Unfortunately yes!

Yesterday was a epic fail, my mate came in the morning so we can go get a 4ltr can of paint from the local auto paints place for the rally pack, on arrival the shop was closed so that's stuffed things up. Maybe I should've called first ! However, across the road is wreckers yard which my mate was looking for a super space saver wheel for his escort, luckily there was a mk6 fiesta with one still in the back, $50 and we're good 👍

On a better note, my mate arrived with a pair of black Recaro chairs he offered for $50 or a few old Classic Ford mags which I have got every one since Ford Heritage mag days but I stopped getting them back in 2017 as they seem to be the same stories on different cars that do the same mods, yawn 🥱 .
Next to the black ones is a pair of brown Recaro seats which someone done a bad recover job on . As I haven't played Singer since home ec in school, there's no better chair to practice on ! Deano has been giving lessons over email plus watching 100s of vids on this stuff. Best part is I can't make them any worse looking !!
Not being a hoarder but I now have 3x pairs of these now , 1 set is trimmed and in my blue mk1 van, plus these on the ute.
I've bought black leatherette with foam backing but don't know what to put in the centre yet, I've seen that quilted stuff from Ali and it's CNC stitched. Or the plaid pattern like in golf GTI which also has foam backing , I'm thinking more to this as it's not a ' go out of fashion' style, there's 1 with orange lines which I might get.
They'll be for the next van which is also orange . Buying from the origin country where it's made rather than local will be cheaper and quality can't be any different.

https://a.aliexpress.com/_mrQBeA1

Yeah I reckon I'll go the Golf style with the orange strips.
Going to make a sewing table this week , might use up an old house door as nicely flat and smooth, will cut to about 1mtr should be ok.
The sewing machine will be better set down below so it's stitch plate is level, Deano will know what I mean, he's got years of threading behind him.

Yes Deano I'll still consider that orange with logo, I'm not ruling that out yet.
Sewing table is nearly ready, I've countersunk the machine so the stitching plane is table height, used up my last piece of stainless sheet making the cradle. Also the misso likes it so that's a win !
Moving to the car, I've had a few items arrive by anorax, 1 item is a engine for my mower, it's now got 6.5bhp instead of the Broke & Strattons 3hp plus the engine is bran new. Now the other item that arrived the same time is my calipers bought from USA , I could've bought them here but would need to auction off a lung and kidney. I paid $45au each plus another $50 shipping. Calipers and brake cables are to suit a Mazda mx5 from 2007,. I choose these over Focus ones is they have a centre pull cable which in theory an Escort handbrake rod can fit with minor alterations . Calipers are to suit rotor up to 260mm roughly.
Cable should be the right length since mx5 is so close in wheelbase it's not funny



Also the slimline sump plugs arrived, if anyone wants to know they are Opel / Vauxhall /Holden Astra , 14x1.5mm , has a nice O ring arrangement too

Yeah there's a few brands that have this handbrake arrangement, Nissan pulsar and an old Peugeot are what I know of . Getting the Focus mk1 rear rotors from the shelf down I think they'll be ok to use but that's just eyeballing things up, the rotor dia is 257mm so if I decide to run 13s it'll be very tight .
On Saturday I got yellow paint for the rally pack, original Pine n Lime so I can get some parts in color soon, just waiting on weather and humidity to be better so maybe Wednesday , just doing the non outer parts first then the shell a week later.

Today I done a bit more sanding on the mk2 dash pad , it's getting to look more like a real one now with it's shape and curves , the original one is from the rally pack as comparison and compare with .


There's still a way to go to match shapes but as long as the clocks for nice and the ends look normal it should be good to pull a mold from.
Update on the bulkhead cover is it's kept shape of the car now and I'll get that ready as well

Yeah I hope so Deano, I'll think of covering it like yours so it's got the texture but hope it's not reactive to resins.

Spent the best part of today swapping cars about, mk1 out and mk2 in since the mk2 will be very close to painting . Since I dragged my mk1 out of the painting room, I thought it's not needing to be in the rotisserie anymore, I reckon it's been 6yrs on there. After cleaning and sweeping the area for some painting tomorrow, the mk1 was positioned over the hoist to make removal of the rotisserie a simple job instead of a frightening one like previously with the van .

Installed the wcxm with rack and lower arms, then the sway bar and front brackets, I don't the same truck as Mark, bringing the mounts forward 20mm , the original 1300 struts are in there till the car is mostly built so I can work out it's final ride height

Struts are a lot forward but that's at full droop

Rear leafs might be a little low , I had to drop the front bolts so I could slide the axle assembly in, the spring to chassis GSP wasn't big enough for the tiny 1300 brakes. Next is find a set of roller wheels