Marcos Ford

"Geoff Mackenzie" gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Looks like that change happened at the same time as the V6...

Looks like the Capri changed from 3.0 Essex to 2.8i Cologne in '81 - and still had a four-speed for a little while before the five-speed came in.

Looks like you're either going wood, 3.0 or _totally_ ignoring originality...

Not sure about when the marine ply hull went out, but certainly the prototype 3-litre used it. And yes, I am totally ignoring originality; I don't think it applies when the original manufacturer used any bits which were laying around his garage!

Seriously, though, I think Jem would approve - trying to build up a car to my own specifications, rather than pickling in aspic a fifty year old design.

Geoff MacK

The 2.8 was a very different design from the 3 litre - not a development, as it were. Think they are all fuel injected. Also think by that time they were 5 speed.

Only Capri I've driven was a 2 litre auto I bought at auction for 175 quid

- to tide me over while my main car was waiting for bits. I quite liked it

- thought it rather better to drive than an MGB.

From what little I know they were completely different, not one developed from the other.

I had a Capri 3 litre for a week as a company car while my Giulietta was being repaired after a back end shunt. Pure Bodie & Doyle. Huge tyre squeal when pulling out when any trace of lock on. Couldn't help thinking that my E-Type with more than 100bhp more didn't do that - just put the power down without fuss. Wondered if that was designed to appeal to Essex Man? But a 2 litre at £175 has to be a good buy - I suppose that my dislike was based on new car prices (ah, the days of company cars...).

Thinking of which, one of my contemporaries at that time chose an MGB GT as his company car - early seventies, I guess? - went out for a ride in it once, couldn't believe how truly awful it was. And even more OT, in atonement for my sins in comprehensively rolling and writing off my Alfasud ti the transport manager gave me an Austin Allegro 1750 GT to tide me over - pretty much summed up the state of the British motor industry.

Geoff MacK

>

With the 3.0L engine, make sure you get the Granada version of the lump, not the Zodiac one. Neither is wonderful and they both have heating and gasket issues, but the later engine is more robust, more powerful and revs rather less unenthusastically (this from experience with 'em in Scimitars, not Marcii). In practice, I suspect most of 'em that started with the Zodiac lump will have had them replaced with the later version anyway, but it's worth checking. There are obvious visual cues to distinguish between the two, but at the moment I'm damned if I can remember them..

German F*rd, not UK. ISTR it may have been a descendent of the 1.6L engine? Shorter stroke, much less torque but more (well, some) ability to rev.

The 2.8L certainly came in carb'd form - lots of Mk.2 Granadas had that one, as did the SE6b and SE8 Scimitars. In the UK Capris only had the injected version, but there may have been carb'd LHD ones. What Marcos used - anyone's guess..

Earlier Mk2. Granadas and the first couple of years of 2.8i Capris had 4- speed boxes. The Scimitars kept in with the Capri internals in the Transit casing with the overdrive - again, Marcos may have raided that parts bin as well.

Tyop. 2.6L, as used in the RS2600 Capri, and ISTR assorted German Fords.

What is it about Alfasuds that like to get rolled or pranged into more solid objects. I did a test day at Castle Combe some years back and the Alfa Romeo club had been the previous weekend and the remains of 2 or 3 Alfasuds were still parked around the circuit having run off or rolled.

I don't know much about the Marcos but I know a guy that owns a later one, a Rover 3.5 engined unit, never liked the styling of any of them myself. Main reason for posting is that I live in the area where they were made and have met a number of people that worked on or made them in the early days and some later. About the switch from a wooden chassis to metal, one guy said that was down to not being able to get suitable quality ply for the chassis so the switch was made. Being a wood chassis what is the state likely to be these days, maybe the wood/metal switch was just a cost issue with the materials, the ply working out more expensive for the required product.

....

The chassis, IIRC, were high-grade marine ply, which should be pretty durable (plenty of marine ply boats[1] from that era still about: in fact it may be the survival rate is rather better than steel cars of that era....). The ply construction should make it eminently repairable, too.

Some interesting comments at:

suggests that with the Granada V6 (130ish-140some bhp from the carb'd

3.0, depending on exhaust system - Ford, of course, claimed more..) the wooden chassis is at the limits of its stretch, and you'd need to be careful with tyre sizing. The Zodiac engine, at 120something bhp, should be OK power-wise, though both engines will have a lot of torque compared to the Volvo donk. Care with tyres again, maybe..

Anyway, that makes it sound like it was the limit on engine output/torque through the chassis that led to the adoption of the metal chassis - probably easier to do that than to design a completely new wooden chassis..

Elsewhere on the same site (home page for it) there seems to be the answer: the steel chassis was much quicker and cheaper to build, allowing production rate to be upped.

V6s with the wooden chassis certainly existed - a quick search turned this up:

Evidently they have no worries about upping the grunt levels in the wooden chassis, going by the "3.4 V6" on the rocker cover..

Given that wooden-chassis production finished in 1969 (so far as I can tell), any V6 cars would have started with the Zodiac engine.

I'll have a bit more of a read around that site later as I think that is the guy I was talking to previously that mentioned the ply supply issue.

IIRC it was earlier in this year that there was a gathering to honour Jem Marsh , him attending, at a local pub in Bradford on Avon and many that made Marcos happen attended. It was Invite only as I understand it but a few heard and popped in to say hello.

OK. I'd be interested to hear more..

A quick think regarding high-grade marine ply and 1969 prompts the thought that that was the year of the Honduras/El Savador border dispute went critical, culminating in the "soccer war". Given that those countries were major sources of the durable hardwoods used in the best marine plys of the day (long logged out now, I guess..) that /could/ have put a crimp in supplies. Also the year of the Biafra war, so that's another big supplier of high-grade tropical wood out of the picture. Could well have been a bottleneck in supplies, and worries that it might be permanent..

Hmm.

Perhaps because they handle so well, you're travelling quite quickly when you run out of talent?

(I had a 'Sud Ti for a while. Cracking little car, apart from the tinworm. It would run rings around my then bosses Mk1 Golf GTi, much to his irritation.)

Plus the combination of excellent handling and relatively little power, so there's the temptation (plus..) of keeping up travelling speed by slowing as little as possible for any corner. If said corner has a patch of oil or unexpectedly tightens, then 'sud (and driver) may become as one with the scenery.

It's an endemic problem with good- (or at least, predicatbly) handling, low-powered cars - the temptation to drive 'em like a [deleted] nutter.

2CVs are notably prone to this sort of thing, too, and I suspect not a few Cit GSs hit things hard for much the same reason as the 'suds.

I suspect the canonical example is the Pug 205 GTi.

Damn this thread. I want another 'Sud all of a sudden.

I think the early 2.8 Granada MKII had carbs rather than fuel injection. I am not sure about the gearbox because the only one I saw at close quarters was an auto.

However, if you are building a Marcos from pick-and-mix parts, the 2.8i coupled to the Sierra 5 speed box would be a good choice.

Jim

Not trying to make it harder for you, but..

Looks like it might be less rotten than many.

Huge gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Oh, yes.