Hello all.

I have an unusual vehicle style, over the years I have bought less popular models and made them my own in my own way. I like them to look as though they left the factory upon first glance but modified upon closer inspection. I have two priorities, comfortable seats and good sounds. I am also a bit of a clean and shiny obsessive. Speed is not such an issue, I ride bikes for that....

This is my third Escort van, I started with a mk5 that was chosen by my work partner at the time. It came to me with terminal rust and in very poor condition, I nursed it for a year but couldn't save it. Then came a mk6 that I chose. It was starting to rust around the edges but still looked smart. After four years or so it was really coming together until somebody decided to modify the rear end for me and drive off without leaving a note. I drove it crumpled until I found the current mk6 replacement. It was showing 54k and was clearly looked after. It was, however, starting to brown along the front roof edge, rear arches, rear suspension mounts and sills, all the usual areas in fact. The near side wing had a large dent. I paid £1100 for it in 2015.

I gave it to my local paint man, he removed the screen, wheeled off the rust all round and blew it over. I fitted the mk5 XR3i wheels that I had re-painted myself and was running on the previous van, swapped the install over, gave everything a serious clean and ran it like that for three years:







The inner wings and load area were barely white, either the van had a BT history or Ford were not too bothered about painting these areas.....

 

There were some modifications, I wish I could find the pictures that I took at the time...

Central locking all round (aftermarket kit) and a CAT1 alarm/immobiliser allowed me to get in and out with a single button built into the key, the last part alone was some grief! Obviously the wheels, they required longer studs and some spacers to allow the rears to clear the arches as I wasn't prepared to dress them. Install wise there was a Nakamichi CD400 up front, 3 Alpine MRV-T707 amps under the seats, focal mids, tweets and crossovers in MDF builds behind the (Encore) door cards, a pair of 12s in a box behind the bulkhead (with quick release wires) and plenty of dynamat.

In 2018, Despite living in a 'nice' area, it suffered an attempted theft:





Two of them apparently, when the alarm sounded my neighbour opened his window and shouted at them and they 'ran' off. I slept through the incident, which at first I was livid about but now I am grateful as a confrontation could not have ended well....

Seeing as this is a daily drive work van and I am self employed I had to call my customer and explain, luckily they understood. It was not easy but I did manage to source a replacement door locally and fit it that morning, the bad news being that it was red. The roof and shell behind the door were both damaged, so all in all it looked a bit shabby.

Seeing as the initial rust removal and re-paint was three years old at this point the front roof edge, sills and rear arches were all showing through as bubbles under the paint. I had also had a little falling out with the paint man over a set of bike bodywork that I had given him, he managed to introduce a new dent in the fuel tank and denied all knowledge when I asked him about it, (I'm a great believer in putting a hand up if at fault) so the van certainly wasn't going back to him. About six months previously however I had met a local guy with a Monaro that had used a local paint shop and I was seriously impressed with the work. I went and met the paint man responsible, ummed and arred and commissioned him to sort out the paint:

Start of the stripping process:


The load area floor had surface rust in many places and needed welding in the tie off wells:


This bodyshop uses fibreglass rather then filler 'because it's stronger' so the finished areas looked a little red, still rust coloured but actually not... (if you see what I mean):


I knew that the A pillars were on their way but when revealed they were pretty bad. Welding and grinding happened here both sides:


More preparation:

 

I chatted with the guy that did all this sanding, he told me that it took him just over a day. I can't start to imagine how horrible that must have been.....

The paint shop owner called me and said that the red door hinges were too worn to allow reasonable alignment. He wanted the original door so that he could cut the mounts off and weld them to the red door, seeing as I had ditched the vandalised door I had to source another, (helpfully?) in white:


I chatted with the guy that painted the inside, he said that painting the 'ceiling' was grief, he had to paint a little then tip the gun down to get some more paint to the bottom of the pick up an hundred times over...




Unmasked:






The van had been with them around 10 weeks at this point, I was struggling along in the little hatch back courtesy car every day.... Naively I thought that it would only be a couple more days before it came back to me....

 

The paint shop owner told me that he had inspected the work and that it wasn't up to standard. He reminded me that I had told him that I was fussy and that he didn't want to have to re-assemble it and dismantle it again - so he instructed his team to prepare it and paint it again. Once done I think that the paint was around half an inch thick....

Three weeks or so later it had been re-painted, cut, polished and re-assembled. To be fair to the man the paint was very good indeed, not a swirl or hologram on it anywhere. I was pleased.

I was not idle while the van was away, I had sourced a set of Sierra / Onion pepperpots and (I must be getting old, I didn't paint them myself...) had them powder coated and fitted with five matching tyres. I had the bulkhead divider powdered matt black and a new pair of roof bars made and powdered gloss black. I know the roof bars don't look great but I do have to carry ladders now and again as well as the odd thing over 3m long that won't fit inside so I have to live with them. New genuine mirrors and front bumper lifted the look of the front and the rear bumpers were powder coated (the wrong colour actually but hey ho) along with new door rubbers, window seals and roof gutter trim clips.

The underside was also treated to 'quick' restoration: sanded clean and undersealed. Maybe not to the standard of the top but fine for an all year round every day vehicle preservation exercise. Certainly smarter than the average Escort van left out there....

The sills were drilled with 6 drain / ventilation holes each side. I was wary of this but the paint man said that he had done it before on other old vans and the sills had remained in good condition on them as they usually condensate and rust from the inside out. I pointed out that if the sills do rust then it will be him sorting them out..... Everything was waxoyled to death too.













The interior was still pretty smart at this stage, the rubber carpet is still hole free and the drivers seat has stood up pretty well to the 30k miles that I have put on it but there is a plan for it.... I have managed to source a NOS steering wheel and gear knob, that, combined, make a real difference to the driving experience:



The paint man added the black strips over the lower door shuts, I wasn't sure when I first saw them, he said that I could peel it off if I didn't like it but they have grown on me....