1974 Ford Escort mk1 - First Rebuild

I bought my mk1 Escort in about 2000 or 2001. It was to replace my previous track day toy, the Sierra XR4x4 which I had sold.

I don't have many images of what the car looked like original, but it was bought for the princely sum of £500 and was pretty much an empty rolling shell:

We think the car was originally a 1300XL, since it had the evidence of the 'chrome' trim around the windows:

But, unusually, it had the 'sporty' round headlight front panel, compared to the 'square' model a 1300XL would normally have had:

The shell was in really, really good condition; at some point when it was nearly new someone had paid for it to have Zeibart treatment and the entire floorpan, under arches, engine bay etc had been coated in a durable black anti-rust, anti-corrosion coating - there were also injection ports drilled around the sills where it had been sprayed and then plugged up again.

I suspect that contributed massively to the fact that there was almost no visible corrosion anywhere. Don't get me wrong, there was still the odd panel that had been replaced, but compared to any other car from the late 60's or early 70's, it was very clean indeed.

Since it was just a bare shell sitting on suspension we had to source an engine and some interior bits and pieces.

1974 Ford Escort mk1

• 1600 OHV Crossflow
• Safety Devices rear roll cage
• Astra GTE Recaro seats
• Standard rear axle
• Standard front struts
• Standard front discs and calipers