The bolt extraction kit turned up the other day! I had it sent to work so I didn’t miss the delivery and after I got chance to give it a go. The plan was, according to the kit, to drill out a pilot hole with one of the supplied Cobalt drill bits and then screw in the reverse thread extractor to wind out the broken half. I’d borrowed the 18V Makita from work to get a bit more power but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be powerful enough. There’s not much to drill but neither drilling slowly, or quickly really made an indent in the bolt. I tried and tried but I wasn’t making any progress so for now I’ve reassembled the rocker cover and I’m driving around at a sensible speed until I can sneak in some time after work and use the power drill and our own cobalt bits.

That being said, I did get the rocker cover finished. The black was a bit boring for me so I dug out a can of Ford “Roman Bronze” I had lying around and used that to add some colour. It’s meant to be slightly metallic so I followed that up with a couple of coats of lacquer to bring out the shine but also to add some protection. A couple of heat cycles later and it’s coping with the heat just fine.

Apologies about the mucky trim, I’m going to give the bay, and the whole car a good clean tomorrow.