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I did just that – except I reversed the deeds. I worked my way up through about 12 cars to a 1972 Stag. Had that for a short while and loved it. Then I met the wife and when we decided to move in together and buy a house, the Stag was sold to pay for the legal costs and we each sold our rent books back to our respective landlords to get the deposit together.
It seems strange nowadays, but we went into the Yorkshire BS with £25, opened an account and asked them for a £27000 mortgage!!
We then got a “practical for the baby” 2 litre MkV Cortina Estate. What a piece of crap that was – the wife hated it. Every time we went out in it, it needed something repaired before the next journey. Steering bushes, brakes sorted, exhaust boxes, alternator, clutch – and that’s the bigger things I can still remember!! Traded that for a new 1.3l Nissan Cherry hatchback – great little car, had that for three years before upgrading to the 2l Bluebird.
JCD, my grandfather also had a Cherry and then a Bluebird. When the cancer made it impossible for him to drive my mother had it. As you said, great, reliable cars.
Being 6′ I got the 3-door version of the Cherry and in spite of the problems loading a baby and carry cot into the back seat, the bigger doors and extra legroom made all the difference. It packed a lot into a small car.
That was the time that the Japanese started doing to the UK car industry the same as they did to the bike industry the previous decade – and they did it well.
The rear seat on the bluebird, along with the belmont, is nrobaly the most comfy rear seats ever. Baring RR etc..
JayCee, did your Stag have the original Triumph V8, or a Ford V6 replacement? Those cars were one of the many Classics that I rebuilt, maintained and serviced. A customer asked me to fit a Ford V6, which is a relatively painless exercise, but I refused on the grounds that I could either find him a good Triumph V8, or rebuild his own engine. I saw “bread & butter” everyday cars as open to all kinds of transplants, but our name as a Classic builder & restorer, depended on each model being correct. Eventually he had a back street cowboy fit a Ford lump. Two years later he was back, Stag on a low loader and his original TR V8 with it. I rebuilt the engine, chassis, suspension & steering: bodywork lads rebuilt the rest. It was gorgeous and AFAIK he still has it. Some Classic owners look after their cars, some just learn what happens when you don’t.
Ford Cortinas: I have had several over the years of all models, but always bought one that I could check on a ramp with the owner present. This led to longer and longer faces when I reeled off faults and began downsizing the asking price. Mostly they drove away, but I did pick up some bargains that I rebuilt for myself, drove, enjoyed and sold on for a nice profit. Pound for pound, the best one I think was a 2.0 Ltr. saloon Ghia 4 door in metallic light blue. Looked a real shed when I bought it for £200 in around 1990, I spent weekends and evenings rebuilding that car, as I did with many others over the years. I wanted to bump the motorway travel economy and worked out that a 2.0 ltr. estate had a higher-ratio differential. Lo, there was a Salvage estate in our compound! Transplant followed after replacing all bushes, seals etc. Cruising was magic on the faster roads and economy tested out better. I put in a twin choke Solex like the one below. (Webers at the time were more expensive)
It went like the proverbial effluent from a garden implement, but accelerated steadily to the local limit, returned 32 mpg+. Heavy acceleration was ‘exciting’ but knocked the economy. As usual, after a year or so, someone local offered me good money and I moved on.
First Japanese car I had was a Datsun 120Y 3 door. Bag of nails. First Hyundai I ever saw in the workshop, was a Stellar at its first MOT. It was all Cortina MK4* underneath and it failed on all the same bushes, lol. Engine I believe, was Mitsubishi or Mazda, can’t remember which. Fast forward to 2017 and 2018: I had a Tucson and then an i20X. Swapped the Tucson to the i20X because we each had ops and could no longer get in or out of it, but the Tucson was one of the most comfortable cars I ever drove.
*There never was a “Mk.5” Cortina. The last model was a “Mk.4 Facelift”. differences were slight but the biggest tell is the roof, which has a higher line above the windows in the Facelift.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Hyundai have come along way in a short time. The Chinese are not far behind. 10 years ago they was making pure shite. Today’s chineese knock off are really good. It’s only a matter of time before they become the next japan. Good cars that work (all have that nailed down today, you can’t really buy a bad one, unless unlucky) but the Chinese will be building and selling at 2/3s the price in 5 or 10 years time.
JayCee, did your Stag have the original Triumph V8, or a Ford V6 replacement?
Yes, it did. The guy in the garage behind my old flat bought it in with overheating problems ( the usual ).
His solution was to buy a written off ( rear end smash ) Stag and utilise it for the best parts out of the two. The engine was stripped, crankshaft re-ground, new big ends and con-rods, over-bored and new pistons, both heads sent off to be skimmed and ported, the auto box from the wreck was ignored and the manual box ( with electric overdrive ) was rebuilt. Carbs were re-built, alternator upgraded, stainless steel custom exhaust manifolds and the pipes and boxes ( from a Corvette Stingray iirc ) gave two separate pipes out the back. It was a beauty. He used it to go on a caravan touring holiday to Lake Geneva and it never missed a beat, so when he was bored with it and itching to go onto a new project ( RS2000 ) I bought it off him. He never did finish that RS project, but he used the engine, connected to a Z-drive, in his speedboat when he went water-skiing. God, that thing shifted. I didn’t ski, so got co-opted into driving the boat – real hardship that was!!
The funny thing is the other Stag engine conversion that people did, with a Rover 3.5 V8 actually improved the Stag’s handling, because the lighter ( ally ) engine gave a better overall balance than the nose heavy original.
*There never was a “Mk.5” Cortina. The last model was a “Mk.4 Facelift”. differences were slight but the biggest tell is the roof, which has a higher line above the windows in the Facelift.
It’s what we knew it as. It was a 2.0l OHC Ghia Estate. It was a bit of a hybrid and may have had the 5-stud wheels from the Granada I’m not sure now. It had the inevitable vinyl roof ( brown ) and was beige.
They did the same in 1972 with the Capris, I had a V4 2litre before they face-lifted them with new headlights, bigger rear light cluster and changed the suspension.
That one provided one of my scarier motoring moments – on the M4 headed to Wales for Christmas, the bonnet latch gave up the ghost and the wind caught the bonnet and blew it back, hitting but not breaking, the windscreen and bending the top section over the roof. Luckily I was in my normal outside lane but doing seventy-ish. I ignored instinct and looked out of the drivers window at the central reservation armco barrier and just hit the brakes, trying, successfully, to keep the same distance from it., thereby keeping in the same lane. I finished that journey ( slowly ) with two luggage straps attached across each wheel arch holding the bonnet down.
John, That last story reminds me of the first car I had at (almost)17. A Ford V8 Pilot, sourced from a scrapyard “Spares & Repairs” or whatever we called it in ’62. Gull-wing bonnet, driving along with a young lady I wished to impress, when the bonnet that I had failed to repair properly, flew off. I was caught up by a terrified, angry driver at the next cafe, demanding to know why I had almost decapitated his entire family and producing the remains of my bonnet from the boot of his car. Humble apologies, quick exit, end of potential romance. Got a few quid from another scrapyard for it. (the car, not the young lady)???
I had a mate who built a Granada/Cortina ‘hybrid’. Granada 2.3 V6, suspension and steering, Cortina Ghia body. It looked like a high-riding Cortina but drove well, no body roll. Lots of mech’s and small garage owners in my area at that time, building “specials”, we were a ‘Clique’ meeting at weekends in certain pubs and places. we are all oldpharts now, still mostly in touch, although I would need a Séance to speak to some of the old crew! We used to bounce ideas and solutions off each other.
I have mentioned before that I had several Capri’s, but never one with a V4. Several Transits had that lump, it had a lower Compression ratio and the only one I ever drove was a part-ex we took. It pulled up 2 of the local steep hills out of the village, like a train, but refused more than a noisy 60mph on the flat. The 2 Capri’s I owned which impressed me most, were the 3.1 RS LHD in Germany and the Mk.1 1600 GTXLR:
No black bonnet, the previous owner had it repainted all yellow. He also had the engine blue printed ( I received all documentation with the car) and had a Plymouth Cricket 5 speed box fitted, from a Texas supplier. that was also blueprinted. Beefed suspension, twin choke Weber carb, high lift cam’s, etc, etc. Unfortunately he had it Cadulac rust proofed, company later put out of business as it cracked, allowed water in and rotted the chassis. I broke the car behind the garage and made much more than I paid for it.
But that car was very quick and I loved it. A good MK1 GTXLR is a collector’s item today, much sought after, especially in Germany. Ain’t it beautiful? – Oh well, it’s in the eye of the beholder!
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.One of my Escorts started off as an 1100 – I wanted a quick performance upgrade, so we put a MkII Cortina 1600GT into it. It needed nothing special to connect the engine and gearbox as the bolt holes all lined up and just fitted. The only problem we had was the placing of the chassis cross member under the sump. One had it to the front of the engine bay and the other had it to the rear. We got inspired and reversed the sump pan – oil seals front and back were the same size luckily. All we then had to do was a bit of plumbing on the scavenger pipe to extend it into the relocated deep part of the pan.
I used to get wheelspins moving off in first gear, first to second and second to third ( courtesy of the ratios in the 1100 gearbox and the 12″ Escort wheels instead of the 13″ Cortina wheels ). We put ‘Mexico’ wheel arches onto the wings for when we tried to put 13″ wheels onto it, but it needed low profile tyres to avoid rubbing the wing so we reverted to wide 12″ wheels as those tyres were a more sensible price!! That car was painted metallic electric blue with the centre door section painted silver and extended onto the front and rear wings – basically a 12″ silver stripe down each side of the car.
We copied that pattern on the Stag, but the main body was in Metallic Ruby with the same pearlescent silver 12″stripes. On that one we tapered the silver stripe down towards the back and continued it across the back panel that held the lights.
Edit – got carried away in my own story there – yes, Bob, that Capri looks the business. I loved the lines, but then I also loved the lines of the Mustang it was copied off. Ditto the Datsun 240Z/260Z – although that one looked like it had a bit of E-type heritage in it for good measure. My Capri was just plain white with a black vinyl roof. That crease down the side and the power bulge in the bonnet just lent itself to interesting colour combinations and demarkations.
First garage I worked at for almost 5 years of hell under an ex-German/Romanian POW, who had a Rich Kid son. Tried him in the garage, useless and we hated working with him. Dad got him a job at a local big print business, bought him a silver 1600 GT Capri. He saw an ad for exhaust side pipes and dad made me fit them: I told him that it need sidesteps, or precious son would burn his ankles and I was proved right. I had to remove the pipes to fit the steps and recommended some slotted covers around the pipes for further protection. By that point I wanted to spend as much as I could on this car, so I also talked son into rear suspension Jacks, hoping that the lack of control would send the immature a-hole into the weeds. Or a wall. He saw the garage staff as answering to him at any time and I had a running battle with him. He actually kept myself and the foreman late on Chrimbo Eve, by going for parts at 12:00 and returning (drunk) at 4:30. I jumped from the ramped car I was working on and would have killed him if the foreman had not stopped me.
Eventually he did drive into a nice big, wide, deep ditch, which brought a smile to my face. Completely wrecked the car as there was huge old Oak at the side, which deflected the Capri into the deepest part, after demolishing the front end. The only disappointment was that the son received just a cut head. The tree is still there, only slightly damaged. He wrecked 3 more cars to my knowledge after I had left the year following the Great Capri Disaster. Eventually the Print company sacked him for being drunk at work and “bothering” female staff. His dad learned a lesson which did not become obvious until dad died and the Will was read: business, all money left to his daughter and husband, house to his widow with instruction that she leave it to the daughter and SIL, excluding the son. The daughter had the balls and intelligence that the son lacked. She and her OH built up the business and now own two more garages. The OH, a nice guy, owns, manages and trains a local town football team which is small-time successful, in the FA cup every year and once won the FA Vase. I went to Wembley for that, was pleased to see half of the County there. Only time I went to Wembley outside of Forest or England games, but saw Forest win more times than England, lol.
Escorts I drove and saw a lot of, but never owned one, preferred Capris, Cortinas and Granadas. My nephew, who lived next door to the Romanian Barsteward and annoyed him at every opportunity, had a 1.4 model which had Sodium filled valves to help with MPG. All this achieved was cooling the air/fuel mix and gobbing up the crankcase breather pipes, with consequent effects upon engine breathing and power: engine almost seized eventually. I cleaned them out, dropped the sump, cleaned out the blocked scavenger filter and pipes, flushed out, ran engine and refilled the (thicker viscosity) engine oil with new oil filter, then new (correct viscosity) oil and filter in another 500 miles to counteract the flushing crap, which I normally hated, as it removes the “varnish” on components and when restarted, the engine is without lubrication until oil gets around. Eventually I dropped a 1.6 lump into it, then he resold it. It was his wife’s car and I found her the Drophead TR7 she had always wanted. I found her a good later, Solihull bonnet-badged car, as these are so much better than the Liverpool factory ones. It was an auto as she only had an Auto licence, and was quite knocked about by a wealthy, uncaring family, so I manged a great price after road test, muttering and shaking my head a lot. I stripped and rebuilt the engine, steering and suspension, the bodyshop carried out a bare metal respray in Champagne. My nephew having made a heck of a lot of money from an enhanced British Coal payout, he bough the local pub and paid for all this work without a qualm.
3 years later, after my nephews’ death from cancer, his widow sold car and pub, retired to become a wealthy lady in a big house. She is a lovely person and keeps in touch, as do my nephew’s stepsons, so I have no reservations there. She says that she would swap house and money for more years with Alan.
RIP Alan, nephew, little brother, best mate. 7 years younger than me, now many more.
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.Today I checked the fluids in my little Swift and then took her on a nice sedate B road blast, it was very wet and the puddles can be 6″ deep in the lanes.
One corner is about 70 degrees, totally blind. As usual I slowed to about 10 MPH, leaned on the horn and flashed my lights as I crawled around. I was met by a Hummer H1. It looked like someone had put my house in the lane. A Range Rover is tiny compared to one, my car looked like a Dinky toy next to a Tonka Truck.
Only option was to reverse, about 15 cars behind the Hummer. There’s a cattery/ kennel about a 1/2 mile back so I aimed for that little drive way, otherwise it’d be about 3 miles of reversing. No passing point big enough for that monster and my car.
There’s another blind corner before the cattery/ kennel, maybe another 1/2 mile back so I ‘advised’ the passenger of the H1 to move down towards that way carefully, shouting and waving bright things. It’s a national speed limit area.
In the end I made it to kennel/ cattery, turned back the way I’d come and parked across the access road to the lane, which is opposite a school. OFC I was abused a lot, and I was on the phone to the Police at the time, via Android Auto.
Not a good afternoon.
If your b roads are a thing like mine (mostly one lane, with cut outs every 500 metres, that give you room just, for two average cars. Why would he think such a car is a goer.
Mine is a wide car ad it is, last year one of those silly and dangerous posh pickups. Like a nivara. Met me in the lane, I reversed to the next lay bay, and he still scrapped my rear wheal arch (it is flared), good job we had a witnesses, to say I was perfectly still. The truck driver claimed I was moving too. It got fixed within in a few days. And I got a brand new astra 5 door out of it. I was super underwhelmed with it. Looks way better inside, but drive poorly, and is very cheap feeling. And it had the same electronic bugs my 65 plate old platform car has.
We had too much water on our local b roads to go that way today. Stick to the longer main road tourist roads. Though seasons over and weather’s horific so roads was empty.
Steve, this road is exactly like you describe.
They claimed they were sent that way by the satnav they’d bought along. They had just bought the H1 from a localish farmer and were driving it back to Gloucester. They are military collectors and were helicoptered in!!!
I hope the Police charge them for the hassle they caused.
Can anyone recommend a digital compressor, preferably with the function to stop pumping at a predefined pressure?
My car was feeling a little odd today so I headed straight to the Suzuki garage which is about a mile away from me. On the way the tyre pressure warning light came on, no problem, that would explain the odd feeling. They were busy so it took an hour but no charge. They then explained that if I bought it in again it would cost £35 as they get about 50 phone calls a day about it.
Nuts to that, so a decent compressor would pay for itself quickly, especially with mum’s car. (I can’t use petrol station compressors as I’d need to kneel down and I need to use a kneeler, not using that in a petrol station as It’d be ruined in one visit)
T.I.A.
Sorry I used a foot pump before my current car came with one in the boot, instead of a tyre. It works very well, but niether digital nor can you set it to cut off. I recon looking through amazon’s reviews would be your best bet.
I’ve been looking at reviews on Amazon and elsewhere, personal feedback would be handy though.
THIS is what I’ve been using for the past two years. It’s basic, but fully functional. Used it a lot over the period because for some reason, even after putting new tyres on, there’s a slow release of pressure. I’ve looked too see if it’s a badly seated valve – it wasn’t.
It just works. I plug it in the lighter socket, set the pressure to a couple above, and I’ll check it again in aweeks time. Pressure can be set in memory, adapters for footballs/inflatable beds and splash pools etc, multi flash light – on/flash/sos – it’s been brilliant and only just bigger than a hardback book, comes in a zip case.
The never model 620, over the 600, is a fiver cheaper. Not sure if they took somthing out. Bit is do a compare if I was buying.
The never model 620, over the 600, is a fiver cheaper. Not sure if they took somthing out. Bit is do a compare if I was buying.
Steve, that one has a needle dial and the compressor shakes so much, you end up making a 3 -4 psi guesstimate. The LCD display is spot on!!
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