Allright, I'm been a lurker for too long now, so here we go.
I'm Richard from Norway, age 41 and located outside a little town called Grimstad down south.
Have allways been a Capri nutter, remember reading about them in my late dads Street Machine magazines in early 80s, not knowing what they were, but I did like the coupe style and those days there were all sort of awesome custom stuff going on with them.
A bit history of my Capri life...
Fast forward to the late 80s, and at one point our family was visiting my mums side of family in the west of Norway (Odda), and we had been visiting a old lady one day, and one fella said he could drive us down to the valley, he is a third coisin of mine or something, never been able to track him up again..
Anyway, I was very exciting as the car turned out to be a Mk3, deep blue paint, black vinyl roof, recaro seats.
I remember we drove down the hill with me in the back seat and my mum up front, and it had a lovely rumble to it.
As we came down the hill and turned into the main road he floored it and it was the the best sound and feeling ever as up tp that point was used to get rides in Corolla KE36, Beetle and such normal cars.
We only got a lift for a mile or two, but that sound got stuck in my head ever since, and I've learned that it must have been a 3.0S with Janspeed exhaust as my mate had a 3.0S with Janspeed in 2000 ish, and it sounded exactly the same!!
Little did I know that all my first 5 cars would be a Capri..
Sadly don't own a picture of my first Capri, but it was a 77' 2.0S (V6) with the front end converted to 78' and later sheetmetal, fitted with granny 2.8 carb engine, painted flat black, slot mag wheels with 205/60-13 tires and Hi jacker shocks in the rear.
Since it was a S it had Recaro seats too (mainland europe got Recaro in 76' and 77' on the S models, complete with fishnet headrests).
It was a rust bucket and lethal, but it was my first car and I loved it!
Rear shacles on the right side poked thru the floor as the frame was rusted out, so for each run the Hi jackers had to be pumped out to max to level out the car.
Steering rack had nearly a half turn slack on the steering wheel because the the bearing on top of the rack was completly shot.
To make it worse the front brakes had uneven force side to side so you had to manhandle the car with brake issue and the steering issue.
At one point I scared te s... out of my brother going down a straight road about 95mph.
Driver window also broke due worn rollers on the bottom if the window so it fell inside the door and ended up in 1000s bits, fixed it with a clear plastic bag and some tape.
It had allways lived in my area and was driven on salty roads his whole life, ended up breaking up and saving the good bits after it had covered nearly 300k miles.
My next car was a 75' 1600L, this was going to be my perfect Capri.
This was sent to a bodyman living not far from me.
It was also converted to Mk3 look, I bought the front valance at Ford, together with a new door.
Also got new wings, new sills both side, new wheelarches, new battery mount and several rust holes repaired.
Sadly I never got the funds to build it, so it sat behind our house for several years and then in a barn till I sold it 10 years later or so.
Here we are picking it up at the bodyman, as it was a downhill from him to our house, my dad was was driving behing with a tow strap to brake for me as the car had no brakes at this point.
Year 1995 or so..
My third Capri was a 79' 3.0S fitted with a x-pack back in 1980 at a Ford dealership, also had LSD, 15" Brookland wheels and Turbo rear spoiler that some low life stole the upper part of.
This is the car I've driven most over a period of one year (36k miles).
I loved this car, with the champagne paint, bronze tinted windows, vinyl roof, brown Recaro seats and that lovely 3 litre!
Sadly broke this for spares too, as I had no funds fixing the small rust issue on the inner wings.
The x-pack still lives on my mates cars, so something good came out of it.
Capri number 4 was a 74' 1600GT, and you guessed it, was also converted to Mk3 look, done by a previous owner, so was the conversion of the 3 litre drivetrain, only bit retained was the orginal 1600 diff.
Means it was very quick to get up to speed but not having a grat top speed, but it maxed out at 112mph at 6500rpm, not good for Essex bearings lol.
When I got it, it had frozen front brakes, sized engine and a smelly interior.
I ended up rebuilding the interior with mix of cleaning and use of parts from the other cars that I had broken in the past.
Brakes were taken form my spare bin to and I bougth a seconhand engine but the oil was hard and muddy, but was able to save it buy swapping the pan from the engine that came in the car.
In August 1998 we were on our way to our annual Capri meeting, but the rod bearings let go on the way, so it was parked up over the weekend and was dragged home on Sunday on our way back home.
I think it was the week after and I was sent to perform my military service.
During the xmas days in 98' I built one engine out of the 3 engines I had, with a tiny help of a friend.
I took the best part of each engine and built a curse word, and it served my well for many years after, including driving up to north of norway for the military on new year 99' (1150 miles each way), and I have been up as far as Tromsø with it.
I also got my first speed camera ticket from when I was up north, on the my way back to the militar after a trip to Tromsø.
Via a work mate a couple of years later I bougth a home tuned 2.8 carb engine that he did himself.
That engine had headers, ported exhaust and inlet, 38 dgas carb, Fast Road 2.8Injection camshaft (higher lift than carb version), I fitted Motorcraf plugs and 10mm Magnecor ignition leads.
This had approx 200hp, and did 0-62mph in 6.5 seconds I also fitted a HD 4 speed (same gearbox as 3 litre), and think I swapped out the rar axle for 3.44 or 3.09 as I saw 127mph one time, and set a speed record of a 62 mile stretch I know no one has beat yet (legal speed limt for the first 10 miles, than flat out on a country road, similar to your mountain roads. Yes I was a bit heavy footed in my younger days lol )
This was scrapped in 2005 as the floor was no good.
Going to continue this story in part two of the intro, to much writing lol
I'm Richard from Norway, age 41 and located outside a little town called Grimstad down south.
Have allways been a Capri nutter, remember reading about them in my late dads Street Machine magazines in early 80s, not knowing what they were, but I did like the coupe style and those days there were all sort of awesome custom stuff going on with them.
A bit history of my Capri life...
Fast forward to the late 80s, and at one point our family was visiting my mums side of family in the west of Norway (Odda), and we had been visiting a old lady one day, and one fella said he could drive us down to the valley, he is a third coisin of mine or something, never been able to track him up again..
Anyway, I was very exciting as the car turned out to be a Mk3, deep blue paint, black vinyl roof, recaro seats.
I remember we drove down the hill with me in the back seat and my mum up front, and it had a lovely rumble to it.
As we came down the hill and turned into the main road he floored it and it was the the best sound and feeling ever as up tp that point was used to get rides in Corolla KE36, Beetle and such normal cars.
We only got a lift for a mile or two, but that sound got stuck in my head ever since, and I've learned that it must have been a 3.0S with Janspeed exhaust as my mate had a 3.0S with Janspeed in 2000 ish, and it sounded exactly the same!!
Little did I know that all my first 5 cars would be a Capri..
Sadly don't own a picture of my first Capri, but it was a 77' 2.0S (V6) with the front end converted to 78' and later sheetmetal, fitted with granny 2.8 carb engine, painted flat black, slot mag wheels with 205/60-13 tires and Hi jacker shocks in the rear.
Since it was a S it had Recaro seats too (mainland europe got Recaro in 76' and 77' on the S models, complete with fishnet headrests).
It was a rust bucket and lethal, but it was my first car and I loved it!
Rear shacles on the right side poked thru the floor as the frame was rusted out, so for each run the Hi jackers had to be pumped out to max to level out the car.
Steering rack had nearly a half turn slack on the steering wheel because the the bearing on top of the rack was completly shot.
To make it worse the front brakes had uneven force side to side so you had to manhandle the car with brake issue and the steering issue.
At one point I scared te s... out of my brother going down a straight road about 95mph.
Driver window also broke due worn rollers on the bottom if the window so it fell inside the door and ended up in 1000s bits, fixed it with a clear plastic bag and some tape.
It had allways lived in my area and was driven on salty roads his whole life, ended up breaking up and saving the good bits after it had covered nearly 300k miles.
My next car was a 75' 1600L, this was going to be my perfect Capri.
This was sent to a bodyman living not far from me.
It was also converted to Mk3 look, I bought the front valance at Ford, together with a new door.
Also got new wings, new sills both side, new wheelarches, new battery mount and several rust holes repaired.
Sadly I never got the funds to build it, so it sat behind our house for several years and then in a barn till I sold it 10 years later or so.
Here we are picking it up at the bodyman, as it was a downhill from him to our house, my dad was was driving behing with a tow strap to brake for me as the car had no brakes at this point.
Year 1995 or so..
My third Capri was a 79' 3.0S fitted with a x-pack back in 1980 at a Ford dealership, also had LSD, 15" Brookland wheels and Turbo rear spoiler that some low life stole the upper part of.
This is the car I've driven most over a period of one year (36k miles).
I loved this car, with the champagne paint, bronze tinted windows, vinyl roof, brown Recaro seats and that lovely 3 litre!
Sadly broke this for spares too, as I had no funds fixing the small rust issue on the inner wings.
The x-pack still lives on my mates cars, so something good came out of it.
Capri number 4 was a 74' 1600GT, and you guessed it, was also converted to Mk3 look, done by a previous owner, so was the conversion of the 3 litre drivetrain, only bit retained was the orginal 1600 diff.
Means it was very quick to get up to speed but not having a grat top speed, but it maxed out at 112mph at 6500rpm, not good for Essex bearings lol.
When I got it, it had frozen front brakes, sized engine and a smelly interior.
I ended up rebuilding the interior with mix of cleaning and use of parts from the other cars that I had broken in the past.
Brakes were taken form my spare bin to and I bougth a seconhand engine but the oil was hard and muddy, but was able to save it buy swapping the pan from the engine that came in the car.
In August 1998 we were on our way to our annual Capri meeting, but the rod bearings let go on the way, so it was parked up over the weekend and was dragged home on Sunday on our way back home.
I think it was the week after and I was sent to perform my military service.
During the xmas days in 98' I built one engine out of the 3 engines I had, with a tiny help of a friend.
I took the best part of each engine and built a curse word, and it served my well for many years after, including driving up to north of norway for the military on new year 99' (1150 miles each way), and I have been up as far as Tromsø with it.
I also got my first speed camera ticket from when I was up north, on the my way back to the militar after a trip to Tromsø.
Via a work mate a couple of years later I bougth a home tuned 2.8 carb engine that he did himself.
That engine had headers, ported exhaust and inlet, 38 dgas carb, Fast Road 2.8Injection camshaft (higher lift than carb version), I fitted Motorcraf plugs and 10mm Magnecor ignition leads.
This had approx 200hp, and did 0-62mph in 6.5 seconds I also fitted a HD 4 speed (same gearbox as 3 litre), and think I swapped out the rar axle for 3.44 or 3.09 as I saw 127mph one time, and set a speed record of a 62 mile stretch I know no one has beat yet (legal speed limt for the first 10 miles, than flat out on a country road, similar to your mountain roads. Yes I was a bit heavy footed in my younger days lol )
This was scrapped in 2005 as the floor was no good.
Going to continue this story in part two of the intro, to much writing lol
