I thought I’d put together a build thread of this restoration to document the transformation & to record all of the information I have found out along the way so that it’s available for others to refer to if needed…apologies in advance for the essay that follows!:
Growing up In Bournemouth in the early 90’s this car for me is a massive nostalgia hit!
I first recall seeing a bright yellow Mondeo complete with chequered flag graphics parked outside my Primary school c. 1994/5 and thinking how cool it looked at that time!
Fast forward 15 years to 2009 and the memory of this luminous Mondeo had faded until it was all but gone until one day during a conversation with a friend the subject of unusual [read horrible] coloured cars comes up and the memories came flooding back!
This spurred me into action and the hunt was on for more information regarding that awesome Mondeo I remembered (obviously I’m a lover of the Citrine Yellow, rather than a hater…it’s a very Marmite colour!).
Some info on these cars:
When the Mondeo was first launched in 1993 all 211 Ford dealers in the UK at that time received 1 ‘Citrine Yellow’ Mondeo Si each to use to promote the new arrival.
The Hendy group (having a history of producing special edition cars) decided to further improve this car and requested 10 of these Citrine Si’s (5 saloons & 5 hatchbacks) which they converted to ‘RSi specification’.
This meant that the standard power was upped from 136bhp to 150bhp (by way of uprated cams), the addition of an adaptive damping system, Full Raven black interior, traction control, Eibach suspension & RSi graphics kit.
It has been said that this specification was in fact supposed to be a predevelopment version of the Mondeo RS (bar a YB engine or the like) , a car which of course never came to fruition. If this is indeed true, this makes the Hendy RSi Mondeos very important indeed. Unfortunately I have been unable to find a member of the original Hendy special development team to ask directly about this, however I am continuing with this research so watch this space!
It is rumoured (although I have been unable to find any official documentation to back this up) that of the 10 Hendy cars, 1 hatchback and 1 saloon were set aside and used for promotional work. These cars had the registration number ‘M163 WOW’ & ‘M153 WOW’ respectively. Both cars came from the Southampton Hendy dealership in order to obtain the ‘WOW’ plate.
Original Press clipping detailing the limited run of Hendy RSi Mondeos:
The car
Once I had started finding out more information about these cars I had to own one but finding a genuine Hendy edition car was going to be difficult! Between 2009 & 2012 I trawled the internet virtually daily searching for keywords, colours, years…anything that might lead me to one of these cars. I posted several wanted ads in various locations (not expecting much of a response) & received plenty of contact from people with standard cars wanting rid. Needless to say, this was all pretty fruitless until one day in 2012 I received a message from someone who thought they might have what I was looking for (although they were unsure). A date was made to view the car and off I went!
When I got to the sellers house I knew straight away that this was right!
Here is what I discovered on the drive:
And yes, I couldn’t believe it…this was one of the ‘WOW’ cars…the saloon none the less (i’ve loved the saloon shape since the BTCC of the 90’s):
The car was in a pretty bad way; flat & faded (in places) paint, leaking cabin, missing original wheels, gutted sound system, dodgy clutch, a totally rotted away O/S wing, damp/smelly interior, all shuts full of moss / algae/ cobwebs etc. The car was currently unused and unloved. It needed to be rescued!
During conversation with the seller he happened to mention that he would be selling the ‘other’ wheels on eBay at a later date. When I asked to see the ‘other’ wheels I was shocked to see all 4 16” diamond cut RS7 wheels in his shed! A price was negotiated and away I came with the car and two sets of wheels (including the original RS7s):
The car had an aftermarket airfilter kit fitted (and bonnet insulation removed) when I bought it, however the seller had kept these original parts and they were included with the sale (top bloke)!
Here is the car as it stood when I first got it home:
Note the gaffer tape on the rotted out wing. Old Mondeo owners seem to have an affinity with this stuff for repairs….there will be no more of that on this car!
Project stalls
It’s still 2012 and I had bought the car. I knew I had secured one of the original Hendy cars & was happy to rest on my laurels somewhat. I planned to dry store the car securely until I had more time to dedicate to the project later that year.
As is so often the case with these projects, they can suffer from ‘out of sight, out of mind’ syndrome.
Having just started a new business my focus was very much on that, not the Mondeo project. The car remained in storage as the project was repeatedly pushed back…every day getting closer to becoming a barn find of the future!
The rescue operation
Fast forward another 3 years to 2015 and it was time to either sh*t or get off the pot! I was either going to restore this thing or sell it on to someone else who would give it the makeover it deserved.
First up was to sort the rotted out O/S wing:
Goodbye gaffer tape!
Removed (along with lots of other parts such as RS front bumper)
New wing prior to prep:
New wing undersealed & fitted, fresh fuel & battery added, the car fired up first time and was driven out into the light of day for the first time in 3 years!:
During this process the air filter was ditched:
Out with the aftermarket:
In with the standard item:
Next up was tackling the leaking interior.
A common fault with these cars is that the ‘weatherstrips’ at the bottom of the windows degrade and the alloy inside them warps, letting water into the door / cabin & often scratching the glass over time as the windows are raised & lowered.
A delivery:
New strips fitted (sorry no process pictures here):
Next was to look into the water ingress into the boot. This was mainly from the N/S cluster, so out it came:
So it appears that the standard seal has failed at some point and someone has replaced this with a bead of sealant (light seals aren’t available to buy independently)…Cue some research and I found a guy who makes replacement light seals for later Mondeos from a waterproof foam. As he was unable to make a MK1 seal, he instead sent me the foam so I could do this myself…
(Picture upside down):
So the Pink might not be the most fetching colour, but of course this won’t be seen & it does a great job of keeping water out!
At this time I thought it appropriate to remove the lights and give the boot shut a good clean up:
Now that the interior was water tight, it was time to tackle the smelly seats!
After:
Next up, the paint really needs sorting. Wheras the paint isn’t too horrendous, I’m currently thinking that a full blow over will be the best option (some panels have discoloured over the years) as demonstrated by the boot spoiler:
There are also a few areas of slight rust around the arch edges which will be sorted at the same time. To do this however will mean the removal of the ‘RSi’ graphics kit. There were a few of these graphics kits over produced and available to purchase through the Hendy parts system – unfortunately none of these kits are available any longer so my only option is to go down the custom route.
A lot of measuring and picture taking from different angles of this:
And several emails / spec checks with a specialist graphics company and a new set was made up, ready for application after any paintwork (coming soon).
This more or less brings the project up to speed (I could go into detail on various other bits done so far also but I don’t want to bore you to death!), i hope you've enjoyed what you've seen so far (if you like old Yellow Fords?!).
Stay posted for the next stages of the project and hopefully completion this season!
Growing up In Bournemouth in the early 90’s this car for me is a massive nostalgia hit!
I first recall seeing a bright yellow Mondeo complete with chequered flag graphics parked outside my Primary school c. 1994/5 and thinking how cool it looked at that time!
Fast forward 15 years to 2009 and the memory of this luminous Mondeo had faded until it was all but gone until one day during a conversation with a friend the subject of unusual [read horrible] coloured cars comes up and the memories came flooding back!
This spurred me into action and the hunt was on for more information regarding that awesome Mondeo I remembered (obviously I’m a lover of the Citrine Yellow, rather than a hater…it’s a very Marmite colour!).
Some info on these cars:
When the Mondeo was first launched in 1993 all 211 Ford dealers in the UK at that time received 1 ‘Citrine Yellow’ Mondeo Si each to use to promote the new arrival.
The Hendy group (having a history of producing special edition cars) decided to further improve this car and requested 10 of these Citrine Si’s (5 saloons & 5 hatchbacks) which they converted to ‘RSi specification’.
This meant that the standard power was upped from 136bhp to 150bhp (by way of uprated cams), the addition of an adaptive damping system, Full Raven black interior, traction control, Eibach suspension & RSi graphics kit.
It has been said that this specification was in fact supposed to be a predevelopment version of the Mondeo RS (bar a YB engine or the like) , a car which of course never came to fruition. If this is indeed true, this makes the Hendy RSi Mondeos very important indeed. Unfortunately I have been unable to find a member of the original Hendy special development team to ask directly about this, however I am continuing with this research so watch this space!
It is rumoured (although I have been unable to find any official documentation to back this up) that of the 10 Hendy cars, 1 hatchback and 1 saloon were set aside and used for promotional work. These cars had the registration number ‘M163 WOW’ & ‘M153 WOW’ respectively. Both cars came from the Southampton Hendy dealership in order to obtain the ‘WOW’ plate.
Original Press clipping detailing the limited run of Hendy RSi Mondeos:
The car
Once I had started finding out more information about these cars I had to own one but finding a genuine Hendy edition car was going to be difficult! Between 2009 & 2012 I trawled the internet virtually daily searching for keywords, colours, years…anything that might lead me to one of these cars. I posted several wanted ads in various locations (not expecting much of a response) & received plenty of contact from people with standard cars wanting rid. Needless to say, this was all pretty fruitless until one day in 2012 I received a message from someone who thought they might have what I was looking for (although they were unsure). A date was made to view the car and off I went!
When I got to the sellers house I knew straight away that this was right!
Here is what I discovered on the drive:
And yes, I couldn’t believe it…this was one of the ‘WOW’ cars…the saloon none the less (i’ve loved the saloon shape since the BTCC of the 90’s):
The car was in a pretty bad way; flat & faded (in places) paint, leaking cabin, missing original wheels, gutted sound system, dodgy clutch, a totally rotted away O/S wing, damp/smelly interior, all shuts full of moss / algae/ cobwebs etc. The car was currently unused and unloved. It needed to be rescued!
During conversation with the seller he happened to mention that he would be selling the ‘other’ wheels on eBay at a later date. When I asked to see the ‘other’ wheels I was shocked to see all 4 16” diamond cut RS7 wheels in his shed! A price was negotiated and away I came with the car and two sets of wheels (including the original RS7s):
The car had an aftermarket airfilter kit fitted (and bonnet insulation removed) when I bought it, however the seller had kept these original parts and they were included with the sale (top bloke)!
Here is the car as it stood when I first got it home:
Note the gaffer tape on the rotted out wing. Old Mondeo owners seem to have an affinity with this stuff for repairs….there will be no more of that on this car!
Project stalls
It’s still 2012 and I had bought the car. I knew I had secured one of the original Hendy cars & was happy to rest on my laurels somewhat. I planned to dry store the car securely until I had more time to dedicate to the project later that year.
As is so often the case with these projects, they can suffer from ‘out of sight, out of mind’ syndrome.
Having just started a new business my focus was very much on that, not the Mondeo project. The car remained in storage as the project was repeatedly pushed back…every day getting closer to becoming a barn find of the future!
The rescue operation
Fast forward another 3 years to 2015 and it was time to either sh*t or get off the pot! I was either going to restore this thing or sell it on to someone else who would give it the makeover it deserved.
First up was to sort the rotted out O/S wing:
Goodbye gaffer tape!
Removed (along with lots of other parts such as RS front bumper)
New wing prior to prep:
New wing undersealed & fitted, fresh fuel & battery added, the car fired up first time and was driven out into the light of day for the first time in 3 years!:
During this process the air filter was ditched:
Out with the aftermarket:
In with the standard item:
Next up was tackling the leaking interior.
A common fault with these cars is that the ‘weatherstrips’ at the bottom of the windows degrade and the alloy inside them warps, letting water into the door / cabin & often scratching the glass over time as the windows are raised & lowered.
A delivery:
New strips fitted (sorry no process pictures here):
Next was to look into the water ingress into the boot. This was mainly from the N/S cluster, so out it came:
So it appears that the standard seal has failed at some point and someone has replaced this with a bead of sealant (light seals aren’t available to buy independently)…Cue some research and I found a guy who makes replacement light seals for later Mondeos from a waterproof foam. As he was unable to make a MK1 seal, he instead sent me the foam so I could do this myself…
(Picture upside down):
So the Pink might not be the most fetching colour, but of course this won’t be seen & it does a great job of keeping water out!
At this time I thought it appropriate to remove the lights and give the boot shut a good clean up:
Now that the interior was water tight, it was time to tackle the smelly seats!
After:
Next up, the paint really needs sorting. Wheras the paint isn’t too horrendous, I’m currently thinking that a full blow over will be the best option (some panels have discoloured over the years) as demonstrated by the boot spoiler:
There are also a few areas of slight rust around the arch edges which will be sorted at the same time. To do this however will mean the removal of the ‘RSi’ graphics kit. There were a few of these graphics kits over produced and available to purchase through the Hendy parts system – unfortunately none of these kits are available any longer so my only option is to go down the custom route.
A lot of measuring and picture taking from different angles of this:
And several emails / spec checks with a specialist graphics company and a new set was made up, ready for application after any paintwork (coming soon).
This more or less brings the project up to speed (I could go into detail on various other bits done so far also but I don’t want to bore you to death!), i hope you've enjoyed what you've seen so far (if you like old Yellow Fords?!).
Stay posted for the next stages of the project and hopefully completion this season!
sweeeet 
deffo keep us updated 
and they come in a more "manly" green 
.
