Found them - MiniSport
 
https://minisport.com.au/products/13x7-rs4-for-escort-rim-et6-pcd-4x108-set-of-5?variant=45582327972150
 
Will probably need to call them though as they're out of stock. It'll be a while till i need them though so I'll file them away in the escort folder for now. 

Welcome! this is an awesome base and i love how long youve kept the car and smart move keeping it dry stored, makes so much of a difference!

Thanks Robbie! The family over in the UK keep asking me if I want to sell it to them 

Been out in the garage but forgot to take photos sorry! The diff has been in and out like 5 times to grind off the sway bar brackets, line up and mark the new brackets position, weld on the tramp rod brackets, mock fit up and then back out again to be stripped and painted. 

It all fit first time which was nice - I had a go at welding in the chassis brackets under the car I'm not happy with the results so I'll fall on my sword and get the body shop to fix them up. Nothing ventured nothing gained as the saying goes.

Worth a shot at welding them on , even I wouldn't be keen welding up side down either, the welder needs to set up just right so it doesn't blob on your arm or foot.. the tramp kit on my mk2 was done with an arc some 25yrs ago, still solid , I wasn't much of a welder back then..
Doing a diff in n out multiple times is when you quickly get sick of looking at it , if it was empty that'll make life easier

My main concern is floor pan flex TBH - the pan is so thin and one of the attachments is welded straight to the floor with no other support, it seems to me it could crack over time. I'm considering putting in a reinforcement plate in the interior to spread the load out and make to whole thing a bit more sturdy.

I did a massive clean up today and took the diff out the housing - speaking of making life easier I should have done that first TBH , at least i got a good workout yesterday.


 
It's a lot cleaner now, it was a mess after all the grinding and welding. Back in the day I blew the diff doing a traction test and had to replace the center, I forgot what the ratio of the new center was - turns out it's a 3.9 which is a spot of luck and will marry up to a 5 speed quite well. It'll be sent off to a bloke here in Melbourne for a rebuild and a LSD center, will probably go with Helical.   


 
Here is a shot of the housing with the tramp rod brackets on, it bugs me that they aren't symmetrical but that's where the rods wanted to sit at ride height with everything nipped up. I'm sure once its all painted and together I'll lay awake at night thinking about it .
 

 
 
 

LSD, a good choice for fast road is a quaife LSD, it's very user friendly and no after adjustments required ever, unlike the clunker fomospo type . 3J, pricey for no extra gains.. which ever one you decide it'll be great fun getting the RS to slide ! I'm doing some research on the new brand on the block which has been used in drift cars and truck racing etc , look up Black Line LSD , they were cheap but are on par with quaife etc for performance... I'm thinking of getting one for the mk1 at a later stage..

RS 4 spoke update, I was told the next batch will be in store around March so if you want a set, get your name on them, first in with cash he gets them

Blackline I looked at a little while ago actually so it's good to know they have some chops. Also Palmside in NZ sell them.
 
https://palmside.co.nz/collections/blackline-lsds-atbs/products/blackline-atb-type-lsd-units-english-22-or-16-spline
 
With the wheels I am still on the fence, it's good to know that he is getting them in though. 

I was out in the garage again today, pulled the engine out and stripped it down. The hope was to just giving it a quick look over to make sure everything was good, hone the bores, get it decked and then put it back together. Unfortunately though the engine shop who did the rebuild - which has done less than 5000km - did a absolute butchers job on it. I am beyond annoyed. I have no recourse though because the job was done when I was 19 - almost 20 years ago.

Two burnt exhaust valves, scuffs on every cylinder wall and piston skirt, 1 and 4 conrod bearings scuffed and what looks to be and incorrect thickness thrust bearings to boot... Part of me is glad I stopped driving it when I did, so good work younger me. I can't imagine the extent of the damage if I kept driving it. 
 






Thankfully the crank looks ok and I still have some meat in the bores so it's salvageable. Wasn't expecting a full rebuild but hey here we are.

Happy New Years Everyone. My resolution is to get this car back on the road in less than two years !

After drowning my sorrows with a few glasses of red it was back to it. I've wrapped and numbered the engine bits and chucked them in a box. In a few weeks I'll be dropping the lot down to a place called Pearl Engineering, they've been recommended from multiple people so I'll get them to cast an eye over and give me a report on what needs done.

In the meantime I cracked on with the front calipers. We had a nice morning here so it was time to clean them up and paint them. 

 
 
Getting all the gunk off took a good hour with the brush and wire wheel. Once they were clean I hit them again with some thinner then acetone to get the last remaining residue off. After that I hit them with two light coats of caliper black, then a final thicker coat.
 

 


 
They've come up pretty good, I picked up four new pistons and a new rubber kit from Yesterford today and I've got a spacer kit coming for them so I can fit vented rotors on the front. I think they'll look nice with the contrasting pins and clips etc. I'll also hit the rotor hats and edges with the same paint once once I pick them up. Same with the rear calipers once I grab them.



 
 

That engine internals looks like it's played a stage or 2 in the Dakar Rally !
When you mentioned the thrust bearing, it brought back a memory of when I used to thrash the life out of my mk2 pinno, then sitting at the lights waiting I heard what sounded like a small bell in the crank case... It quickly went away after a few seconds but since then each time I press the clutch pedal it caused the revs to drop, I knew straight away what happened but kept driving like a loon for 6 months till I got a good motor built to swap out. Once the rattler was removed I dropped the oil and sump, there it was, a twisted half thrust bearing in the shape of a ch2 logo, lucky no mess or swarf etc was found so I installed a new set of thrust bearings (next size up) and sold to a mate who also thrashed it for years after without any problems. Pintos are a tough little engine ..

That's a spot of luck , never good finding bits like that in the sump!

The thrust bearing out of mine barely had contact wear on it - only on one half right on the edge, it probably needed one size up minimum. 

All the new bits are in the calipers and they're on the bench curing so I started on the diff today. Stripped it back to metal, cleaned it and hit it with some heat to get any residue off then a brushed on a few coats of KBS. Not 100% happy with how it leveled out so far. I'll probably let it cure, give it a slight rub back and then give it another coat.