Many hands make light work they say... and I must agree. Many thanks to Andy W for coming round tonight and giving me a hand on the very night I finally took the 1.8 out. Andy on one side, me on the other it was out in about 90 minutes.Took delivery of a brand new aluminum bellhousing Monday. With it offered up to the ST there was a very small amount of fettling to get the starter clear of the sump and that's where I left it for the cider, sorry, for the night!

I'm not going to be using the water rail I had on the 1.8 as I feel the original Ford housing works better and as I'm considering a heater this will suit it better. So some remaking of pipe work is in order and I will be plumbing the Focus oil cooler into the remote filter head. First I need to attach the new bellhousing, derust the flywheel I'm going to use and actually get the ST engine in!

I'll give the Mondeo clutch that I bought for the 1.8 a go but feel I may need to upgrade to some thing stronger. Time will tell. Old 1.8 out, new ST waiting menacingly to go in...

I'll be taking the opportunity to clean the engine bay out while there's plenty room. There's still mud and grass from the crash and fibreglass dust everywhere from the rebody so its an opportunity not to be missed.

Quick update, engine is ready to go in with new belts and oil/filter etc. Was intending to get it in this weekend but have bought a new aluminium bellhousing at the last minute and am waiting for it to come. Picking up my 'new' Rover 45 this afternoon as well.

This week has seen me buy a new tintop, Rover 45, and get the Focus engine ready for install. I took the engine and alternator mount off the silvertop and offered them up to the blacktop. Of course they didn't fit. As mentioned earlier there's one of the M10 threads for the engine mount in the block missing, although I've seen other blacktop engines where this is present! Also my custom alternator mount fouls the water pump housing. So, I've made a new alternator bracket using the Focus aircon mount and remade the engine mount using a threaded boss on the sump.This required a bit of angle with lugs for the alternator that bolted on using the A/C pump points. Its a bit closer to the engine than the last effort and a lot lighter!I used the original steering pump bracket to mount an idler for the auxiliary belt with an attachment point for the alternator upper adjuster arm.The engine mount has been remade using the top mount behind the A/C bracket. This involved grinding away the thickness of the mount from the back of the A/C bracket and sharing the bolt holes in the block. An extra 'leg' was welded to the bottom of the mount to attach to an M10 boss on the cast sump.A new belt was sourced from Halfords that goes round the new system, along with new engine oil and filter. I'm just waiting for a new cam belt kit to come as I want to install it while the engines on the stand. Then I'll be hoisting the 1.8 out and dropping the ST170 in!

ST170 engine install starting now.... the engine has been on the stand for a bit now while I've chopped the sump and rebuilt the car.

Tonite I've chopped off the side of the sump to allow the type 9 starter to fit. I've roughly pushed all the ribs back but will need to bolt up the bellhousing and starter to see if its OK. Attacked the sump with the angry grinder and forgot to take any before photos. But, if your thinking of doing it yourself you know what the 'before' picture is.Here you can see the modded sump pan and the back of the ali sump reduced to the same height as the type 9 bellhousing. Really need a new camera......Next, I need to take the engine and alternator mount of the car and do the necessay mods to fit to the Focus engine. i need an idler to get teh water pump turning the right and the Focus block has one of the M10 engine mount bolt holes in the block missing that are present on the earlier 1.8. Strange..

Got a £7.99 car cover from Lidl tonite which looks to be doing a nice job, bit flimsy but OK for in the garage.

Managed to get the car ready for Mondays track day. Over the last couple weeks fitted finished off all the niggly little bits and bobs. Number plates on lights fitted up, sanity checks on the water oil, suspension bolts etc. Arranged the new front cycle wings leaving the back real close to the road.

All of a sudden its Sunday morning, the suns shining and nervously I'm behind the wheel driving to the garage for some fuel ready for Mondays track day. Found the back of the cycle wings fouling slightlty on undulations in the garage. Get home to find them scraping the top of the drive so out with the cutoff saw and trimmed the bottoms back to 4" off the ground. They seem OK like that and it does help keep the debri from the wheels down as I found out on a cold wet track Monday.

Monday dawned for an early start down to Teeside Autodrome in the fog and peak traffic round the Boro.

the track was soaking with standing water and not wanting to bin it on my brand new shiny Yoko's I was takign it fairly easy. Had a couple of moments round the chicane (everyone did) as it was very slippy there. You could tell who had been off by the amount of mud they were carrying back into the pits. Some nice cars there, including a really old 60's Lotus 7 and a mad supercharged Busa Westfield.

Pictures of the day can be seen here: http://petrolhead.fotopic.net/c1605837_1.html

Got home in one piece with a small list of improvements.. stop the horn blowing on left handers, stop lights not working and an intermittent Acewell. The dash kept going to 0mph, rev counter erratic and sticking. Hopefully its just the plug into the loom loose as these things weren't there before the crash.

Some observations. Since the rebuild and suspension setup by MNR the car feels very stable combined with the new Yokohama Pradas. However the car did feel quite slow compared to the zetec engiend Westies, but as my engine temp was a chilly 58 degress due to having no thermostat in certainly didn't help.

So, next steps are the ST170 engine install, then better brakes, maybe some lighter uprights Toyota gearbox, soem proper dials for the dash and a heater... well I thought how good a heater would have been on Monday, if the engine temp had been up.

I've just picked a FWD Escort gearbox up off the bay that will be engineered to accept the W58 box to go behind the new power plant.

I have decided the trailer has to go as its in the way now, along with all the other junk I've accumulated. I need room to move the car around freely to facilitate the upcoming engine swap.

Split the weekend between the scooter and the car with hardly any beer to speak of, in fact in the garage until 1am Friday night/Sat morning without a drop. A first in my book...

Anyway with the scooter running and sporting a brand new performance carb (should see around 7bhp, thats total mind, not extra!) I've been working on the car.

I picked a new set of Yokohama Prada 2's on Friday and had them fitted at the local tyre place Saturday morning. With them nicely bolted up to the car I thought about how to fit the Ace. Not wanting to cut any holes in the dash I've mounted it on the column. I've used a 35mm exhaust clamp with a hole drilled through the flat piece and a 40 mm long piece of hex that has an M8 thread through it. I'm leaving the shroud off for now until I've driven it a bit and decided the final position of the column.

This morning I set about fitting the nose cone that I've been dreading. Making a cardboard template I marked the curve of the nose on the body work and trimmed it back. I used an electric sander for the fine adjustments smoothed it back until there is a nice small even gap with the bonnet. This time around I've recessed the body for the headlamp bar, not cutting into the nose at all. The bar bolts onto the chassis bracket that had bits of wood on last time round. At the moment the body is not secured to the chassis at the front as I want to do it a bit better than the wood I used before. And of course the nose cone is scratched to bits where it slid off the front and bounced off the block paving. ARGHHHH!! Well, I can't have it all going smoothly now can I??

Headlamp bar bolted to chassis let down into the bodywork instead of cutting into the nose cone.

Right then, having survived the threat of redundancy I'm back on it once more. One of my colleagues volunteered at the last minute so everyone is happy. Although, with one gone and the same amount of work, I'm actively seeking a new job.

Thats the good news, heres the bad... the new scuttle is now wearing 4 holes in the wrong position, one large one where for a minute I thought the steering was on the wrong side, two where the expansion tank was too high initially, and one where the mirror was in the wrong position. With all that in mind I'm attacking it little by little now with the dreaded cutting of the front body tub to fit the nose looming.. oh my god!

Tonight I've made a cardboard template for the nose fitting as the front of the body tub needs trimming back and secured the bonnet. With the expansion tank now a bit lower (back to its original position) the bonnet could be offered up and the bonnet clamps fitted.

I'm not enjoying this at the moment. Probably because I'll find out tomorrow if I'm redundant or not....
Today I've put the new inside rear guard on and all the lights back on. I've also been polishing the new bits and trying them on. Polished the bonnet removing all the marks from the original build up and offered it up to the scuttle... DOH! the expansion tank is too high, why didn't I measure the position from the old scuttle? OK, so how about the new aeroscreen I got last week? Fix it on with the mirrors, taped the aeroscreen on and measured the position of the mirrors. Offside first, everything OK, off to the nearside and measured the postion on the aeroscreen to match the other side and drilled the first hole. Hmm looks a bit further in.. earoscreen had slipped under the tape and one hole in the wrong position.... time to pack up and continue with the death by lager project.
As I've said, find out tomorrow if I'm out of work so I think I'll leave it till I'm in a better mood.

Trackday booked for 3rd November so plenty of time to get me head round it and get her back on the road.

Still a bit pi€€ed off with the crash, putting it back together reminds me of the crash. Underneath the car is still scarred with mud and grass where it was dragged out of the ditch, but I'm determined to get her back together and out on the road again. Soon!!

Today I've been fixing the bodywork around the cabin and bolting down the scuttle. This time I've kept the scuttle rigid by cutting holes for the steering column. I had to totally disassemble the column to get through the holes and it took ages fiddling with the little bits and bobs that make up the tilt mechanism but it was worth it, it looks a lot neater than cutting slots and chunks out of the dash. I'll need to cut the cowl back to suit the new set up but I want to drive the car about a bit and get the column in the right position first as I've also adjusted the brake pedal back a bit. New carbon look dash looks super!!

Got the offside rear wing on as well and will be cracking on tomorrow to get the rest sorted.

Got the car back yesterday. Went down to MNR with my locost trailer and brought it back. The new body tub is loosely fitted atm as the scuttle, bonnet and nose cone need to be fitted before the body is finally attached.

So, started by measuring the scuttle as I want to just have holes for the steering column instead of cutting slots out. This will keep the scuttle rigid as cuttign slots at the front mean the dash can flex all over the place.

Measured where the column comes out the back and transferred it onto the new scuttle. Cut the hole and tidied it up then realised it's on the wrong side! ARGGHHHH!!!! Abandoned ATM while I drink myself to death....

Stay tuned....