1970's Factory Bult V8 Ford Escort "Eliminator"?
Discussion
Back in 1975 when I was an apprentice one the guys in the workshop’s father worked at Ford in Dagenham in marketing in believe.
Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
AVO did build a single V8 engined Granada, but I'm almost 100% certain they never did a V8 Escort. AVOOC would have heard of that before now. Largely because the engine bay is a bit tight to fit a small block Ford into (even though physically it's a very small V8) and that's productionisng a car we're talking about, not the back street custom stuff where you can fit anything into anything so to speak.
I can't see Boreham building it either as a rallying option, as they had the BDA. The 260/289 Ford V8 while compact, is still weighs a significant amount more than a BDA, so it just doesn't make sense from a rallying point of view.
Maybe Broadspeed or Urens Raceproved did it..?
Or, I have a vague recollection of a muralled custom car from the seventies called The Eliminator... perhaps it was this he was thinking of?
I can't see Boreham building it either as a rallying option, as they had the BDA. The 260/289 Ford V8 while compact, is still weighs a significant amount more than a BDA, so it just doesn't make sense from a rallying point of view.
Maybe Broadspeed or Urens Raceproved did it..?
Or, I have a vague recollection of a muralled custom car from the seventies called The Eliminator... perhaps it was this he was thinking of?
Edited by aeropilot on Thursday 21st October 12:49
Smike said:
There were quite a few V8 Mark 1s in the Super Saloons Racing back in the 70s, like Doug Niven's 351ci one.
Can't remember any AVO car but I'll look through some of my books
Mike Crabtree ran a Martin V8 engined one as well in the early 70's.Can't remember any AVO car but I'll look through some of my books
Don't bother looking in the books
eddiegrundy said:
Back in 1975 when I was an apprentice one the guys in the workshop’s father worked at Ford in Dagenham in marketing in believe.
Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
This is very very interesting and the first time I have ever seen one of these vehicles mentioned since I was an apprentice!!!!! Back in the 1970's when I was an apprentice I worked with a guy whose father worked for Ford AVO name of Hurford, he told me about a car called an "Escort Eliminator" that Ford had built and were testing so I think there may be more than a grain of truth in this. Glad I found this as I have never seen any reference to this vehicle before.Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
Digger57 said:
eddiegrundy said:
Back in 1975 when I was an apprentice one the guys in the workshop’s father worked at Ford in Dagenham in marketing in believe.
Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
This is very very interesting and the first time I have ever seen one of these vehicles mentioned since I was an apprentice!!!!! Back in the 1970's when I was an apprentice I worked with a guy whose father worked for Ford AVO name of Hurford, he told me about a car called an "Escort Eliminator" that Ford had built and were testing so I think there may be more than a grain of truth in this. Glad I found this as I have never seen any reference to this vehicle before.Anyway my colleague told me about a special Mk1 Escort Ford had evaluated and apparently had got as far as printing some blurb about it. It was allegedly known as the “Escort Eliminator” and was apparently fitted with a small block V8 motor of about 4.4 Litr 260Ci.
He told me, the reasoning was the V8 represented cheap BHP and Ford wanted to use it in rallying.
That is as much as I know has anyone else ever heard mention of this mysterious vehicle? The whole tale may well have been a myth, but given Fords record of building some strange vehicles at the AVO unit I felt there may just be a grain of truth in it.
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