Reviving a barn find P1800ES
 

Thought I'd start a thread on here to document my latest project. The car is a 1972 P1800ES that's been sat untouched in a garage for 20+ years.

It belonged to an old friend who realised he's never going to do anything with it and after some gentle persuasion passed the baton on to me.

This car is 100% complete and the bodywork and interior (albeit filthy dirty) is in fantastic shape. However, mechanically it needs A LOT of work. I plan to take my time over this project and I'll use this thread to post updates as they happen.

This weekend we managed to roll it and inspect it further. Even though it was left with the parking brake off it took 4 of us to rock it about and crack it free so that we could roll it out into the daylight.

I have never seen one on the metal before, in fact, I never knew these existed until now so I am completely naive to these cars. I have totally fallen for it's glorious looks, it's super retro styling and interior, the hefty 50 year old Swedish engineering and the wafty soft suspension that should make for a hilarious driving experience.

Here it is as we found it.

https://thumbsnap.com/s/97dzDWVS.jpg

And after we managed to roll it out of the garage.

https://thumbsnap.com/s/aF5h9aj7.jpg

https://thumbsnap.com/s/yj1KhKwj.jpg

https://thumbsnap.com/s/jov62RuP.jpg

So, there are plenty of good points about this car....

The bodywork is in top shape and should clean up very well. I have had a good look around and underneath and there's no rust other than some very minor surface blemishes on the front wings. The interior is also in very good order, totally complete and with a little love should look fantastic.

The car also comes with lots of spares including a new rear boot glass and even a genuine Volvo workshop manual.

However, there's a lot that's not good and largely a consequence of being parked and untouched for 20+ years, so essentially this is a recommissioning project rather than a restoration.

The brakes are seriously pitted and need a complete overhaul. I got a borescope in the petrol tank and the fuel is jellied and the tank rusted from the inside out, so it's going to need an entirely new fuel system.

It has the Bosch D-Jetronic fuel injection system. Whilst that's a good thing, I'm slightly dreading having to diagnose this if it's at fault.

I plan to be methodical and steady about recommissioning the old beast, so the first thing we did was pull the plugs and spray some Marvel Mystery Oil into the cylinders.

Next plan is to give it a proper clean up and then we'll move on to the fuel system, working our way forward to the ignition system and eventually attempting to fire it up.

After that it'll need tyres, shocks, coolant system overhaul and who knows what else?

There's plenty to do, but Autumn is fast approaching so I won't be able to do much mechanical work this year, but I'll be sure to update this as I go.

Quick question to follow up on this. Does anyone know of the correct battery I need for this car? I can't find anything definitive online.

I am presuming this car will have leather seats. If so, and they are good refrain from sitting and kneeling on them as the leather will be dry and will easily tear and split.Remove them from the car asap, clean and dry them then give them a good covering with hide food.
When you have done the other resto work you will have soft supple seats to refit.
Sorry I cannot advise you re battery.
Chris

For some reason online catalogs don't go back to the 1800 models. Its a group 24 battery, not sure if that system is used in the UK.

Probably have to drop in to a place like Halfords and have them look it up.

Just pay attention to the location of the terminals and size measurements to confirm.

Thanks... I had the same thoughts on this. The seats are indeed looking very dry and brittle and we have refrained from sitting in them. I'm not sure they're leather and suspect they're vinyl up front. I think the rears are leather on these though?!

Either way, when I clean the car the seats will get a liberal dose of reviver to get some moisture back into them.

Odd isn't it. There's nothing definitive online about this. The workshop manual states 95ah, and that's it.

Closest match I can see is the Bosch S04 028, but I need to double check the dimensions before I make a purchase

Hi

Good luck with the restoration.
The Bosch S4 battery will fit as I had one in my ES the only issue will be the orientation of the terminals. I bought a new battery Positive lead because it was too short to accomadate the S4. The leads are quite cheap and you can buy them at diffent lenghts. Also I thought the original orientation of the battery was a bit strange as the battery clampling bar was close to the terminals and it made much more sense(to me) to have the terminals to the rear of the car.
The other issue I found with the original batteries on sale was that they had no carrying handle which makes removal more of a challenge.

Gavin

I fitted an EXIDE 031 (formerly 069) battery to my '72 1800E back in Feb. 2014. It came with a 3-year guarantee and cost £70.80 inclusive of VAT. I believe it has a 72Ah rating. This has front-facing terminals (negative on the right, closest to nearside front wing). Still going strong.

Hope this is of help. Happy hunting.

P; (a name would be nice!)

I don't have time right now to help with pointers, so will leave it up to others...but wanted to welcome you to the forum!

Cheers from Connecticut!

Group 24 was a very popular size in the 60's.

"it made much more sense(to me) to have the terminals to the rear of the car."

That's the proper original configuration.