Basically my KA had a bit of a misshap this evening resulting me on the end of a pole up an AA vans rear end ...


Driving around before entering on the motorway i picked up my mate before we went to the bodyshop to pick up his car, the thermostat symbol was flashing at me, pulled over the side of the road, checked the water level and oil and everything seemed to be fine, turned it off and had a fag for about 10minutes to cool the engine down a little bit...

set off again and literally a meter or two down the road it started flickering, then it went off for about 5minutes it seemed intermitten as if the sensor was having a spazzz.

anyways joined the motorway and it started doing it again i was like ffs! heaters went from boiling hot, to bone cold, to stinking of oil, kept on driving a little further and all you could hear was knocking from the bottom end and steam/smoke pouring out the back at this point it was loosing power badly, dropped it down a gear to see if it had power and nothing (not sure if the KA's ECU tells the car to shut off fuel pressure and put it into a fail safe mode or something) anyways, pulled over on the hard shoulder pulled the bonnet catch and it poured smoke and steam out everywhere humming of oil! feel sorry for people on the motorway they couldn't see S@#t!

anyways, AA came and picked me up, dropped me off home had some dinner and went to start taking the car to bits, i took the rocker cover off and it was just oil, no water or creamy mess inside i was like wtf! checked the dipstick level and it was on the requirement i was like ey, what's gone on here!? put some fresh water in it, fired up straight away, no knocking, heaters warm, bloody freaky...

left it running for a minute and it was boiling up throwing all the water out, steaming...
so at this point i thought it was the thermostat getting stuck shut or open, i changed it when it cooled down put fresh water in it run it up, fan kicking in, staying at the same water level, heaters warm all was completely fine, was so freaky!

drove it around tonight all was well and good until i pulled into my road to get on the drive, completely missfiring, konking out, eventually started it back up and steam was pouring out the exhaust, checked the water header tank and it's boiled it all up again like no other again i was like GRRR! at this point it's sitting on my drive in shame.

im bored of the pony power and really can't be flumped to change the head gasket (if it is that)

how hard is it to put a 1.6 Zetec Silver top in it and run that?

Cheers, Nathan

 

2 litre it

 

1.6 would be a awaste of time, 1.8 or 2.0 have better cams/heads so are much better, theres a convertion kit for it as well

 

but it's the fact i can buy a full 1.6 escort for Ł130 tomorrow?
cheap power and when i get bored of it i'll drop the 2litre in as plug and play

 

cud get u a complete, still in the car, running, low mile 2 litre blacktop mondeo 2moro for Ł400 ?

 

i probably could but it's way too much work atm as i need a car for work etc...
the Silvertops are easier to fit than the Blacktops and you have to get a different sump, flywheel, clutch, oil pickup for the 2.0 blacktop mondeo engines

i was gunna run the escort around until i prep my KA for the zetec conversion, when its ready gut the escort and put it in the KA as it's easy to do..

i just need a car and need to get rid of one quick, theres already 6 cars in our household as it is! lol

 

Perhaps buy the Escort anyway. Gut it of all the parts for the conversion, weigh the shell in and sell a few bits and you'll make a lot of your money back.

Then buy a 2.0 lump and fit that instead, using bits of the 1.6 to convert it.

Might as well just do the engine swap once, saves faffing about removing it again!

 

put another std engine in it and save forthe 2 litre