Tuesday 16th August. Front suspension alterations - again!

 My visits to Gaz shocks and Burton Power Products on Monday to try and buy new springs for the green Cortina turned out to be quite unsuccessful. They can order new springs but both have a one month lead time. (Apparently Mk1 Cortina's have their own specific spring diameter and other springs from Escorts and Cortina's don't fit-which is not what the 'experts' on facebook were saying!) There are other options available, such as converting to adjustable coil overs, but they need your original struts to do that and I cant have my car off the road for any long periods at present.

So, my only option at the moment was to re-fit the cut down springs that I had taken out on Saturday! It's not an ideal solution, but they aren't dangerous or illegal, so they will just have to do for now. With my previous recent knowledge of doing this job, this time it took me just over an hour to do both sides. I then took the car for a quick spin around the block and it was looking much better without the horrendously high front suspension. 

It was a nice day with no sign of rain, so I decided to to take the car to work where I could park it in the warehouse on a dead flat floor. (Hardly any roads round my way are on the flat) The car drives really well on the different rear springs with no banging and clanking like I was getting before. It goes reasonably well too and has no issues keeping up with modern day traffic. In fact, now that I've got through most of the bodges, it's very nearly where I want it to be and is turning into a really good car. (A small exhaust issue is the next on the agenda) 

Parking it the warehouse showed that it isn't quite level. It either needs to come down an inch at the back or lift up an inch at the front. For the time being though, it'll do until I decide what I'm going to do about the situation with the front springs. I'll probably go down the coil over route, but not just yet. I've got an impending week long trip around Europe coming up in the Triumph and I haven't even started the prep work on that yet!