1972 Granada Mk1 coupe build - Still going... 14-10-2024

[grizz]

Feb 14, 2022 14:26:45 GMT eurogranada said:

Well, it's winter and with many other things going on, there's not really much to report on the granada. Still the same niggles, yet also still it just does what it should do evrytime I use it. With the nicer weather this weekend and needing the graage space for a project I used it some more and it's just a get in and go experience.

I do really want to look into LPG for it, as fuel prices have gone bonkers. It's no fun having a nice car but no spare money for the fuel...

Anyway, my project was finally buiding the workbench that could double as a saw table.

So see what I've made... No build pictures just end of day one and end result type shots. It was a really fun build and it's the lead in to building a wall cabinet that measures 325x224,5cm. It is to house our (new) 55" television, an electric ambiance hearth (no real flames but real heat), my old high spec audio system with (new) bookshelf speakers as my standing ones didn't fit the room anymore with the addition of a new sofa in 2019... So I have livingroom tunes again! Yeay!

Anyway, that will be quite the build and I thought it would be nicer to work on a bench... I had always planned on incorporating my toolbox on wheels, but due to the sheer size of it I had to take a different approach. Just putting it on beams would make it a very high workbench, it's not low as it is, so I attached it to my bench framework. Also I had always wanted a deep workbench as you always have to little room. But in order to keep some room between it and the car so I can actualy work behind it with the car inside I decided to make it only 61cm deep. I have 3 edges standing proud so I can use them to clamp stuff on. I also foresaw that my next big job would mean processing 7 large sheets of 12mm MDF board so to have something to work with I made an extension on the back. I can fold out a pair of supports and have a 61cm wide extra worktop rest on them. This is mainly for sawing of the large sheets. I made this 12mm thick for now as it will usually get a second sacraficial sheet put on top of it. The sacraficial part is in the fact that this sheet is there to put your workpiece on and just cut into a mm or so when sawing. When it gets too battered it can easily be replaced. If the 12mm proves too flexible, I have an exact copy of the sheet to add to it if I decide it needs it.

Have a look at my weird and wonderful contraption...

That looks great.


I do love a “ simple solution “

[eurogranada]

Thanks for the compliments gents!
Much appreciated..

[gess]

That workbench is really looking smart. It seems very practical, at least for clean woodshop work, maybe not so much for dirty engine and gearbox work.
How stable is it when you fold up the table? I would assume it could fall over if you put too much weight on the unsupported side.
nice to read thqt the Granada is performing as it should. That bodes well for the new 2022 season!

[eurogranada]

Feb 16, 2022 8:32:47 GMT gess said:

That workbench is really looking smart. It seems very practical, at least for clean woodshop work, maybe not so much for dirty engine and gearbox work.
How stable is it when you fold up the table? I would assume it could fall over if you put too much weight on the unsupported side.
nice to read thqt the Granada is performing as it should. That bodes well for the new 2022 season!

In reality I do a lot more wood related stuff than mechanical tinkering these days. As the Granada is relatively done. Although adding LPG would be a nice new project and rebuilding a fresh engine as well. The Granada engine runs well, but I feel the distribution sounds like it is going to explode one day (maybe soon, maybe not haha). That would be a worry... Building a fresh engine is expensive... and parts like chain guides for these are not too common anymore.

Back to the workbench, it's very stable. And as the toolbox contains heavy tools, I don't expect it to tip over anytime soon. Keep in mind the extended worktop is only meant to act as a saw table, to give the wood/board that is on there to be sawn the support it needs to get nice straight cuts. And even then mostly the cutting will be done on the tool box side. It's not intended for heavy engine parts in extended mode. But as a workbench, the 24mm thick top provides enough rigidity to carry decent weight. I think it will do well for my kind of home shop work. A metal top for future welding may be added at some point.

It's going to prove how capable it is pretty soon anyway... I'll keep you all informed.

[eurogranada]

So I've been quiet for a while. That is because life has been consumed mostly by work, some diy projects and the clearing of my elderly home (is that correct? I mean my parents house that I grew up in). Mainly the latter has been a huge drain on energy both phisically and mentally.

But, before going more into that, I can say I had an impromptu drive in the Granada yesterday with my wife. Was actually very much fun! The Granada itself is still awesome to drive. That power from the 2.9 bobbie is just so good....
The problem is that I can't drive it without thinking when will it blow up?? I think I hear the distribution getting louder each and every time... And then there are some small niggles that I should take care of but that I just can't put myself to doing: thing like an audio wire that is dodgy and means one speaker cuts out regularly, the fual gauge always reading empty with half a tank or so left and therefore being useless, the cubbies I still need to make to finish off the seat base area, a non operable mileometer, a dodgy wire to the ignition which means that only with a fully charged battery the car will start, otherwise I think voltage drops too far (as the direct to starter hotwire always gets the engine running). Little things really, but they require access in a way that makes them pretty big jobs... Then there's the exhaust that could do with fine tuning as it's louuuud. And then there's the real kicker, due to current fuel prices and the thirsty nature of this engine, I really should look into LPG and while I'm at it building a new/fresh motor. It's just not economic currently. But I don't have the car not to use it...

All of this counters the high, the rush I get when actually driving the thing pretty quickly after parking it.
But, just seeing it looking great in the garage or outside I know I love what I've made of this thing to bits. I love it all... the blunt nose with the huge square lights, the bulky back with the big tail lights, th ebright in your face colour, the beautiful custom interior that suits the car so well, just everything. So I know I need to fix those last items to my satisfaction... but time is at a premium and energy low...


So back to the time between this and my previous update.

I had three projects on the go. I had a (by wife and daughter) long desired cine wall build. Our house got new maintenance free windowpanes, glass and doors requiring new curtains, a piece of missing floor to be added etc. and I had a heater/radiator cover with window sill to build.

I started with the cine wall. A scratch build of a 3.25 by 2.25m cabinet. It was to look like the thing was made of 7cm thick boards. I designed a custom cine wall that in the end consisted of 49 board sections, 99% of which were to be sawn at a 45 degree angle. The structural parts needed to make this cabinet a reality were a further 65 parts. They were made into 18 (I believe) prefab sections that required 3 layers of paint on 3 surfaces so about a 150 painted faces... Oh the joy.... It took me five weeks to make the parts (after work, sports, children) and 3 days during one week to build the cinewall in situ.

So does the new workbench do what I need it do do? Hell yeah! I couldn’t have been more happy with it. It was designed to work in the small footprint I have and be versatile in use and it really turned out to be just that. The sacrificial saw board meant I could make perfect cuts without sawing into my workbench top or losing support for the panel as I was sawing. Very pleasant to work that way. I could move it about where I needed it, I could clamp the boards in the right places so far and The height was even so convenient that a workmate with my small table saw on it lined up with the top of the workbench. Allowing for long board cuts that I didn’t make with the circular saw and rail to easily find support when pushed off the end of the table. Also a luxury compared to how I used to have to work.It’s also movable enough to get it in and out of the garage, although the step in level means I really should create a transitional board to make that more easy.

Why so many parts? Well, 7cm thick planks would be really heavy, hard to find and expensive. So they were made from scratch as hollow planks consisting of a bottom board, a facia and a top board in a U-shape with a structural support in between connecting top and bottom board lengthwise for strength… Add to that the parts needed to actually mount the whole thing together and it adds up quickly.
I’m not one to quickly say I’m proud of things I do, but I’m most definitely proud of this cine wall. It’s also functional in the exact way it was meant. I love the TV location and the flexibility that it’s mount gives me, the fact I can now have my stereo back in action (with new book shelf B&W speakers that give me goosebumps) and the lighting plus hearth.
Is it really finished? Nope, I need to add doors to the lower sections. They are in the making.

Right some images then. The picture uploader seems to make a little bit of a mess of the order (sorry).





































































Next up I’ll quickly show my window sill radiator cover creation. It was made the way it is to aid hot air being able to reach the room. So the top is a combination of an open section that air can get through and a normal flat board section. A small fan system aids that. The front is also made of beams to aid heat dispersal as well as giving a nice look. It was not meant to fully hide the radiator so it’s a bonus have the radiator look a bit ok. As we currently have the sofa in front of it and no intention to switch up the living room staging, it’s a moot point for me anyway now. I do really like the small visible part though. The ladder effect of the small beams is just what I had envisioned. And although not practical now, the thing is so sturdy that one can sit and stand on it!

This thing also took some time to make as the corner where it turns to meet the new window frame is also cut at 45 degrees and it just took about 38 beams over three lengths and obviously a support structure to become what it has. And again, 3 layers of paint on 3 sides of all these parts… It gets tedious lol. Luckily the weather those 2 weeks was superb.

Again, some piccies.









Well that leaves me the new PVC/metal windowframes. It was one thing we had on our wish list for a while. Some of our wooden frames were rotten even though they were visually in good nick as painted 4 years ago. You couldn’t however have a window open as when a gust of wind would grab it, it was likely to shear the fixings from the frames complete with the wood as it had cracks and filled areas. A design flaw if the neighbors are to be believed. Not a problem if kept up, but our previous owner was financially unable to do the required upkeep leading to these issues. So we made the call to use the crazy financial housing market to generate funds. We opted to do the full house including front door and swapping a single garden door/window combination for a two door with side glass combi, which lead to 7 frames consisting of 9 panels.

On our wedding day the work started. Four days were planned, three were needed in the end as the superb weather meant they could work faster than normal. It was messy, loud, intrusive, but the house is more beautiful then ever. I had the week off to aid with on the spot decisions and I used that time to do all the painting on the cine wall and the other jobs like adding a bit of flooring and curtains etc.

As I didn’t do the work, just the constant cleanup and paid the bills, I’ll just show some before and afters…






































During all that, actually it started in November 2021, I had first the remodel of my parents’ new abode. One hundred m2 of flooring and 342m2 of painting later we had them moved in by mid December, but then in January the real job started: clearing their home of 47 years in which they had filled every bit of space. And it’s not a small place to start with… So around all of the above, a 36-40 hour work week and sports 3 times a week I squeezed in one to one and a half day of clearing as well.

Not only has this meant being very busy almost non stop for months now, it’s also proven mentally draining. It’s slow going and there’s just so much stuff there. Every inch won is immediately lost to the next bunch of stuff. Clearing the attic alone has taken almost 4 months. And then there’s the battle of wits, over things that we see as trash and my parents as treasure, but they don’t have the space for it all. The sheer volume and never endingness of the work is hard to deal with. But, after 5 months, we’re getting closer!

That brings us more or less up to date….

[teaboy]

No wonder you had no time for the car!

[varelse]

I just helped my parents move from the house I grew up in, in to their new house where they have retired on the coast.

Luckily my mum is just as brutally practical as I am and follows the ethos of; if you haven't seen or used it in over a year, it needs hard justification to not go in the skip.

Don't even ask about the storage boxes that are still packed from before they moved IN to that house.

I think they took longer digging through all of the junk just to see if there was anything worth donating/selling haha

[eurogranada]

Thanks for that!

We are now seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Although at times I wondered which tunnel it was, the one to a life that is my own again or the tunnel to heaven...

It's been a mammoth effort, but the house will soon be on the market. It will be fotographed in exactly one week time. It's now mostly empty but not there yet. We need to get rid of the 50 boxes we've been recycling over and over for doing away with old paperwork and there's some furniture stuff still there. One final push to get the last bits to the dump and put some furniture in a better place for the pics. Then when it sells we'll need to make sure all furniture is gone and the garage empty. There's only really useable stuff in there now but it can't stay.

Being there's four of us to do this job I focussed on the sides I could at least deal with, like emptying the garage and the last bits in rooms where at least most of the paperwork and random stuff had been processed. Also did a lot of the trips to the dump. Having a van makes that easier. Others dealt with the processing of the paperwork and endless boxes. It's been a team effort.

I'll be sad to see the house go, as I grew up there, but it will also mark the end of 8 months of heavy labour. And though we knew how much stuff there was, I think none of us had expected how slow going it would be. Mostly as my parents weren't ready for many things to be discarded and wanted to have a say in everything. That has been a learning curve, but they've come pretty far. Never as far as we'd regard far enough, but it's what it is. The house will probably sell quick enough and for a good price so no real worries there.

It will be good for all of us, including our parents, to have closure. Will that be tha last of it? No, the new place needs some lights hung and possibly a new kitchen. And the garage at the new place will need a second going through, but that is all lower priority stuff.



At least all of the above has meant that some of my own mojo is returning. So I had the Granada re-appraised for another 3 year stint of insurance. This meant washing and generally caring for it a little bit. The appraiser still loved my car a lot. And it presents equally as good as three years ago. It's value has been compensated for the higher price levels we are now seeing throughout life. And I'm fine with that. I have to pay the premium based on the value so this keeps it real. An actual increase in value of the car can be had by changing the engine over to a fresh one. As that represents a fair chunk of money usually. Putting in LPG will not add much value according to him. I doubt that, as reduring the fuel cost to 1/3rd in these times surely must be worth something.

I've also taken it out a couple more times and really enjoyed that. Although I need to do some things to the car to enjoy it even more (fixing one audio lead is the no 1 issue lol). I'm working on making a list and then when my life is more my own again, making a serious start on the niggles.

I also finally had enough mojo to empty out the back of my van with all the stuff I now inherited from my parents as it needed to be rehomed. So not only is my van mine to use as I like instead of a mobile storage space again, I also don't have to fear stuff flying everywhere in cornering.

I'll be busy for a while to come, but I feel like I'm moving forward again.

Have a picture of the car looking gorgeous while I was sorting the van and garage.

[varelse]

I imagine if you can manage to pull off a duel fuel setup that doesn't look out of place on top of the engine, it may help with value a bit.
But I think most people would look at a car like this and justify the extra fuel cost as the price you pay for having a cool old car that sounds great and goes hard.

[CaptainSlog]

Would an LPG installation effect the performance? you say it would cut the cost by 60% is that due to the price of LPG or is it more efficient? We do not have LPG powered cars in South Africa so I have no idea about them.

[varelse]

You lose performance, it's pretty much just about the fuel cost.
They're no longer viable here (Australia) as the cost of lpg has gone up so much and the price of conversions hasn't changed. And you need to keep the system certified every year or two.
From what I understand you still need to run on petrol every so often so seals etc don't dry out.

I suppose ivanhoew would be able to weigh in with experience, as Medusa is pure lpg?

[giuseppe916]

www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/11738449/why-richard-hammond-drives-on-lpg-volvo-200org/10

[eurogranada]

May 27, 2022 13:59:01 GMT CaptainSlog said:

Would an LPG installation effect the performance? you say it would cut the cost by 60% is that due to the price of LPG or is it more efficient? We do not have LPG powered cars in South Africa so I have no idea about them.

If you use LPG injection, with 1 injector per intake runner, no, not really. I've driven LPG cars for years as a young(er) man (my parents used to run it always) and with the later systems from the mid 90ies, I could not discern if I was running on LPG or petrol. This last system was one of the first LPI systems from Vialle.

I understand that as the LPG has a higher octane rating some even say they see improved performance. These days there are also add-ons to the system that can keep temperature and valve seat recession in check.

I guess it's down to choosing the right system for the application.

The price reduction is mainly because even at record prices currently, the LPG is about 1/3 to 40% of the price of petrol. Even with the cost of a system it would not take too long to earn that back. Given I can get half a system for free and only need to buy things like lines and the tank itself and I intend to do the build myself this is even less of an issue.

[eurogranada]

May 26, 2022 0:38:15 GMT varelse said:

I imagine if you can manage to pull off a duel fuel setup that doesn't look out of place on top of the engine, it may help with value a bit.
But I think most people would look at a car like this and justify the extra fuel cost as the price you pay for having a cool old car that sounds great and goes hard.

As my car is already fitted with a non standard engine the fact the LPG would be visible or not is not the deciding factor in whether an LPG system adds value or not. Although my engine cover would cover many of the parts. Things like (future) availability are more a factor. Also the associations with the LPG systems themselves being more harmful to engines don't help. And in our market the political climate having killed off many LPG cars in the past decade means that there's little demand and this in turn feeds into the dwindling demand and availability issues. And therefore this is reflected in little extra value purely for having an LPG system fitted.

I also agree that due to the political climate, fuel cost has become more accepted as you say: as the price to pay for driving something cool.

[eurogranada]

May 28, 2022 1:12:53 GMT varelse said:

You lose performance, it's pretty much just about the fuel cost.
They're no longer viable here (Australia) as the cost of lpg has gone up so much and the price of conversions hasn't changed. And you need to keep the system certified every year or two.
From what I understand you still need to run on petrol every so often so seals etc don't dry out.

I suppose ivanhoew would be able to weigh in with experience, as Medusa is pure lpg?

We only have an initial inspection for LPG systems and it's probably a part of the MOT as well. But we don't have two year checks on these systems in our country.

Most systems from the mid and late 90ies up, already start on pertrol and swap over after a certain time/distance.

[eurogranada]

It's called an update, but I consider this more of a massive downdate...

Something bad has happened, something that shook me and had me trembling on my feet. I need to tell you that my Granada is once again on life support. In a battery disconnect induced coma even.... to give away the punch line before starting to tell the joke: she had a wiring loom fire. I could prevent real fire from breaking out by doing the disconnect asap and making sure there was nothing smouldering anymore. Still the damage was done, the car was dead.... It took me a while to realise it was just a coma, but still a hefty trauma needing serious surgery and transplants to patch up. I'm gutted really. And you know when it happend? Obviously three days before the biggest national Ford Granada meetup I've been thwarted to attend so many times in the past few years... So I missed that again!!! That in itself was a bummer as this was the full on summer edition again, while the one I visited and won best of show was only a winter and therefore smaller event.

The back story? I was asked to drive the Granada to a Gala evening that Charlotte was invited to as a plus-one by two of her girlfriends as she had missed her own gala. The intended limo and other car ideas all fell through because of availability or cost. So trusty old dad and the granada were (t)asked. Although after seeing a pic they did really love the car and were more than happy to driven around in it.

So the evening comes and Lotte and her friends are ready. The granada is as well as she always is. So we set off and we hit traffic almost immediately after turning onto the motorway. I wasn't worried by that as the dual fans always keep the car a very hot cool. Meaning I feel it's running hotter than I'd like, yet the gauge says no worries and the fans come on when needed (but it always feels a bit late). Anyway this time the engine temp got higher than I'm used to. I couldn't hear the fans over the girls enjoying the radio, but I sort of knew they couldn't be on given the gauge indication. As this slow going traffic took 45 minutes, the temp gauge rose and rose. Never hitting red, but then again, it shows normal temp as cold-isch also, so I knew it couldn't go much higher for fear of loosing/blowing out the coolant or a head gasket etc. But just in time traffic got moving and in the next few miles the temp dropped to cold-ish like normal. Phew, dodged a bullit there, and shat some (bullits) as well.

I thought I was home free, but when we get to the venue, the wait was again about 40 minutes, which this time proved too long. Just before the girls and the granada's big moment in the spotlights it dies on me. No restarting by key. After 3 minutes I got it started by screwdriver, but not long enough to make it through. The enginebay was soo hot, fuel evaporated in the lines and didn't make it to the injectors. We had to be pushed... oh the horror, the shame, the jokes... people still clapped like maniacs for either the car or the girls. So they still had a great time. Some environmetally friendly jokes were made as well, with me not laughing...

Anyway, the girls are out and I get pushed a final 25 meters so I could park out of the way. I let the car cool for a few minutes and start it by screwdriver. It fires up and runs hot-ish but normal. I get in and speed off without stopping, to create airflow. The engine cools down to normal on the way home. And I think "well, I've made it, now just find out why the fans didn't kick in". So I parked the car on the drive, walked the wife with the doggies and got back half an hour later. Bonnet was unlocked but closed as I had had a short look for anything amiss before walking the doggies, but I couldn't find anything.

So it's now 20:00hrs or so and I haven't had a meal yet. So as my wife was making some diner for me, I thought I'd put the car in the garage. I thought I'd chance a key start, as the temp had gone down by now and the trip meant the battery should have enough charge to overcome the voltage loss issue on that one starting wire. I turn the key, the starter makes a noise like it's going to do what is required, when suddenly the sound dies away (after only a second or so) and is replaced with two bellowing magic smoke plumes... One from the location of the ecu, the other from the loom just after where it enters the car and splits in smaller bundles. It was a thick brownisch smoke that really linguered. I heard a bit of sizzling and rushed to undo the negative battery clamp. Fortunately for me the bonnet was unlocked but resting in place and a bahco was close by. I got the battery undone, cracking my phone glass in doing so. I check inside wave around some air with a cloth but nothing flames up and no more active (fresh) smoke. A full on fire was therefore prevented thank god, but enough damage was done.

At that moment, trembling still, I though the car was dead.... at least I considered it dead.

A day later and some of the will to fight had been restored. Now to find out what the damage is exactly. How hard it will be to find a matching ecu/pats and key etc.... And if the insurance will payout anything at all... it was just re-appraised two weeks earlier...

Obvioulsy the fans not coming on was the prelude to the loom going up in magic smoke, so it's all explicable. But what is the cause? Is it the engine loom that now got so hot the cracked insulation (remember this replacement engine was put in with the working but fragile original badly insulated loom) couldn't handle it? Not sure as the fans never came on even before the car ran overly hot. Implying the underlying problem was already there. Also typical that the smoke came from the known good part of the loom, which is not to say that a short further up the chain caused it. But still. So has it maybe chaffed through some wires where the loom enters the car? I had put protective beading around the metal edges but maybe not enough or some of it got lost? At my last check though I'd not seen any evidence of a problem in that area.

Whatever it is, maybe I'll find out after dismantling the dash and engine bay. I don't dare putting in a new ecu and ecu loom without also changing over the engine and box loom now so it is really an engine and box out job...to gain sufficient acces. Not something I'd like to do in my driveway, but I may have little choice. I'll see when I have a bit of time how hard it's going to be to get the loom from the engine bay. I just hope I can find a new set of ecu, key and pats module...they are supposedly coded together. And possibly a replacement ecu loom to modify (as mine was to fit the granada)...

Anyhow, the good news is that the will to fix the car again has come back to me.

At least it looked good just before leaving and my daughter looked beautiful and all concerned had a great evening that they would not have wanted to miss.

[westbay]

Sorry to hear this...

MeGaSquirt ??

[grizz]

That is a bit of a bummer on the car.

As you say, happy child, proud dad…..

Car is tomorrows concern.

[eurogranada]

Jun 14, 2022 7:09:59 GMT westbay said:

Sorry to hear this...

MeGaSquirt ??

I can't justify the cost of aftermarket ecu stuff really. If I can find it, the original stuff is very much more affordable and it is also 100% geared towards making the most of the engine/box performance combo. It's also easiest to replace like for like as it's all derived from the original donor so pretty much plug and play apart from stripping excess wiring.

I'm not very much into aftermarket ecu stuff, but I've not only got to control the engine, but I also need to control the gearbox. I've also read a lot about issues in supporting the VIS system on the intake. It is more complex than just opening and closing it from x-y rpm as is often implemented when aftermaket ecu's are used. I also would have worries about the maps. Is there one for this engine, probably plenty, but how safe are these etc. I'm not looking to make the car fly either, its performance is fine on the standard ecu.

But I'm not excluding any options either at the moment. I just need to see first how extensive the damage really is to determine the best direction to go.

It may be a little while though before I can get into this due to other commitments for the coming two weeks.

[eurogranada]

Jun 14, 2022 7:15:38 GMT grizz said:

That is a bit of a bummer on the car.

As you say, happy child, proud dad…..

Car is tomorrows concern.

Quite right!

It just took me a while to get to that point, but now I'm once again fully committed to resurect the car.