READER’S RESTORATION: Granada Ghia X

The most-thoroughly restored Mk2 yet!

T he worst thing you can do to any classic car is to leave it unused in damp conditions. This 1983 Granada 2.8 Ghia X was left parked for 23 years. You might remember it from our Grafters feature in the Spring issue, but we doubt you’ll recognise it. Owner, Davey Farrell has just got his car back after an incredibly extensive restoration.

“I first heard about the Granada in 2017,” explains Davey, “it had been left at a garage in 1994 after the timing cog broke a tooth. The garage put in an engine with just 1500 miles on it and replaced the exhaust and brakes, but the owner was injured at work and couldn’t afford to pay his bill so the car just sat in the corner.”

Davey offered to buy the Granada but the garage owner, who had since received the car’s V5 in lieu of payment, wanted £5000. “I offered him £2000 once I heard it running and then we came to a deal. I’m a builder and he urgently needed work done to his house, so I did that in exchange for the Granada.” Davey then contacted Neil Dawson at KD Kustoms UK. “I’d planned to restore it myself but in the month I’d owned it I hadn’t even had time to wash the car. I thought it looked solid, but Neil soon found a lot of hidden rust.”

“It was rotten,” remembers Neil, who began the restoration in September 2018, “the outside had surface rust, but once we’d done the stripdown there was serious rot in the front chassis legs and inner wings. We ended up replacing the entire front end, constructing a jig to keep the whole thing straight. We fabricated new inner wings and the slam panel, I got hold of some new-old stock front wings and sourced a new bonnet, too.”

“Many of the hard-to-find parts came from stock car racers who were all extremely helpful. I visited racers in Lincolnshire six times — a 12-hour round trip from here in Scotland — and what I couldn’t find we made.”

“I THOUGHT THE GRANADA LOOKED SOLID, BUT WE SOON FOUND A LOT OF HIDDEN RUST...”

That even included new A-pillars: “We folded them out of sheet steel in-house,” continues Neil, “and also replaced sections of the floor, the boot floor and crossmember, rear arches and rear screen surround. I bought one headlight surround but we had to make the other.” The rear valance, all the jacking points and even the petrol filler flap also had to be replaced.

Every piece of the car was gradually removed, stripped, cleaned and repaired.

Feeling blue

“I wanted to put my touch on the car,” adds Davey, “so had Neil repaint it from the original Champagne Gold into Caspian Blue.” That meant sourcing a new interior since the existing brown one would clash terribly.

“We got a Ghia interior from a racer and had to swap all the fabric parts over to keep the X’s heated front seats,” remembers Neil. “We had the seat covers and seatbelts in the bath at home cleaning them — my partner Kara is very understanding, in fact she did a lot of the work to restore the interior.”

It’s here this particular restoration goes somewhat above and beyond what you might normally expect as Neil admits he “got carried away with the details”. Take the engine for example. “Davey asked we just paint the engine block and inner wings, but in the end we refurbished every individual part,” smiles Neil. “I spent an entire week on that alone. Every seal and belt, the radiator, the water pump… it was all stripped and rebuilt. Of course, all the gaskets had rotted. We painted the fan blades the correct yellow because we couldn’t get the correct finish from cleaning and polishing alone. The dipstick was painted with the correct band of red — I researched that, too. The overflow tank and other plastic parts were cleaned and degreased in the dishwasher at home. Everything had rust from sitting; even the sump had holes in it.”

Everything underneath was media blasted, rebuilt and epoxy coated then the floor covered in tinted Raptor lining. “We were going to lacquer it but it would have looked too shiny.” The suspension, axles and brakes had all their components replaced. “We also fitted a new stainless steel exhaust specially made to match the original one.”

The interior had the dashboard and steering wheel leather-filled and dyed to match the new colour scheme. “We took the instruments apart and refurbished them, used chrome paint on the dials and polished the lenses. The wood was sanded and relacquered.” Another great example of the pains KD Kustoms went to is the parcel shelf. “You often see them sitting uneven,” explains Neil, “we removed the old cardboard backing, carefully smoothed the material then fixed it to an aluminium plate so it will never bend. It was attached using a spirit level to ensure it’s perfectly aligned.” The speakers received new custom-made hessian cloth covers and the radio/cassette was stripped and painstakingly rebuilt. Neil even found a company in Germany to make a brand-new radio aerial to original factory specifications. “I spent weeks researching images of Granadas,” admits Neil, “right down to where the factory seam sealer goes. I’m obsessive about things like that,

“I SPENT WEEKS RESEARCHING IMAGES RIGHT DOWN TO WHERE THE FACTORY SEAM SEALER GOES...”