New Ford shite for me! - Wheel arch repairs

[Spottedlaurel]

Hey, excellent news! With no internet at home I’ve been a bit out of touch on this, glad all worked out OK and I helped this move onto a good home. Even more so, I’m pleased it was as good as I thought and hasn’t caused any disappointment.

 

I would have liked it for myself for a brief while, but Mrs SL’s Primera failed its MoT and so we had to concentrate on either repairing or replacing that (we went for the latter, so anyone want to but a cheap 2.0 P11 estate for spares/repair?!) rather than add yet another car to the fleet. That being said, I have stumbled across another Camry on which I’m making inquiries...

 

Anyway, look forward to seeing the Escort again soon. Looks like it will be a while longer before I buy my first Ford.

[Guest Leonard Hatred]

What does the Primera need for its MOT?

[Spottedlaurel]

What does the Primera need for its MOT?

 

It failed on emissions, knackered CV joint and one tyre. A few advisories too, nothing horrendous, but we’ve decided to let it go. Emissions believed to be an O2 sensor, which probably caused the idling/stalling/intermittent engine light problems we’ve been suffering for a while. Tidy car, rather than derail Trigger’s thread I’ll pop an ad for it on here later.

 

Not so many concerns like this with the Escort of course.

[In The Pit]

Glad the Escort has found a good home, plenty of waxoil (fill the doors,bootlid etc) and it should give reliable service for years to come. The MKIVs are a nice drive, hard to believe they ceased production 21 years ago this year!

[In The Pit]

Looks like it will be a while longer before I buy my first Ford.

 

What Ford do you fancy then? I see you like Camrys so if luxury is your bag then the MKII Granada can still be found at a reasonable price at the moment, MKV Cortinas too although they do seem to be around £1500 for good ones now with top ones fetching over twice that.

[oldford]

I saw it today, what a proper genuine car it is. Given a good going over with the Waxoyl and sorting out the rear arch, there's no reason why you shouldn't get years of trouble free, cheap motoring out of it.

 

And for the doubters, I can categorically, definately, positively, without a doubt confirm that it is Blue.

[Spottedlaurel]

Looks like it will be a while longer before I buy my first Ford.

 

What Ford do you fancy then? I see you like Camrys so if luxury is your bag then the MKII Granada can still be found at a reasonable price at the moment, MKV Cortinas too although they do seem to be around £1500 for good ones now with top ones fetching over twice that.

 

I did see a 2.8GL Granada a year or two ago which I found very appealing, but I can’t see it doing much that my old Laurel doesn’t. If I buy a Ford it’ll be a randomly found, overlooked cheapie like this Escort.

[trigger]

I thought I'd update this thread with my current wheel arch repairs, I'll copy a paste a bit of it from the Autoshite 24 thread.

 

As you can see earlier on in the thread, My rear arches were a bit snotty and after my passenger footwell started to fill up when it rained and it seemed the battery tray was FUBARed as well i decided to bite the bullet and get it welded up, especially as the mot as due...

 

£200 lighter the car came back like this.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

All it failed on for the mot was a sticking rear brake which was a knackered wheel cylinder!, It had no advisories or anything!, So it's solid now and with a years ticket but it's needing a fair bit of tidying up...

[trigger]

After plenty of grinding, banging, sanding and swearing i was starting to get somewhere.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

What a mess!, Mind you it's starting to look more like the right shape now.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

This was the easy side, Looks a bit better now.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

I've sealed the welds in the battery tray with some Tiger seal which i then etch primed.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

Which after a bit of primer and paint came out looking pretty good.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

Yesterday i stonechipped the sills and primed the arches as well, then today i flatted down the primed arches with some 800 grit wet and dry and scotchied up the old paintwork so that the new paint would stick then rolled it into the garage and masked it up.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

Then I've attacked it with the paint, Firstly using a old can of Vauxhall pastel blue that i had left over from my BMW then 3 coats of Maritime blue that i bought from Halfords which seemed to cover pretty well.

 

I'm quite happy with the results considering how bad they were when i started.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

I've also had a go at fixing the split in the rear bumper, The old girl who owned it before me had backed into a wall so after knocking the worse of the dent out of the rear quarter corner i heated up the plastic bumper with a hair dryer and puller the plastic back into shape, then i drilled a few holes in the bumper and fitted cable ties, This is the Autoshite way of bumper repairs.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

Jobs left now are to underseal the new metal inside the arches and stonechip the arch, Fit the rear bumper back and give it a bloody good hoover and wash as well as T-cut and polished the new paintwork once it's dried.

[scruff]

What a great little motor, well done Trig

[Angrydicky]

There's at least one MK4 Escort in the local breakers Trig, do you want me to see if there's a decent rear bumper there?

 

Nice work by the way

[trigger]

Cheers, I have a few breakers around here that i haven't tried yet, I'm just bolting the bumper back on now as I need the car tomorrow for work and the bumper doesn't look to bad to be honest, Better then it did with the gaffer tape holding it together!.

 

Looking at those arches I think I've been a better job then I've given myself credit for, I'm pretty chuffed with them as it happens, I've bruised some sealer behind the arches so hopefully they shouldn't rust.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

[Mr_Bo11ox]

I can't see the pics, dont think thats your fault though triggr - I have never been able to see any pic that anyone has ever linked to off that 'tinypic' site on any computer I have tried! Does anyone else have any problems like that?

[Angrydicky]

Most are working for me, but none of the ones in Trigger's earlier post about the repairs straight from the bodyshop are currently showing, and two missing from the latest post. If I right click the little red cross and select "show picture" it usually works for me.

[Guest Leonard Hatred]

It's very rare that tinypics work for me either, but these do.

[Angrydicky]

Just refreshed the page and they're all working now

[retrogeezer]

Top work there Trig, those repairs look great! (thumbs up smiley)

[trigger]

When I've finished washing the car I'll uploaded them through my flickr if you want.

[RichL]

So glad to see this car has has gone to a good home. Great work there trig, it's a minter

[seth]

Neat work Trig

[Lord Sterling]

Nice work there Trig, gotta try something out like that someday for one of my Sterlings.

[trigger]

Thanks for the kind words guys, Hopefully the photos all work now as I've uploaded all my photos via Flickr.

 

1988 Ford Escort Mk IV wheel arch repairs by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

 

I have questioned if spending £200 on welding on an old Escort is worth it but the way I've looked at it is that I've got a car now which has a years mot and is very tidy and straight for only £500 all in and which has years more life left in it.

[warren t claim]

That looks lush! When you come to sell it....

[Spottedlaurel]

That's definitely the way to think of it. You could easily have bought one for £500 or more and it would still have needed the same work, and it'd be unlikely to have the good history of yours.

 

Saw an Orion locally with a dealer sticker from where yours was sold:

 

Dingle's Attleborough Motor Works Ford & Subaru dealer sticker by Spottedlaurel, on Flickr

[oldford]

I saw the paintwork that has been done on the Escort yesterady and it is a real proper quality job that has been done