gess
Part of things
Posts: 220 
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Jun 16, 2017 11:36:20 GMT
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I have been lurkin on this site for some time, commenting on some builds, only watching others and found out that it was time to start my own thread. I have been watching in awe how rusty cars of all makes have been cut to bits and welded together, and finally built up the courage to try and concer my own rust problems. I have had the car for about five years, and almost never used it. It seems that my memory of how wonderful old cars were to drive din't quite fit the reality. I also discovered that my Hyundai is more comfortable and with more gadgets, and that tinkering was more fun than driving. Anyway, the car was bougt on the eastern side of Norway on September 27. 2012. I live about 500Km away on the west coast, so it was a long trip in an unknown car. It had passed its PKK (Mot) but I do believe that the previous owner had a friend who signed these papers because there vere some niggles to say the least. The car smelt like an old shed, it was dirty on the outside and inside, but I made it home without any real problems. The sun roof was leaking and there was very little power from the engine, but I drove steadily within the limits and got home.  It's beige...  Black interior, no holes for speakers in the doorcards or parcel shelf.   The C pillars are shot, as they are on almost all Granadas, but I had a plan to tackle these.  Driving up the mountain between east and west. I noticed that th 2.6 V6 was low on power and if I opened the throttle too much I got what felt like too early ignition, and the engine would almost stall. Actually it was an inlet valve with no clearance so that problem got solved a bit later on. |
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Jun 16, 2017 11:47:39 GMT
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The story continues. The Solex carburettor was leaking and would cause the car to stall on occations. The car was difficult to start when hot, which isn't very fun when it stops in a roundabout in rush traffic. So I exchanged it for a Weber 38DGAS. I thought this was a easy direct replacement, but some modifications were necessary to the sandwich plate between inlet and carburettor. The ditance between the venturies are a bit different between Solex and Weber, but the bolt pattern is the same.  Some filing and sanding was required  Made my own gasket.  Webercarburettor and adaptor to take Solex airfilter box. The ball joint on the two different typ\pes of carburettors were different sized, but I found a part from an unknown carburettor and made it fit. The Front suspension was removed and exchanged for one that I previously had sandblasted and painted. I removed the old worn rubber bushes and installed new Polybushes       |
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That is a wonderful slice of beige!
I had a Mk1 Granada many moons ago and it was a superb machine...
This one looks wonderful and I can't wait to see what lies ahead.
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***GARAGE CURRENTLY EMPTY***
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eurogranada
Europe
To tinker or not to tinker, that is the question...
Posts: 2,556
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Jun 19, 2017 13:50:04 GMT
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Hi Gess,
Nice to see you have started your own thread now. Been looking forward to it.
Your car looks pretty good and of course I recognise some of the work you've done as I did the same. My car was originally a 2.6 also. Only mine turned out to have suffered from an unleaded valve seat coming out of the head. I had 1,5mm of valve clearence and a nice rattle! That for me was what started it all...back in 2004. But with a healthy 2.6 the power is absolutely there. I had also swapped a Sierra t-9 5 speed in as a direct replacement for the rocket 4 speed.
I don't know what it is but this beige also suits the car nicely. Your interior looks nice and clean and original. Those c-pillars and the lower window tray between the wings are known rot spots indeed. My coupe was 100% sound in those areas but that is probably as the vents are in the top edge instead of the c-pillars.
Seems to me you're a bit further with the car then you've posted, so I'll be waiting for updates! Did you tackle those pillars yet? How are the sills (inner rear corners) etc.?
Looking forward to the rest of the story. So bookmarked. Also as you say the BEIGE one, does that mean there's to be a thread about another one as well?
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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The car looks better in the pictures than in real life unfortunately. I guess that is common for many cars on this site. The car has had its roof exchanged for a roof with an original sliding sunroof, and that job was not very successful. There are a lot of rust damage around the edges of the sunroof. At some point, parts of the car was resprayed, and it was not a very good job. The clear coat has started to let go and there are parts with a lot of imperfections and dust in the paint.
The rear corners seems to be ok, but there are some rust on the wheel arches, and I am in the progress of exchanging the rear jacking point on the driver side.
It all takes a lot of time, and time is something I do not have a lot of.
The C-pillars on the Sedan is different from the coupe in several ways. The vents are open so rain will enter. The inner part of the C-pillar has a profile that is supposed to guide water out through the bottom vent. This profile has a rubber band attached that presses toward the inside of the outer part of the C-pillar. As time passes, the rubber will vibrate against the outer panel, water will protrude, and rust occurs from the inside out. One will not notice the rust before it is too late.
My 2.6 engine is low on power, with worn bearings and low oil pressure. I am uncertain what to do about this engine, I will not throw it away, but it might get some attention in the near future, bearings, gasket etc. I am also planning to completely rebuild a 2.8 engine with K-jetronic injection and install that. The problem is to get the car approved with the engine swap. It is difficult here in Norway.
Progress on the car is as it is on the pictures. It has been in the garage for several years neglected due to family commitments, but it seems that I will be able to work on it more now, fingers crossed.
This is my only project, the beige Granada. I had another one earlier but it was way too rusty, that was the green one. I will post some pictures of it. That was my best Granada and I really loved it, Signal green 76 model, 2.8i engine and Spax lowering kit.
It is tho one on the right in my profile picture.
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Apr 25, 2020 19:16:57 GMT
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Life for inn the way for progress om this old Ford. Work, kids house and garden always get higher priority than my hobby. I see that a lot og people have some free time now with the world shutting down. I had hoped for a bit of Granada time but as I am an engineer working in an office, I am obliged to work from home. I am expected to work a full week from home, and that is no problem as i save the commute. However, i have to kids living at home and one og them need home Schooling, som i addition to work I have to teach. Still I have managed to make a tiny bit of progress. Rust is an issue and one of the previous owners got the car through MOT with sine bodging and quick rust repairs. Unfortuneately, Welding was exchanged for silicone. But I see that many others cope with old bodges, and so will I.
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eurogranada
Europe
To tinker or not to tinker, that is the question...
Posts: 2,556
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Apr 25, 2020 21:17:45 GMT
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These are indeed strange times. And where some benefit from free time as they can't do their job others only have more on their plate. I think I'm not far off from where you are at.
It's good to see the car is still in your possession and getting worked on, even if it is slowly.
You've always been a supporter of mine so if I can do something in return let me know!
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Apr 25, 2020 23:02:34 GMT
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It screams the sweeney lovely car
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Thank you for your support Alex. The best mojo support is reading about the projects on RR. There are so many increadibly rusty and worn down projects similar to mine in here, and so many hard working people grinding away getting their dream car back on the road. It is inspiring. Of course I have a sweetspot for you car, beeing a Granada, so I always read your posts. As mentioned earlier, the enginge was a bit tired, in fact it was more than tired. It has been neglected by PO and probably run on cheap oil with refilling of oil when needed, rather than changing oil regularly. There was a lot of oil on the utside and inside.  The head gasket has obviously been leaking a bit and there was some coolant in the cylinders that had created a bit of pitting in the bores. The Piston rings were worn and also some of the bearings had seen better times. I talked to a car mechanic about the state of the engine and his proffesional opinion was to chuck it all together and get to use the car again. It would not be a reliable engine butr the important thing is to use the car and not have it just standing in the garage. I went for this solution, new rings, gaskets and bearings, but I never got the engine back in the car. I started to poke a b\it in the rust on the panel behind the front wing, in front of the door. There was a small hole the suddenly was a big hole, an then it escalated. |
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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 As mentioned, the engine had developed a head gasket failure and some cooling water had made the cylinder rust a bit.  Engine out and ready for further inspection. I had to scrape away quite a lot of oil and grit, on the plus side, the block was not rusty on the outside.  I had performed a bit of surgery on the kick panel ant thought I should have a look at the parts that seemd to be in good contition, oh how I was wrong. PO had tacked and glued the plates on. On the plus side, they came of easily enough :-)  It escalated quickly. As on many of the RR projects, the POs makes a mess that has to be rectified later on. |
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eurogranada
Europe
To tinker or not to tinker, that is the question...
Posts: 2,556
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Now that last one is a very familiar hole. I guess I was lucky the extent of rot to the a pillar was not as bad as yours. I hope your upper parts of this spot near the bulkhead are better.
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Apr 27, 2020 11:00:38 GMT
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This area has been repaired earlier. I believe that the car has been fixed in a garage in its early life as the section where the wing is attached is actually connected ia pretty decent way with what seems to be original parts. Then later on, as the repair probably wasn't treated properly, some hobby mechanic has welded and glued pieces of steel in place to get it through its MOT. I hope to make it solid again.
There is little rust besides what I have cut away, on the A post that is. I have a lot on the rest of the car, but I will get to it when I get to it.
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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The engine in the car was not in a good shape but was put together some time ago with some new bearings, piston rings and gaskets. It was very hard to turn the engine over using a spanner even without the sparkplugs in. This killed the mojo a bit and progress stopped. I also noticed a pinging sound when I turned the engine over. A small metallic ping at a certain point in the revolution. I was going to leave iet as the oilpan was on and tourqued up, and the engine only had so much life laft anyway. But then I read goldnrusts engine saga which is a bit similar to my story, and I took notice of homersimpsons comment about following the user manual and checing the engine rotation for each step you take. I had followed the user manual, but i torqued up everyting befor I noticed how tight the engine was. I decided to remove the oilpan and chech the torque. After loosening the bolts I turned on the crank to investigate the pinging sound. I was afraid it something major, but in the end foud that it was a small washer on the six edged axle connecting the oil pump and distributor. The distributor is driving the oil pump and to avoid this hex-axle beeing lifted from the pump when removing the distributor, there is a small washer pressed onto the axle.  This washer was not positioned where it sholuld so the cranshaft was touching it each time it revolved. I pushed the washer back to where it is supposed to be and the sound was gone. I torqued up the main bearing, checking the rotaton as I went along, then I torqued up the conrod bearings also. Last time I used the maximum torque, this time I went a bit lower and what du you know, the engine is easier to turn over. Success!  I put the oil pan back on and the engine is a bit closer to working again, now I just need to get on with fixing the engin compartment and get it ready for the engine. |
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eurogranada
Europe
To tinker or not to tinker, that is the question...
Posts: 2,556
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Good to see this pop back up!
Those V6 engines are pretty bullet proof really so I hope you get it to a decent working order!
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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This engine will never be reliable, the work needed to ensure that is above what I am willing to pay. It would need an overbore and new pistons and I don't want to spend somewhere around 1200Euro on that. I have another engine, a 2.8 that I am planning to spend a bit more time and cash on, but it is difficult to justify spending so much money on an old engine. There are always some more important projects in the garden or house.
My vacation plans went down the drain so we will be on holiday in Norway instead of Denmark. It is a bummer, but the silver lining is that we probably will have lousy weather and I can spend some time in the garage instead of painting the house or making a larger decking :-)
My son thought I should find a cooler color for the car, I said I wanted it green and he approved.
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eurogranada
Europe
To tinker or not to tinker, that is the question...
Posts: 2,556
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Hm, Granada V6's from 2.0-2-8(i) were pretty commonly found here. Plenty of cars stripped for the bangers. But they are becomming more thinly spread. At least I have a very good source if you'd want to just fork out some cash on a known good engine that you can just drop in... Shipping might be prohibitive, yet some of the rates our company pays or transporting goods I often consider pretty cheap. Or you can do a road trip...
But if your 2.8 is of known quality, I'd just put that in.
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Thank you for the offer but I have a bit to do before I can drop any engine in. The 2.8 is of unknown quality, but it is supposed to be rebuilt anyway. Currently it resides in several boxes in my garage taking up much more space then a complete engine...
The priority is to get rid of rust, weld the corroded areas and get some primer and paint under the hood.
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gess
Part of things
Posts: 220
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Managed to get some quality time in the garage last night. I had intendet to do some sanding under the hood, but glued a bit of metal with the glow-stick instead. I started looking for the CAD template I had made, but instead I found the finnished metal bit. I keep forgetting what I do and don't do. Anyway, I gor a bit of metal attached to the car and that is a good thing. N o after picture, the phone obviously thought it was an uniterresting thing to take a picture of because it didn't save it. Now also with after-shot. Had to put the E-up on charge this morning and took the opportunity to get a picture of my welded bit.   I am no GN when it comes to fabricating, but I do the best I can with my limited skills.  |
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Last Edit: Jul 10, 2020 7:38:45 GMT by gess: Addad picture
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