Renault Estafette Van, Mk2 Cortina GT

That Gilbern GT’s a beautiful looking thing. Always liked them.

The trailer is now finished. I’ve fitted a new plywood floor. I wanted to fit marine ply but this was special order so settle for 1/2” exterior grade for £20. If it rots in a few years it’s cheap and easy enough to replace. Tire still going flat though ☹️
So the van? Not touched it. Except the horn stopped working on the Cortina so I pinched it off the van. The reason being is I had booked the Cortina in for an MOT yesterday and didn’t have time to buy and fit another before hand as you need to take the headlamp surrounds and grille off in order to do so and there are a trillion screws holding them on. I did watch a YouTube video on how to fix a horn that only made a ffft noise. After I’d fixed it, it didn’t make any noise at all 😕. Hence the theft from the van.

So with the horn fitted, my plan was to test drive it Thursday evening and if it drove ok I’d drive it the 13 miles to my brother’s garage, if not I’d trailer it. But Thursday evening it peed down so no test drive. I thought I’d just trailer it

So yesterday morning it was lovely and sunny MOT was 10am. I realised I hadn’t bedded the brakes in so drive the car down to the end of the village to bed them in. The car drive really well, so I thought stuff it. I’ll drive it there. I went home , chucked some tools in the boot and off I set. I drove to the end of the village and slowed at the junction and the clutch pedal hit the floor. Ball bags. I didn’t want to stop incase I couldn’t get it going again so drove 3 miles to my elder brother’s garage as it was in the way. On inspection the clutch slave cylinder had turned and the plastic oil pipe had touched the exhaust manifold. That’s £30 down the pan as it was brand new. Luckily as it had these leak already the spares secretary had given me 2 to try. I nipped home in my brothers Land Rover to get the spare and raced back to fit it. My brother had already taken the broken one off so pipe fitted and I was off to my other brother’s for the MOT.

The journey was trouble free (with the clutch pipe cable tied away from the exhaust). In fact the car was a real pleaser to drive. It nipped along with no rattles, bangs or squeaks. The only issue being the gearbox jumping out of gear now and again. Further work required there, but I got to the MOT station on time.






He set the timing for me and balanced the carbs too whilst on the gas analyser. The tester said it was the cleanest car he’d ever tested and gave it a pass. I also did the tracking too.

I then left and stopped at the local harbour to take a couple of photos.









I even stopped at the petrol station and bought a snack as I was starving.



On the way home I called in to see the guy who painted the car as he’d asked to see it and when I left there I drove up the road and the bl00dy thing ran out of petrol.☹️. My eldest brother came to the rescue and and towed me home with the Land Rover. I put some more fuel in and picked up Jones Junior (the younger) from school. He enjoyed the drive home.

So all in all I good day. After 10 years off the road it finally road legal again. I’ve now got a lost of things to sort.
1. New fuel sender needed
2. New temperature sender needed
3. Sort leaks from rocker cover
4. Sort leaks from front pulley
5. Fit rear seat belts
6. Buy and fit new horn
7. Investigate gearbox issues (winter job)
8. Fix whatever else appears next time I drive it

Oh. I insured it with Classic Line ion here. No limit on mileage £25000 agreed value (when I send the photos off and thy agree), £175 all in. Really easy to deal with too.

Thanks Pete

Thanks strikey

Thanks Jim. It’s good to know nothing is falling off

Jonsey

When you fitted the cable retainers what size holes did you have and did you find them hard to fit?

Thanks Grumpy. Still a way to go but it’s now a “running restoration”.

So, long time, no posts. What have I done on the Cortina since last time? Well not a great deal really. So after the last show I took it to, I noticed a good spread of engine oil over the floor below the car. Not a flood, just lots of drips. I changed the front pulley as there was a witness drip from there and there was a large groove in the pulley where the oil seal runs. The one I fitted was better, but only a little.
I took it for a short drive to get the engine warm and when I got back it was the same 😩. So I bought a new steel billet pulley from Burtons as I intended to do this anyway as the pressed steel pulleys fall apart if revved. It is also smaller in diameter than standard so a bit less power is sapped by the water pump and alternator.


It’s shinier too, until it rusts😁.
I then noticed that the alternator and that side of the engine was covered in oil and realised it was coming out of the dipstick. I welded a washer to the dipstick and added a felt washer too. Now when I had this engine in my mk1 Escort I ran a vent pipe off the top of the rocker cover. I removed this when I fitted it in the Cortina as it looked neater. I also removed the PSV and thought this would be enough breathing. Obviously not. I’ve now reinstated the vent and put both into a bottle to see what comes out.





I took it out for another drive today to see if all is resolved, but forgot to check when I got back. I’ll check in the week. But on the drive, I stopped in the previous owners house to ask if it every jumped out of 4th gear when he had it. (It’s still jumping out of 4th, but then I’ve done nothing to prevent it). He said it never did. This hopefully rules out wear so it’s either the new gear stick I’ve fitted not fully selecting the gear (easiest option) or something has been put back together wrong when it was rebuilt. I’ll try the old gearstick first.

I also added a mirror to the passenger door.


I prefer the look of no mirrors, but they are handy, so a bit of function before form sadly.

Put in the wrong phot to show the stretch. This is it😁