The cam belt had snapped, which on this engine means the valves and the pistons have met each other at speed. The owner wanted it gone. That suited me perfectly, because I was not buying a car.
It was the same model as mine in estate form, and it was loaded: a good exhaust, a boost gauge, straight body panels, and a long list of smaller things worth having. A dead engine is irrelevant when what you want is everything bolted around it.
Stripping it taught me something I have used on every job since. There is a point where a bolt has been in place long enough, through enough weather, that it is effectively part of the car. A spanner will not move it. Lean harder and you round the head off and turn a ten minute job into an afternoon.
The seatbelt bolts were the worst of them. Nothing shifted those until an impact wrench went on, and then they came free almost casually, as though they had been waiting for someone to ask properly.
The good parts sold on. The rest was scrapped.
Some cars are worth more disassembled than they ever were whole, and this one knew it.
