yes it's all polybushed now. I've also put -1 springs on it all around. It drives better than it did but it's still quite horrible. I think the fact all the sound proofing is out of it makes it worse. I've got fancy new stuff to go in it once all the welding is done. 

 

Decent soundproofing can make or break a car, I reckon. I loved my old '49 Chevy to bits but I hated driving it for the year with a totally gutted interior. I always felt it was as close as I would ever get to being in a Lancaster bomber, a constant drone in the middle ear and every single bang and crash on the tarmac amplified to the extreme.

 

It looks a cracking car mate, get it soundproofed and then decide on it's future, would be my advice.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

Unreliable migs SUCK ASS 24/7

 

 

they BLOW COX 2 m8

[cort16]

I was fuming at it. I considered pissing on it but didn't want 20,000 gigawats delivered straight up my bell end so just booted it .

The place I go to get my wire and welding bits and bobs have some red-hot-xxx top shelf mig welders for sale but they start at 500 quid  + vat. I'm always tempted just to melt my credit card and get one just to have the satisfaction of welding up something and not having to stop every 10 minutes to fuck around with it.

 

The cortina is definitely going but it's no where near being in a state I could sell it. I.e. on of the doors isn't attached. I bought some horrible cheap ass car cover off ebay for £9.83 (in delivery) to try to keep it a bit drier in my non heated,non water right garage but it's bubbling here and there. .

[BavarianRetro]

We've a "spare" Miller Migmatic here you can borrow for a few days. It's not spare as such, but we can get by without it for a wee while. It'll easily go in the boot of just about anything and there's a full spool of new wire and a new bottle of gas on it.

[cort16]

Thanks! That's a kind offer. I really need to get a permanent solution as my fleet of crocks are always needing something welded on them.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

I was fuming at it. I considered pissing on it but didn't want 20,000 gigawats delivered straight up my bell end 

 

 

You haven't lived!

[Eddie Honda]

The place I go to get my wire and welding bits and bobs have some red-hot-xxx top shelf mig welders for sale but they start at 500 quid  + vat. I'm always tempted just to melt my credit card and get one just to have the satisfaction of welding up something and not having to stop every 10 minutes to fuck around with it.

 

^^^^ Here's a man who needs a Portamig. Just melt that flexible friend and do it.

[BavarianRetro]

Thanks! That's a kind offer. I really need to get a permanent solution as my fleet of crocks are always needing something welded on them.

The offer is there - even if it just lets you see the difference between entry level and Miller entry level.

 

I guarantee that you'll be amazed at what a skilled welder you actually are using a decent box/gas/helmet combo over SIP/pub gas/disposables and an Ebay £30 helmet.

[sheffcortinacentre]

if you can't afford new look for a good used professional one.

 

I won't bother with the hobby type stuff been driven nuts by them to many times, if a a decent used professional one can put up with a few years of daily use then occasional use should see you out.

[cort16]

My previous mig was an ex pro one but tbh I didn't really know what I was doing and interpreted it as it wasn't working properly. I could have spent 100 quid on a new torch for it and it would probably have been fine. It was a big fucker to have in a wee work space though. 

The one thing I will say is I replaced the old metal liner about a year ago with a plastic one all be it a sealey plastic one. I wonder if it's worth trying to stick another metal liner in it before I set it on fire?

 

Also the MOT on rover ran out last week. Only just noticed today. I might just hang off and lob it in after Christmas now.

[BavarianRetro]

A new liner isn't expensive and will never do any harm, but even a plastic one should last more than a year with low use, but while adjusting the tension, a new liner, tip, shroud and good branded wire are all good starting points, the cheap welders are what they are and the wire feed motor and components are often simpy not up to the job of delivering consistent performance.

 

If you're using disposable bottles too, you're making things very difficult for yourself.

[cort16]

I've got a proper 9l bottle with regulator I get from hobbyweld I think I had a leak in the system somewhere.