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The Ford Granda mk1 has always been my favourite car. I've owned five of them
over the years, starting with a Consul L 2.0 V4 in in 1977. Next came a
3.0 XL (that would be a rare car now) and later a very tatty 2.5 L manual.
In 1981 I bought a Consul 2.5 L Automatic for spares from a friend.
We chopped it up in his drive and its gearbox was used to
convert my manual 2.5 to
auto. Although the autobox performed well in his his car It was nothing but trouble after being installed in mine. This and a few other problems caused me to sell the car for scrap a few months later.
There was then a very long gap of about 12 years until I got the next one.
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| The 2.0 Consul in July 197 | Jake and I (on the left) with the remains of the 2.5 Consul in May 1980 |
Ford Granada Mk1 series 1
3.0 litre Ghia saloon
GCD 168 N
This is the fourth Granada that I have owned, I bought it in 1992, It had 69,000 miles on the clock and the body work was in reasonable condition being only slightly crumbley around the edges.
Although the car was garaged and only used in the summer the bodywork gradually deteriorated until I was forced to make a choice of either scrapping it or having it restored. I went for the more expensive option and handed it over to a specialist car restorer who fitted two new front wings, rear wheel arches and sills. He also patched the joins between the rear wing and C-pillars, a common area of weakness on the mk 1s. Thankfully the underside was sound and needed no attention. This was followed by a bare metal respray in the original Flame orange.
More recent pictures (2006) here
I bought this one on the spur of the moment in 1996, it had
35,000 miles on the clock, but I suspect this was really 135,00. Despite the age of the car, the interior is in excellent condition. Early
GXLs are quite rare, which was one of the things that tempted me.
Later it developed a blown cylinder head gasket, and the car was laid up. Since then it has been sitting in a garage gathering dust. At the time of writing (July 2007) the car has been in storage for over 10 years, so I should really think about selling it. A number of people have expressed an interest in buying the GXL, but as I reside in the USA, it is difficult to deal with the sale from such a distance.
Ford Granada Mk1 series 1
3.0 litre GXL saloon
GJG 123 L
