Hi all, Against all better judgement, I have started restoring possibly the worst RS2000 in Australia.

Welcome to the forum mate
I remember seeing this for sale a while back, and Thort to myself, it's not really as bad as it looks , but it does look bad !
Hope you can got it completed at some point.
How strange a 4dr has the Greg Carr coloured stripes, if you know the history, please let us know.

Yeah , its not good.... but I have found a few guys down in Tassie, willing to help me out with parts, I just need to be realistic about what is achievable! So a full mint resto is out of the question, My plan is to get it rolling again, I intend to go with the flat front rally nose for now, well until I can gather up a full RS nose.
 
Thinking about not having a timeline to finish.....

wow, yeah Ok, you win in the most committed stakes to begin with.
Just start on one bit at a time, and work at it.
 
But thats seems to be more and more the norm for the UK guys to start with?
At least out rusty old wrecks are 'dry' rusty, as opposed to soggy arse, dragged from a farmers field in Wales wrotten.
 
So are you in Aus, Tas, or Ireland, doing in undertaking this one?
I wonder if it would be worth considering pickign up a donor car, just for so many of the odds missing from your shell.
 
Glad to see another havign a crack, keep us up to date and welcome.

Yeah Marty, The first I noticed when I saw it for sale was the rally colour job. Copying the Colin Bond one?
I wonder if this car started as an RS?
 
 
have a look at this link
https://www.shannons.com.au/club/news/racing-garage/ford-escort-mark-2-a-rallye-sport-world-champion/
 
If my research is correct, Bob Holden did a number of MK2 RS conversions on stock escorts. My RS (suppose its really a replica?) with the cossie started life as a 1975 1.3 coupe. I have known of two panel vans which received the same treatment.
If anyone can correct or expand on this I would be really interested.
For some reason I have kept the pic of the Blue RS (somewhere in the UK?) on my desktop.

That UK RS rust is so bad the windscreen has left the chat !

A friend of mine thought he was in a winner a few years back, find a 69 mk1 Escort project from Port Lincoln so he trailered it back to Adelaide , a 16hr round trip.. it was so rusty that the boot lid skin broke away from the frame somewhere near Port Augusta, then the drivers door skin started flapping so that needed taping back on, when I went to see it I couldn't stop laughing, even the metal dash panel was full of rust holes. I opened the door and it fell off, no floor, no chassis. He sold it to a keyboard warrior I know for 500 , he came down from Peterborough to collect it, fool !
He reckons he'll restore it, he can't even weld, not that there's any good metal on it, the whole shell needs replacing

Myself and the RS live a couple of k/m outside Hobart Tas, I was a welder for a few years back in Ireland, and have done a little bit of body work, nothing of this scale! I have gathered up a load of parts for it, so I think my next stage is throwing it all together and see whats missing, my main concern is nuts, bolts and fasteners, I won't know whats missing until I need it.... Good idea about the doner car, I just need a complete mint RS2000 that I can strip for parts.....

I cant, seem to fix my location details. Will try later.

Wouldn't that defeat the purpose !

You'd be better to get a 4dr Ghia or Rally pack that's less rusted as yours and use what you can.

Big question is how far do you go at chopping up a good car to repair a rusty one , is doing a reshell still a thing ?
Someone in Newcastle is/was selling new mk2 2dr shells for about $13k just saying !!

Somehow Marty I think Nicmag2 was taking the piss re donor car???
Plenty of help here and the fb (if you ignore all the scammers) for sourcing bits