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Good morning vehicle chasers. Jumping on the Belkits Escort bandwagon following the excellent build by Nick Belbin I've been attacking the kit I've had for a while. I must confess to doing bits and pieces for a while but have only started chopping the chassis about this past week. If you want to see what's in the box can I suggest you buy a kit , you won't be disappointed. There's not much left intact on the sprues in mine anyhow! This is the car as it appeared back in the day, clip from YouTube. I am fortunate that a contact also had some period photos from Wembley Stadium as the car departed on this epic event. The car is also well detailed in Graham Robson's book 'Works Escorts in Detail' and there are plenty of images on t'internet. Here I'm mocking up the locations for the extra bracing bars and bull bars as featured on the escorts used in the event. I have subsequently discovered the kit lamp brackets set the light too high. Another feature of Ford's modifications for this car was the installation of auxiliary fuel tanks with extra filler caps sited in recesses in the rear wings. The standard fuel filler located in the left C pillar had to be filled along with the rear lamp recesses as the block lamp units were replaced by individual lens type fittings [see photo above] An auxiliary lamp used as a reversing lamp has been fabricated too. If you can't beat 'em chop out some plastic. I was hoping to get away with part surgery [ l/h image] but decided a major op was called for. Hence drawing templates for all the new bits to make the inner arches. As per NJB's build I'll be fabricating new front shocks too. The rear arches have been shaved to make fitting the body easier down the line. As mentioned earlier the kit spot lamp brackets set the lamps too high. Again Nick's build provided the inspiration and with some images of AVO Brackets off the net I have made a replacement from plastic strip, rod and hex section for the bolt heads which I'll get cast in resin for future builds. The other bracket is for the wing mounted lamp on the East Africa Rally Escorts ... more on that story later . That's the state of play so far, the front inner wing build being next in line to complete.