"I bought the 1968 GT Cortina one lazy Summer's day in 1989 from a dude out Research - Warrandyte way. He was asking $1200 for the car as it was....no RWC, front tyres that were balder than Peter Garrett, and an engine that blew a little smoke - about on par with John Elliot. I thought: 'He’s dreaming!'. The interior had well and truly past its used by date, but hey, that didn't matter, as I had bigger plans for this car. The other problems with the car didn't worry me either (just so long as it was driveable), but that didn't stop me from pointing these faults out to the owner, and haggling him down to $800. Somehow I always had the feeling that he had built a 'haggle' factor into his asking price, but I was happy with my new toy and that’s all that mattered."

"The car in its 'raw' form had a certain racing appeal to it, so I thought I’d look into rallying the car. My local Garage bloke nick-named the car 'Grunter' - which was quite appropriate, as the engine had been bored .060 inch, and sounded very impressive at decent revs. Myself and a friend decided we would put this little grunter through its paces and see how it handled, performed, etc. so off to the back-blocks of Gembrook we went to 'view the wonderful scenery', and not hoon about on any of the hundreds of kilometers of dirt roads.

"For a 1600cc pushrod engine, the car had plenty of pick-up, and coupled with a close ratio gearbox, was an absolute pleasure to hoon - er - I mean drive around in. I just wasn’t too thrilled about the 'under-dash' handbrake arrangement. This made handbrake turns rather awkward, and as all good 'enthusiasts' will tell you, fast handbrake turns are good handbrake turns! Well on one particular 'sight-seeing' venture, on a loose gravel road, at about 80km/h, we came across a moderate off-camber corner and slid very elegantly into the earthen bank on the edge of the road. Thankfully this was a very soft earthen bank so there was no panel damage, only a hell of a lot of mud caked into the deep-dished chrome rims. It was when I finally got the car home and removed the last of the Gembrook mud from the rims that the idea came to me to restore this incredible piece of machinery. The idea mainly came about because I realised then and there that this was a GT and GT’s ain’t that common these days, and I would hate to write it off on a rally. So the quest began to restore this car to its former glory.

"This was no easy task, and took approximately 12 months to complete - due in part to availability of finances, availability of time and availability of genuine parts (like seats, door trim panels, bumper bars, chrome finishing strips, etc, etc). I wasn’t too happy with the selection of standard Ford paint colours of the period for my GT, so I opted for a 1988 Honda 'Superior Blue' basecoat arrangement. Here’s a tip for all you 'do-it-yourself' spraypainters: Don’t paint in a poorly ventilated garage, on a stinking hot day, without maintaining food and fluids, as this will lead to a mild case of 'pukus alotus'. Just trust me on that one.

"The interior was fully restored to original condition (its amazing what you can find hidden under old car carpets!). The engine had a good going over (honing, new rings and bearings) as every time I pulled off from a set of lights, I couldn’t see if there was anyone behind me through the thick blue haze! Eventually the car was looking and running like it had just come off the showroom floor. Unfortunately the GT saw more dust than miles sitting in the garage, as I was too frightened to take my pride-and-joy on the road too often... just in case. After having only done 400 miles in the car over 2 years, I thought it was about time to let it go to a good home, and get that rally car I always promised myself!

"And so it happened, the GT went to a good home and I bought the next project - a 2.0 litre 1978 Escort, but that’s another story. My current 'toy' is a 1969 1600GT Capri (currently being built for rallying), so it seems the British Fords are definitely in the blood!"

To find out a bit more about this car, ask Todd about it at walks9pro@yahoo.com.au.