Best of Both Worlds
Performance Meets Practicality
It was all the way back in 1977 when Chris got his first car. He had been looking for a MkI Escort but ended up with a MkII Cortina instead for £325. It appeared to be a good car having recently been sprayed in a sky blue colour but like most first cars it quickly became a labour of love – it didn’t take long for the rust to start bubbling through and Chris found plenty of mechanical issues to deal with too while also giving the 1600 Super a few touches to make it his own.
Over the next 5 years or so Chris changed the colour again, this time to Daytona Yellow and gave it some of the obligatory extras of the time including air horns, extra headlights, a furry dash and headlining not to mention padded draylon door cards too. However, it all went wrong just a week before his wedding. At just 15 miles an hour he managed to clip a curb and put the car into a wall. That’s when he realised how much rot had taken over, the front end was completely destroyed though amazingly the air horns survived! As luck would have it, a friend of a friend had a MkII shell available which Chris made full use of to rebuild the Super again before finally selling on 18 months later.
30 years later Chris quite fancied getting himself a classic car. The wish list included a Ford Escort MKI RS2000, a MK1 3 litre Capri, maybe a MGBGT V8 or MG RV8, and possibly even a TR6. It was the TR6 that he ended up with, a very nice car he was very happy with and had no plans to part with – that was until he went to the NEC in 2022. He came across our club stand at the Lancaster Classic Car Motor Show where we were displaying three of the cars that had been on our 60th anniversary Cortinas to Cortina to Italy earlier that year. Chris was transported straight back to 1977 before discovering one of the MkIIs in front of him – a 2dr car fitted with a ST170 engine – was for sale. He’d have bought it there and then if he didn’t already have a garage full of Triumph, but the seeds were sown. When Chris got home the TR6 was put up for sale and the search was on for another MkII Cortina, but this time it needed a lot more performance than his first car from all those years ago.
A few cars that fitted the bill caught Chris’s attention. There was a mint looking blue mink 4dr that had been given a 3 litre V6 Essex conversion he liked the look of, another 4dr, this one in electric blue with a 2.9 V6 Cologne engine fitted was very interesting, but it was an early 2dr with a naturally aspirated Ford Cosworth YB engine that Chris just had to have.
The seller had bought it (along with a MkII Lotus Twincam) already modified two years earlier as an investment. He had tucked it away under covers in his workshop but never got round to driving it, just starting up it and warming it through occasionally. Needless to say, Chris was a little apprehensive about the 230 mile drive back home from Chester but he needn’t have worried, the car never missed a beat.
Since owning the 2dr Chris has found a lot of the car’s history. It started life as a 1300 Deluxe but sometime before 2009 – when Dave “the-Ford-Cortina.com” Baglow got hold of it – someone had changed the colour to a dark blue (the original colour remains a mystery) and upgraded the interior, engine and running gear to turn it into a 1600E replica. Dave sold it on to someone who had plans to fit a Ford Duratec engine but the project stalled and the Cortina was sold on again as a rolling shell in 2012 and the new owner then restored it into the car you see now.
One way or another, DCT 144E has quite an impressive spec these days. The YB Cosworth has been rebored to 2.1 litres and benefits from a fully ported head, forged pistons, Cosworth crankshaft, hydraulic high lift camshafts, Jenvey throttle bodies and a Simpson manifold with a full stainless steel exhaust system. It has a modern lightweight Edge alternator and is mated to a quick shift 5spd gearbox. To cope with the extra power the steering box has been replaced with rack and pinion and coil over suspension from GAZ has been added. Up front there are larger Willwood front brakes and at the rear there’s a 3:3.1 LSD with heavy duty half shafts with the original drum brakes being replaced with a disk conversion. It has also been completely rewired too to allow for the ECU, adding in a fusebox and umpteen relays at the same time.
On the inside, the dashboard resembles a series I GT but all the dials have been upgraded with new Speedhut gauges with a GPS speedometer. The front seats are from an Audi MKI TT and a retro style DAB radio has also been added. Outside there are 15 inch Minilite style wheels complimented by what is believed to be Audi Dakota Grey paintwork. Strangely, this only comes up with an 80% match but local paint suppliers have mixed a rattle can and some touch up paint that is a perfect match.
All photos © Chris Seymour & Cortina MkII Owners Club LTD.
