I've been busy making perspex side windows this weekend, so thaught i'd take some picture as I went to show you guys:
The Escort in question has already got a perspex rear screen along with a few other weight saving measures in a bid to make it less of a slab-cracker, and i'd been planning on making the side windows to match some time in the future and save even more weight.
These plans were braught forward thanks to some moid stoving the window in and nicking it.
When I retrieved the car I stashed it down the side of my parents house for safe keeping:
Here it is!
Look what those loveable rugues did. I'd like to repeatedly stamp on their heads to a fine paste..... but, I digress:
I started by ripping the doorcard off.... litterally, in the fragile drivers sides case:
Time to get rid of the little quarter light devider, these just unbolt:
Here it is removed, incase you couldn't imagine it:
Now it's time to make a cardboard template of the new one-piece window. Obviously only the most accurate tools and the sturdiest of work benches will suffice:
The new windows will be made out of this stuff. I think I was too busy saying "HOW MUCH?!?!" rather than reading the "Exterior use only" writing all over it
Hey ho, whats the worst that can happen!
Bit of cutting, sticking and swearing and the template is made. Gale force winds are very useful in this situation.... Jesus wept :
....But managed to hold it down onto the perpex sheet long enough to draw round before it launched into the air, did some aerobatics down the garden and flew out of sight:
Bye then!:
Cut it out with a Jigsaw. Slow and steady won that race:
Those plates in between the window channel need to be cut out to fit the new window. This would normally be a 5 second job with the angle grinder...... but instead it was 15 minuites trying to work out why the angle grinder didn't work, and another 20 minuites painfully nibbling away at it with a saw fitted with a coarse 'wood' blade at an angle so finger-twistingly uncomfortable i'm now finding it difficult to type
:
Stupid damn saw blades! :
Got there in the end:
New window merely needs wrestling into place:
Random 'in progress' shot:
With the window fitted in place with the rubbers it was time to get rid of the winder mechanism. Quite a weighty affair really. Thankyou Ford for rivveting it in:
But the window can't stay up of its own accord. No sir. We need to fashion something to hold it in place. A quick root around the garage yielded this aluminium bar. Looks like a curtain rail or something? I dunno. I cut it down to size, bent it to the right curve by tredding on it, drilled some holes and bish-bah-bosh.......:
........Its a window support:
Time to stand back and admire the fruits of my labour:
Looks much 'cleaner' with its one-piece window, saved a bit of weight too
Next job is to make some lightweight doorcards aswell.... it never fails to amaze me how much they weigh in at for what they are!
Got some other weight saving measures going on in the near future.... watch this space
Thanks for reading
The Escort in question has already got a perspex rear screen along with a few other weight saving measures in a bid to make it less of a slab-cracker, and i'd been planning on making the side windows to match some time in the future and save even more weight.
These plans were braught forward thanks to some moid stoving the window in and nicking it.
When I retrieved the car I stashed it down the side of my parents house for safe keeping:
Here it is!
Look what those loveable rugues did. I'd like to repeatedly stamp on their heads to a fine paste..... but, I digress:
I started by ripping the doorcard off.... litterally, in the fragile drivers sides case:
Time to get rid of the little quarter light devider, these just unbolt:
Here it is removed, incase you couldn't imagine it:
Now it's time to make a cardboard template of the new one-piece window. Obviously only the most accurate tools and the sturdiest of work benches will suffice:
The new windows will be made out of this stuff. I think I was too busy saying "HOW MUCH?!?!" rather than reading the "Exterior use only" writing all over it
Hey ho, whats the worst that can happen!Bit of cutting, sticking and swearing and the template is made. Gale force winds are very useful in this situation.... Jesus wept
:....But managed to hold it down onto the perpex sheet long enough to draw round before it launched into the air, did some aerobatics down the garden and flew out of sight:
Bye then!:
Cut it out with a Jigsaw. Slow and steady won that race:
Those plates in between the window channel need to be cut out to fit the new window. This would normally be a 5 second job with the angle grinder...... but instead it was 15 minuites trying to work out why the angle grinder didn't work, and another 20 minuites painfully nibbling away at it with a saw fitted with a coarse 'wood' blade at an angle so finger-twistingly uncomfortable i'm now finding it difficult to type
:Stupid damn saw blades!
:Got there in the end:
New window merely needs wrestling into place:
Random 'in progress' shot:
With the window fitted in place with the rubbers it was time to get rid of the winder mechanism. Quite a weighty affair really. Thankyou Ford for rivveting it in:
But the window can't stay up of its own accord. No sir. We need to fashion something to hold it in place. A quick root around the garage yielded this aluminium bar. Looks like a curtain rail or something? I dunno. I cut it down to size, bent it to the right curve by tredding on it, drilled some holes and bish-bah-bosh.......:
........Its a window support:
Time to stand back and admire the fruits of my labour:
Looks much 'cleaner' with its one-piece window, saved a bit of weight too
Next job is to make some lightweight doorcards aswell.... it never fails to amaze me how much they weigh in at for what they are!
Got some other weight saving measures going on in the near future.... watch this space
Thanks for reading
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