MK1 Makes it way into Garage

[SJ Lambert]

Took the twin cam motor and gear box out of my Mk1 Twin Cam this morning. As I was doing it myself with my "crane" being a rope and pullies rigged off a spar in the garage roof I split the two - slung the motor out and dropped gearbox to the floor.

Poor car had been daily transport for years before getting laid up about eight years ago - will probably run a spare motor in it after restoring the body.

Will take bellhousing to machine shop to facilitate the repair of the spare L block (needs an new "ear" welding on). - Seems previous owner broke it off by dropping it........

Will likely be laid up again - waiting it's turn behind our open wheeler restoration.

Cheers

James

[holywood3645]

I found a guy living in Vermont who was a Broadspeed Fabricator, his name is Tivvy Shenton. I'm going to send him some pics of the car and hopefully he can sort the fabrication out for a reasonable price. The only problem is he lives in Vermont (about 2500+ mile away)

James

[holywood3645]

Very Excited today, Found a serial number under layers of paint on the Mk1 escort inner wing. THe chassis number is BB49HC24866
Found a serial number under layers of paint on the Mk1 escort inner wing. THe chassis number is BB49HC24866

According to http://www.rs-garage.co.uk/decode.html the info is as follows

B Britain
B Halewood
49 (Lotus Twin Cam engine model) Heavy duty shell
H 1968
C May
24866 (production number i guess)


Can any off the escort guys offer any addional info?

James

[SJ Lambert]

Nice, I'll check mine to see how close they are!! - I don't know whether the "VIN" number and plate rivetted onto the engine bay in mine is an Aussie Ford addition or not (perhaps Mark would know) - will post a shot of it - the number, CK49MA26535A, is stamped into the engine block too.

Cheers

James

[SJ Lambert]

Aussie ad for the Escort GT 1600 on the back of Racing Car News, June 1972.

By 1972 they'd been so re-named. I can't recall where I heard it, but it's firmly in my mind that they re-named 'em cause they were having trouble shiftin' 'em!!

[Elanintheforest]

That's a great advert James....thanks for putting it up here.
I think that twincam sales stopped in the UK when the RS1600 was born in 1970, although the two were built in parallel for a while. In fact the first 'few' RS1600s were Twincams with an engine transplant, and all Ermine White of course.

It's interesting that the Aussie cars kept the oblong lights, when the UK went to round lights in late '68, and the later Aussie cars were higher specification trim than the basic Brit cars. I guess they were intended to be mainly road cars, where the Brit ones were concieved as a homologation special, and pretty much stayed that way for their short production run.

Is there a group in Australia that have done the research into the Aussie cars? I'd love to know how they were built (knocked down kits or fully built in Australia), how many, when and what the specification changes were.

I do like the colours of the Aussie cars. We only had white cars, but towards the end, there were a few red ones, a blue mink one and a few other colours....but very few.

Mark

[elansprint71]

A friend of mine has an ex-Ford RS1600, with a huge photographic history file. When they announced the Mexico, all in a bit of a rush, they were very short of demo cars and his car got a Mexico paint job and did quite a tour of the UK dealers. Of course there were two provisios- nobody must open the bonnet and nobody must drive it!

I'll see if I can get some more info (not seen him for a while).

[Elanintheforest]

I'd be very interested in hearing about his RS1600, Pete. It must be a very early one.

There was probably no need to repaint his car, just to add the boy racer stripes that were standard on the Mexico. They only made the early RS1600s and Mexicos in Maize Yellow, Ermine White or Sunset Red, and the only difference between a RS1600 and a Mexico is the engine and the stripes...everything else is identical.

I bought my Mexico to 'make' an RS1600, but it turned out to be such an original car I just couldn't do it! Here she is before a renovation was started last year, along with a photo of the first RS1600 made at Aveley, with Graham Hill looking on.

Mark

[SJ Lambert]

That's a great advert James....thanks for putting it up here.
I think that twincam sales stopped in the UK when the RS1600 was born in 1970, although the two were built in parallel for a while. In fact the first 'few' RS1600s were Twincams with an engine transplant, and all Ermine White of course.

It's interesting that the Aussie cars kept the oblong lights, when the UK went to round lights in late '68, and the later Aussie cars were higher specification trim than the basic Brit cars. I guess they were intended to be mainly road cars, where the Brit ones were concieved as a homologation special, and pretty much stayed that way for their short production run.

Is there a group in Australia that have done the research into the Aussie cars? I'd love to know how they were built (knocked down kits or fully built in Australia), how many, when and what the specification changes were.

I do like the colours of the Aussie cars. We only had white cars, but towards the end, there were a few red ones, a blue mink one and a few other colours....but very few.

Mark

I don't know whether anyone out here has done the research on their build mo and numbers - I'd love to know as well!! I'll photograph the inner wing number on mine as James (holywood) has done which is about as much use as I can be at the moment.

As far as I can tell mine's always been orange and had the same wheels as the advert til some rotter decided upon a midnight lift a while back.

Cheers James

[holywood3645]

Much more info that this is provided on link.
http://www.rs-garage.co.uk/decode.html
James

[elansprint71]

I'd be very interested in hearing about his RS1600, Pete. It must be a very early one.......

Mark

No wonder I've not seen him, he's moved house and sold the car a while ago! However, via the miracle that is LinkedIn, I have found where he is hiding and will see what details I can get. His folder on the car was one of those really thick ring-binders (same as the Buckland book) and was full of photos and clippings about the varied life that the car had endured. I think at some point it lost its original registration, which was on another car and the owner would not sell because... you can guess the rest.

[holywood3645]

Swedish Papers arrived today.
More questions!
James

[holywood3645]

Great Escort race Action

http://www.youtube.com/v/kDAK4jBKmow

Jamess

[holywood3645]

It turns out after much research this is my Mk1

elan-racing-f12/emma-emanuelsson-timex-team-1972-t27685.html

It changed several colours over its life. It was very successful in the 1972 Swedish Touring Car Championship.

Originally owned by Flemming Rasmussen from Denmark (see picture of replica with nice colours)

Now the question is, which point is is past life do I restore it to? I wish I had the BRM Twin Cam for it. But I?m on the hunt for it,

It had been wrecked and a new roof put on it in 1969. I found pictures of the incident on the www

James

[holywood3645]

Turns out the MK1 is one of the Timex cars raced from 1971 to 1973. It has lots of race history, and has been verified by the orginal owner! Instrumental in wining the 1972 STCC championship

And worth a fortune.... I have been told, more than a genuine 26R.

Wooooo Ho!