2redrovers

Yeah I hear you. 
I spoke with Mark today when I realised the issue, and he was great with information. and very sympathetic to my problem. 
 
Its been a crazy ride so far. I had a self imposed finish date, basically 12 months since the accident, so December this year, to have it finished. And it is still possible. but there is every chance it will blow out passed that, and thats ok. 
 
Yeah the 13s do fit. Minimum wheel size is 13" 
 
 
 
Yep thats cars. 
And Fords ridiculous engineering. where they change hub, strut, stub axle, across different models, hence forth why im in this predicament. 
 
Its getting to the fiddly and annoying parts, the stressful parts, and I know that it will all pay off the day that I turn the key, and drive it down the street for the first time.  
 

All done and for sale $3990

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ah yes BUT! 
i've seen many examples where "do it once, do it right" doesn't work , even project binky had to cut up a perfectly sculpted front suspension area and the floor a few times and they planned, planned again and still changed stuff. 
i could rattle off several from this forum that have had to redo on bad or new info or just didn't know until hindsight kicked in. 
 
so don't be hard on yourself, just do what's best to continue forward as usual. (you are doing very well already in these trying times keeping it progressing)
 
another question on the big brakes.. did they still fit in the 13" rims? i can't remember if you checked earlier. 

Bloody cars hey 
 
*rant warning* 
 
This post doesn't start with a rant straight away. 
So yesterday, I had enough, I was a bit naughty, I went and visited Mark and the car, and grabbed my front struts to bring them home and clean up, and fit my new brakes. 
All was going well today, until it was not
 
Firstly, I pressed the spherical bearings out of my strut tops, because they were worn and had a bit of slop, time to replace. I called the local bearing wholesaler, and perfect timing they were just placing an order, so I had them by lunch time...only I didn't. They did get 2 x 20mm spherical bearings, but they didn't get the right ones. So the fella was going to investigate more and get back to me. 
 
This one originally being from Germany, it isn't a common type, in the sense it is a very high rated bearing. 240kn load rating. apparently that is the hard bit. 
 

 
So I currently don't have useable strut tops until they are sorted. 
In the meantime, I gave the strut tops a nice polish up. Definitely no pro job, but I am happy with the results. *they speak for themselves * 
 

 

 
Once I had done that, I started playing with the new brakes, getting them fitted. this is when my day turned to crap
 
So they are big. I dont think I fully comprehend how big they are over the stock brakes...
 

 

 

 

 
And here comes the rant. 
I bought these, after being told by, 2 guys who are very well known in the small Ford community here in Melbourne, and abroad, 1 of which owns and runs arguably the biggest parts supplier for English small Fords, in Australia, that this brake upgrade kit would fit standard Escort struts. I questioned it, and they both said yep they see no reason why not. Now, I have been dealing with these guys, and will recommend them to anyone. 
But I went and spent a good amount of money, on this brake kit, admittedly from a different supplier, also very reputable, for cost reasons, to find out today, first hand, the (bad) intel I was given by two guys who should know better than anyone else, was completely wrong. 
What does this mean? 
I NOW HAVE TO SPEND ALMOST AN EXTRA $1000 TO UPGRADE MY STRUTS! 
 
Ok, yes, the obvious fix for this is not use the brakes, send them back, keep the stock brakes. But I am not comfortable with that. The original discs, are below minimum thickness, they were not fantastic with the 1300 in there. they certainly are not going to be confident inspiring with a warm, heavier, 1600 in there, with near double the power. 
Can i replace the original discs? Yes I can. For some STUPID reason, these little, solid rotors, are crazy expensive to buy. like more than 1/3 of this brake upgrade kit, just for 2 solid discs. 
 
And for the benefits of these brakes, it was money well spent, but on TERRIBLE BLOODY INTEL 🤬
 
So you can hopefully understand I am dam furious. 
Because to setup a set of struts to suit the brakes, I have purchase the following;
- 2L struts including hubs
- new inserts. Ill go with Gaz adjustable again to match what ive been running in the 1300 struts. no they are not interchangeable
- bearings
- tie rod ends to suit the metric taper of the 2L struts
- paint to make clean them up
 
So I am angry, and I am still coming to grips with it. Progress had stopped due to lockdown, now it has stopped because I haven't got a functioning front suspension to get the car rolling and out of Mark's shop. 

Damn, hate it when that happens. guess you don't want to refit the old stuff back in until the new stuff arrives, risk of scratches and extra work. 
 
what WOULD you have done if you didn't buy the big brakes if you were told they won't work? bought new stock discs only?

two very good points. 
 
1st point. Yes I definitely could put the original stuff in to get the car rolling. I would not hook the brakes up, because i have to custom make the hard brake line on the strut anyway for the metric calliper fitting. But i could get it rolling yes
 
2nd point. 
 
Thats a very good question. What would have I done, if? 
 
I would probably have kept the original equipment for now. I would have kicked myself for not working it out earlier. 
Id have just done it in stages. got the struts sorts, then the brakes. 
 
In saying that, id not want to do it twice. 
The car is being built, ground up built, so what is the point in doing things twice? do it once, do it right. 
 
I do have to laugh as i say that...because the rear end will still be stock standard, and in due time, it will, get an upgraded "english" axle (Australian Mk2 Escort diff). This is because they are basically a smaller version of the Ford 9", and ratios and LSD centres are readily available. 
 
 

Ahh Aaron thats cars for you Mate.
 
I bought a lovelly 345 diff for the falcon only to realise the fantastically polished PROstars i love so dearly dont clear the calipers. Nek Minit had to drop $1800 on new 15" wheels to clear the calipers.
 
Then i decided they dont suit the car as much as i hoped and colour coding the bumpers was important, however, i didnt want to paint the originals so i sourced more.
 
And so on and so on.
 
Dont lose heart bud its how our cars evolve!

So with us being in hard lockdown yet again, nothing much has been happening to the Escort. 
 
Ive been finding little things I can do from home on it. 
 
I pulled down my tail lights and cleaned them thoroughly, including polishing the cast alloy housings to (hopefully) make the light dispersion a bit brighter. 
 
Left (brake) has been done, right hasn't. can see a bit of a difference there. 
 
  
 
I also cleaned up the backs of the housings, so when I open the boot, Ill see nice shiny polished light housings
 

 
I then attacked the chrome rings. I carefully wet sanded these with 600 and 1200 grit paper, then polished them with Bowden's Own metal polish. 
You can see the sanding marks a little bit, but they aren't bad and in the direct sun you can't see the sanding marks. 
 

 
The reason I did this is shown in the below pic.
The bottom tail light was before, I did the polishing. Notice the dirt stained into the chrome along the bottom edge of the light? 
Now look at the above tail light, and that is the one I sanded and polished. I tried a few methods, but wet sanding was the only way to remove the crap stained into the chrome 
 

 
Today my big brake kit arrived. 
These are a reproduction "M16" calliper. M for metric. These were fitted standard to Mk2 Escorts. They are basically the same as my P16 callipers on my Mk1, but with a few upgrades. The pistons are marginally bigger, and the piston seals are a much better design. 
The major difference with these ones are, they are manufactured wider than standard M16s, to take vented discs.  
M16s are a split calliper, and normally to run vented discs, you can buy spacer kit that goes between the two halves of the calliper, which widen it and allow a wider disc to go in. These, are built wider ready to go for vented disc. 
 
They are a bolt in kit, other than 2 things that need to change. 
Firstly, the hard brake line that goes to these need to be custom made with an imperial fitting on the car end, and a Metric on the calliper end. 
Secondly, my two piece hubs, the wheel mounting flange needs a chamfer machined into the inside of it to clear the callipers. this is only because im running standard 1300 hubs. If i was running Mk2 or 2L hubs i wouldn't have to do it.  
 

 
I decided to go for the optional, matched pair slotted discs. This kit should well and truely stop the car  
 

 

 
This is from a fellow RSOCV member's Mk1 just to show what the brakes will look like when installed. **i dont have coil overs** 
 

 
Because I can't go work on the car, I am basically getting everything ready to go for the day I can go back to the shop and continue on the car. 
So this includes new hard brake and fuel lines. While we have the use the of the hoist in Mark's shop, I will replace the brake lines. Bundy tube is cheap. I bought 6m for $45. that will be enough to do the entire car. 
Ive got all the new door seals sitting waiting to be installed when I can go over, boot seal, everything I need to nearly complete the car on the outside and get it rolling again. 
 
Im also getting the ball rolling on the last of the "big ticket" items, like my seats. they are the last big expensive item that I need to spend money on. 
 
I found this photo online. this is the exact scheme im going for on my Recaro seats. Saddle vinyl trim on the outsides, and Sahara tweed in the middle 
 

 

I know of at least one in the future. 
just not sure when. Its for a Zetec conversion into a Mk1. But its a fair way off. 

sure is. 
 
Yeah i think ill make a few mistakes initially, but the gears are very defined, and the gates are very precise. so hopefully wont take long to get used to 

I got the gearbox back together today. It shifts really nicely now. much better than it did previously. 
 
 
 
And bolted it back up to the engine. 
Aligning the gearbox on my own is a bit of a challenge, so sling and engine crane to the rescue. 
 

Pre crossflow use the same cam bearings as xflow, its an extra hole for the pre xflow to oil the rockers as they have an extra oil gallery to supply oil to the head and rocker shaft, that gallery gets supplied from the top of the cam journals, whereas xflow use the lifters and pushrods to supply the rockers with oil, its no real biggie just interchangeable bearings
 
 

Small update. 
 
at this stage, I will be reinstalling the running gear and subframe next Sunday. 
the hoist is clear and given the green light to go install it all. 
 
I also spoke to someone who works with these small Fords and owns a number of them, Tim from Angry Anglia, and he was saying he runs the same cam I have fitted in a number of his cars, and its a really good low/mid range cam. Lots of low down torque, and gets moving really well through the mid range. So im happy with that.
 
ive put in my order for the rest of the parts i need to finish the car, including my brake upgrade For the front   

possibly. 
I had the vac advance disconnected because I remember from on the 1300 the vacuum advance was faulty, so was running just mechanical vacuum. 
 
i had the base timing set at around 11 degrees BTDC. I think 12-14 is probably about where it needs to be. but the timing scale stops at 12 BTDC lol 
 
Once the engine is in the car and I have it running, I'll hopefully have had the dizzy fixed and graphed to suit the cam, and timing will be better. 

Video time  
 
Apologies for the crappy footage. I was too lazy to set up the good camera, and it turns out the battery moved and was vibrating against the bench I had my phone sitting on 😕 
 
Watch for the old fella zapping himself at the start I had him jumping it for me while I was on the throttle 🤣
 
 

Rev range is 1250rpm - 6000rpm. Designed to give instant torque down low and to be run with a twin choke weber. 
Id be happy with 65rwkw. 

Cool! 
what's the rev range/limit of the cam? 65kw at the wheels at 6000rpm for My guess

Good stuff

Good stuff

IT RUNS!!! 
Yep, it runs, and runs quite well. 
I didn’t film the first fire, but the second time we fired it up I did film. 
Ill post the video up later. 

I had to reset the exhaust valve clearances, which quietened down the top end a bit. 
 
But it runs like a dream. Its going to be a savage little engine i think. I haven’t done a comp test, im going to wait until its in the car and ive run it properly. 
In hindsight, I should have gone a slightly bigger cam. But i am looking forward to going for a first drive. Im expecting it should make around 70-80kw at the crank. Most likely ill put it on the dyno once its up and running to get a proper tune. So ill take your bets when its ready for the dyno 

Tomorrow is the day. 
I will have the engine up and running. 
 
Today, I got it all ready to run. Filled it with oil, set the base timing, and had it turning over on the starter. 
Ive also wired up my VDO oil pressure gauge for when we get it running so i can keep an eye on that. 
At this stage I haven't seen the oil pressure register on the gauge, but there appears to be oil pumping around. 
When we first cranked it, it was very slow, then after a couple seconds it took off, im assuming as oil started pumping around the engine. 
 
Before calling it a day in the shed, I stuck the plugs back in, and had a crack and cranking it over...it was very slow. Battery is in good health, so im going to take a stab and say this engine has a fair whack of compression. 
 

 
Suddenly this little engine seems to be very busy with pipes lol. ive decided not to hook up the radiator, but I am going to fill the block with water so I can at least run it for a short period. hence the radiator hoses pointing upwards. And hence why the heater hoses are linked together etc. 
 

Good to hear

Put your straight edge on the end of the case, use a ruler or a straight length of wire/rod and measure the depth of the inside of case to the spot next to the pin. Line up the ruler/wire on the outside of the case perpendicular to the straight edge. Hey presto.. You now know how thick the casting is in that spot.

BTW the weld is the same consistency as the the cast give or take a little difference in density. Physically drilling it won't be difficult, finding the right spot would take an educated guess. I'd probably go just behind the round bump in the casting support and 3-4mm up from the fin surface. That should find the void, go slow and you should feel the bit fall in to it. Poke a wire in the hole to find the end of the pin and that will give you the measurements of the pin when you add the thickness of the case plus the visible length.

From the side, I'd probably aim for where the back of the pin used to be.

Reference photos of the other box