ekjdm14

A fella I knew used to buy and sell those a lot, one was properly gone to where the starter wouldn't crank it over. All well and good until they tried to bump start it to get it moved into the garage, *clank* and gearbox oil started dripping... Not sure what happened but guessing it cracked the g/box case somehow.

Bulldog Mack for me a-la Rubber Duck. Do like the needlenose Pete as well though, or an arguably "so ugly it's beautiful" Autocar ConsTruckTor... Hell this is a Ford forum so can't forget the "Louisville" LTL9000 as well... OK I'll admit it, I do have a bit of a thing for old Yank and Aussie trucks. Especially if it's rocking a Detroit.

Wouldn't touch one with your bargepole mate. From what I've seen the belts disintegrate in the oil (wow, who'd have thought it?) and at best start to clog up passages with shed rubber/cord and generally strip their teeth and stop driving the oil pump, which is great for an engine also. From what I've heard it's a pretty big job to do the repair, sump/pump/front main/timing set and stuff like that off & probably replacing the shells if it's gone completely too. I can't honestly think of a good reason to not have the oil pump driven by chain or gears, I'm into Frenchies too (another big offender for the moderns having wet belts) and think I've seen an oil pump or chain failure one time in the old style bottom ends (XU/XUD/DW/EW series up to about '06-09). That was an engine that had sat and somehow got varnish/residue in the oil pump, which locked up when the car warmed up after being resurrected & cracked the housing/broke the chain. Anything post-2000 kinda turns me off automatically on grounds of being too new, but especially if the mfr saw fit to include rubber belts inside the crankcase. I have heard of chain upgrades being offered, but not done much research as it's about 20 years out of my wheelhouse. Can't imagine they're any worse than the belt at least!

Bluebird, 4i & Horizon for me please... Some lovely motors out there, wonder if we get as good a selection at Smallwood...

Yes my brother... lol last I saw the police were digging in the grounds of the place (and we went for a nosey down Middlewich custody suite where they were all trying to break in to rescue the leader! Peace and light my bawsack!) Been back over to Wales again today, this time in a pug 306 & typically saw a good few old fords, Mk1 and 2 Escorts & a late Capri amongst others.

We're over near Crewe (more's the pity!). We did go for a day out around Talacre bay, think it was Tuesday so you may have spotted us going down the A55. Speaking of which, rear wheels are in dire need of balancing & I mean DIRE... Anything over 62mph you can feel the wobble come on & gets truly horrendous by 70 just where we wanted to be cruising at.

Well the AC was short lived, condenser has a pretty major leak from the bottom right corner (and will need new schraeder valves too). No surprise given the system was empty, but no big loss either at less than £20 for a kilo of R290 (one of the main reasons I looked into it originally, not to mention it's not technically illegal to vent it to atmosphere like the usual refrigerants). Other than that though it all worked OK and was reasonably cool, may sort it eventually if a cheap condenser turns up but no biggie to do without. Blower fan works great at least.

Blower motor is alive once more. Following a guide on FordScorpio dot com I stripped the wiper linkage and cowling out, made a couple of incisions down the side of the heater box & removed the top which gave access to the motor itself without pulling any AC or heater pipes/disturbing the heater box in general. Turns out the motor had, as expected, jammed from the few years sitting the car did. Otherwise though it was in lovely condition with loads left on the brushes and barely any wear on the com bars & once freed up and oiled it was just a case of replacing a melted thermal fuse integral to the motor itself & it's working a real treat. Need to get the AC working now, it's got gas in it (literally propane AKA R290, I run that in all our cars that have AC and it's much better IMHO than 134a, Have seen -40 vent temperatures on a 306 in summer!) so there's some further diagnostics to do with that. From the terminal block on the wiring I'm going to say it's had a new compressor clutch at some point so that may be of interest first up. Can't wait to feel how it works with R290 in the system, have heard Scorpio's are known for overactive de-ice sensors so may have to make some mods there too.

You missed the qualifier "if" 😉 Besides, I'd get disemboweled if I spent that kind of money on a "project"

Honestly though, people have fixed worse & the price is more attainable than most 2-doors. Never be concours but I can see it being brought around as a "driver" if it doesn't end up donating shell cuts to rally brigade. If I had the itch for a 2-door like I used to as a kid I'd seriously consider that.

800-odd miles down & we're looking reasonably OK as far as resurrecting the old girl goes. Recording over 30mpg on the onboard display (I would say more like 25-27 but still better than expected). Some small niggles since going back on the road, thermostat failed no biggie, radiator has a couple of *small* leaks when cold (one from a tank joint & another around the g/box cooler line) but no appreciable loss just the odd drip, gearbox would definitely benefit from fresh fluid & filter and we have the blower/AC to fix but other than that she's a comfy interesting old barge. Hoping to get a day at the seaside soon, let's hope my underseal keeps the salt air at bay!

Agreed, no need to use telescam for anything IMO. Bank transfer or paypal (and buyer covers the fees) are about the only way I'd do business with someone unknown to myself.

Sounds like a dodgy earth if ever there was one. Worth tracking down while it's still broken though, those things can "self heal" and then come back to bite you at the worst time!

One of these days, you'll wake up dead 🙃

Beats my job title in 2000/01 "Butt Welder".... Yes, there were plenty of "waving your torch around" jokes...

Don't think that was his name, online profile doesn't look like him but could well be wrong. RP2000 you're more than welcome to help yourselves to 95% of our rain, I'm sure we'd still get by with only minor flooding from the other 5% & they ban us from using hosepipes through summer anyway so might as well give them a reason for it...

Haha cool, I'd imagine Bernard knew the fella down Leafield ave probably, old bike courier and (IIRC) founder member of NABD. Wish I could remember his name now, he gave my youngest lad a GS550 project bike for a donation to the charity.

We were on Brayside up near the park! They'd just finished the mural by Sifters when we were moving out... (if you ever went up there last year or so you probably saw my old tractor out front lol) small world.

Nah their main diet is cheese, surrender & dodgy electrical connections... (at risk of being thrown in the tower I will say this though, they provide us with a healthy supply of doctors & engineers) Anyway back on topic my first job was making wrought iron gates and fireguards!

Haha, we lived in Burnage for a while & have to say we did notice a "little" more tendency to rain than just a few miles further south in Cheshire! Just be thankful you have a garage to open up to the rain, I'm working on driveway! It's the wind doing us in here though mainly, gusts trying to knock the bonnet prop out, blowing my hat off, it's even been blowing tools under the damn car it's been that strong. Calmer today though, hoping to get a bit of a Buxton/Cat n Fiddle run in later.

Welcome, from one newbie to another! Good to see there's still the old guard hanging in there. I'm not the one to be asking since I'm terrible at getting pics uploaded (honestly, I will try!) but would love to see the van in particular.

Thanks, will give them a check if I need to buy a replacement. Hoping to be able to save the original motor with some oil & a set of brushes but we'll see. In other news, the Scorp' is officially back on the road after 6 years! 🤩 Had it to a point where I thought just book it in & see what else needed sorting, as I had a feeling it'd fail emissions because of a slight stumble at idle caused by the dizzy cap (Typically it's an unobtanium part, similar to the earlier 2.8 but with different connectors). I've got a 2.8i cap on order and was going to grab some leads to suit ready for the retest when I'd have sorted the other issues too. However, she just squeaked through emissions by skin of her teeth & nothing else to fail on either! Bonus! Think she got a bit too excited at the prospect of being brought back to life though as she promptly refused to restart after the test, traced it down to a blown fuse caused by the starter wiring touching the exhaust manifold so that was a brief scare. Fired her up bridging the solenoid and marked that as another job needs done but other than that well pleased. Will try and get some photos now she's all cleaned up, rear arches still need smoothing out and paint plus the spoiler is missing but other than that & the electrical she's pretty much ready for springtime cruising. Perfect timing too, what with fuel prices being such a bargain currently and nobody panic buying making everywhere run out... Ohhh, hang on... 🤦‍♂️

No worries. Just managed to find a '92 wiring diagram that looks to be close enough to our car to help diagnose the blower so that's a bonus. Decided to simply mud up the left rear arch for now as it's nothing like as bad as expected so will tidy it up enough to enjoy the car for a while & always got the repair panel to do it properly in future, just itching to cruise round and enjoy the spring weather when it returns!

Drool inducing those Mk1's both. That said, I'd take the SS if I had to pick. Is the old photo the same car? Just wondering as different plate, maybe private plate?

Thanks folks, I'm notoriously bad at getting photos but will try (it's a PITA getting them from phone to laptop, just CBA usually!) Got onto a couple of the more "niggly" things with the Granny now as weather not great for welding. Blower fan doesn't work, found blown fuse "cool, maybe a quick fix"... Course not, new fuse and still nothing. From what I've seen so far the thermal fuse resistor pack is mangled (open on one coil too) and the connectors have been hot at some point, easy enough to replace a few spade terminals there but nothing doing with power direct to the blower motor itself either so that's likely dead as well! At least it's not blown the fuse again lol. Also a small miss/stumble at idle and just cracking the throttle, sounds like cap/rotor from the relative spark strength pulling leads off, but they look OK inside, leads are decent, will have to pull plugs and check/change those too. Would love to be able to find a wiring diagram about now, would help a lot with sorting the blower motor if anyone has an idea where to find one? As an aside, I knew a Dave Knight back in school days. Not been Cruckton hall by any chance?