Hi my names Phil and here is a thread about my xr2, the car was bought with a good mate of mine as a project for the pair of us. The car came from Manchester way and was owned by an old guy who had shown the car back in the day. Original plan was just to use the car and enjoy it, first of all we changed all the shocks, new tyres, sump, lots and lots of bushes, gave it a service, new radiator. Then after a while we decided the car having had a bit of paint here and there in its life time would really benefit from a full respray. Also the underneath had been painted white previously and was starting to crack and peel off. So we stripped all this off and removed the body kit and all the interior to see what was required.



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The car was remarkably good for the age the floor plan was mint, the only real rust was the off/side rear arch and rear bottom quarter requiring repair and the start of a small hole in the front valence. The boot had some sort of door mat glued in there which was nothing but a water trap and required removing, so of the car went for welding and paint. We also had the yale locks removed and filled.

Pictures after paint.



Back from the paint and repairs we were pretty happy with the results there's a few flecks in the paint here and there its not perfect but that's life. Next came the painting of the arches and underneath which we tackled ourselves over a weekend with my mates compressor, on reflection we should probably have done this before the respray..





Well with all that done all the interior was cleaned and refitted, then came the body kit..... well it cleaned up pretty well the middle sill sections are slightly discoloured a common problem I believe. Then we had the headache of the body kit fixings, I managed to find a place to supply the rivets but all the other fixings were impossible to find lucky we saved some and my mate ben managed to make up the rest out of bits and pieces.

So here's the finished result, hopefully not to bad for our first resto. New number plates all round, new grey stripe and xr2 sticker and under bonnet decals.




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Well there we go it all took about 5 months and we thoroughly enjoyed doing it, I've had some cars over the years but the comments and attention this car attracts is amazing. There's a few jobs left to do maybe uprate the engine and carbs and maybe a escort s1 gearbox. I hope I haven't bored anybody too much or broken any forum rules by posting too many pictures this is my first post after all.

 

You have taken something really smart and made it even better. Well done.

Minds me of the B reg i had when it was new - of all the cars i have had it was the best.

 

Looks like a tidy car. Nice job. If only I could find the motivation to do my xr3i

 

Excellent job! Looks a really nice one!

 

May I ask what the paint job set you back?

Also, where did you get the boot sticker?

Oh, great job. My first car was a rosso red xr2 with twin 40's and a piper cam!

I feel the urge to do exactly what you're doing now, keep up the good work!

Nick.

 

Thanks guys, I think it really helped to have such a solid car to start with some of the ones I've seen on ebay since certainly would have required more bodywork than mine.

What has really helped me is the fact that jointly owning the car as obviously halved the costs which if your not carefull can easily get out of hand.

I think also momentum is so important, it so easy to put off jobs, you need that momentum to get a job done to move onto the next then next!

 

Thanks nick paint job was Ł1500 including the small amount of welding

The sticker was from ebay http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Ford-Fiest...item3a75f9105d I just emailed the guy and asked if he could do me a metallic grey one (we wanted to lose some of 80's red, the stripe, the sticker, red bordered number plates) and it was no problem atall apparently he has the official rights from ford to reproduce the decals.


My advice if you feel the urge to do something like this... go for it!! as my mate said "I don't want to sitting in a care home saying I wish I done this I wish I done that....."

 

looks mint,had one for 8 yrs loved it,apart from under bodykit most of it had rusted away

 

Looks really Fresh that pal top job

 

Thanks I appreciate that, just been reading your thread aswell, nice attention to detail you have and some nice hard to find parts aswell

 

Reminds me of my first xar I had at 17, a D reg white xr2,

Looks lovely after the paint, job well done.

 

Wow thats mint.

 

What a good job you've done....lovely wee car

 

that looks a lovely car that you have done very well with it, you can get a textured bumper paint in a few different shades that would make the kit look like new if you wanted most paint shops sell it and as i say it comes in different shades so you should be able to get a good match

 

thats one of the cleanest 2i's ive seen ,amazed at how good it is with the kit removed there usally hanging behind that,top job

 

That's a very nice example, well done

 

nice work!