:: Diary - February 2011 ::

:: Tuesday, February 1, 2011 ::

I decided to finish cleaning the Cerbera. I move the car out of the garage, and finish off cleaning the boot, the rear bumper, and around the nose. Then I go around all the door shuts and edges.

When I check the coolant level, I have to top it up slightly - like the last time, about a cup full. It's hardly used any coolant since the engine was rebuilt.

I also check the oil level - about 1/4 inch below the "max" mark. I put a tiny bit of oil in just to bring it up to the mark.

Disregarding, for a minute, the stone chips on the front, the car doesn't look bad at all!

:: Thursday, February 3, 2011 ::

I find myself with some spare time so go and have a potter around the Cerbera. First I check the tyre pressures, and pump them all up by a pound or two to the right pressures. While doing that, I remember the advice at the MOT that the rear tyres are getting towards the end of their life - a check with a gauge confirms they are just on 2mm - still legal, but time to be changed!

The rear tyres are Bridgestone SO2, and the fronts are Toyo T1Rs. A check on-line shows that the Toyos are cheaper, and reviews suggest that they are better (or certainly no worse) so that's what I'll go for. I can get them fitted through Blackcircles about 5 minutes from the house, at a cost (for both tyres) that's only slightly more than I paid for one, of a similar size, 2 weeks ago for the Lexus from the main dealer (that was a bit of a desperation purchase because the tyre had an egg on the side and the dealer was the only garage with one available urgently).

Didn't have time to buy them today though, I'll do that tomorrow.

Remember my rant towards the end of last month, about TVR Car Club events getting outside the reach of many of the members? Well a similar topic came up on the club website, so in I went - and I don't think I'm very popular. I can now see, however, how bleeding parochial one or two of the members are - thankfully not all are like that.

:: Friday, February 4, 2011 ::

We'll I've just ordered the tyres on line, for fitting next weekend. I'm off to have a lie down in a dark room while I convalesce from open-wallet surgery.

I've also got the Cerbera's insurance to pay this month. And the annual rental for the barn at the farm. And two daughters who are doing their level best to ensure that the local shops survive the recession. I'm trying to convert them to Buddhism so that they'll find true enlightenment in an orange blanket and a pony tail, but they're not having it - apparently inner peace can only be found in River Island and Top Shop.

:: Sunday, February 6, 2011 ::

It's TVR Club meeting day today. So naturally it's raining. Good job I spent all that time cleaning the car so that the new muck could stick on easily. I set off after a short stop for petrol (and after I'd recovered from the shock of seeing the price of Optimax - I only wanted a few gallons of petrol, not to buy the whole Shell franchise)! A nice young lady at the next pump says she likes the car, and especially the colour, which is nice, and (almost) makes up for the shock of paying for the petrol.

Head over to Dave's to meet up with Mike and Jim, and then we're off, with Jim in front. At least we'll be going straight there - Jim can only follow the signposted route, no dallying about on back roads today!

The meeting is good, about 10 cars have turned up, and a fair number of other owners are there, but not in their TVRs. We discuss a possible event in Scotland following on from my rant at the end of last month about the Big Northern Gathering. No confirmed details yet, but it sounds good.

Time flies by, and soon it's time for the journey back home. It's raining again, but Mike's in front so we come back by a slightly longer and more interesting route. The Cerbera behaves throughout - temperature right where it should be, everything else fine, apart from the red "low outside temperature" warning light flickering on and off at random and telling me that it's freezing, no it's not, yes it is, no it's not...

I've been seriously thinking about selling the Cerbera, because I don't use it (or the S) nearly as much as I should. On days like today, though, selling it seems like madness. Even after 2 years, I still think it looks stunning, and so, apparently, do lots of people that drive past - you see wee boys peering out of car windows for a better look, and I can well remember when that was me, seeing a TVR for the first time (it was a Vixen or Grantura or something of that era), and saying to my brother "One day...". I was only 40 then...

Anyway, enough nostalgia. Another good day with the car and the club. Next outing will be Wednesday when it's getting new back tyres.

:: Wednesday, February 9, 2011 ::

I've ordered a pair of rear tyres for the Cerbera through blackcircles.com, and they're beng fitted today. The garage is just 5 minutes from the house, so I can roll the wheels there if the car won't go! But it does - no problem.

The fitter is just first class - he asks me where he should put the jack, he gets a block between the jack and the chassis, and removes the wheel nuts by hand. He gets both old tyres off, and the new tyres on, while I stand and blether to him (and watch!) - and no part of the machine, or any levers etc, touch the metal part of the tyre rim. It's completely unmarked! Then he balances them and replaces the wheels, torquing them up properly once the car's off the jack. Brilliant Job!

I don't want to test them because the road's wet, and brand new tyres and wet roads don't mix.

So instead I go home and nail rubber sealing strip around the garage door edge, so that when the door's shut, there's no more big gap for cold, rain and beasties to get through.

Then (because it's still raining) I spend hours getting the web site's indexing up to date, correcting stupid typing errors on a lot of pages, and sorting some layout problems.

:: Sunday, February 13, 2011 ::

Hard to believe it, but that's two years yesterday since I bought the Cerb. The only reason I believe it because I received the annual reminder in the form of the new insurance premium... It's not too bad I suppose, the two TVRs added together are less than the premium they tried to charge me last year for the Lexus (they didn't get that much, mind, I changed insurers and although the first lot promised to "price match" I told them to eff off for being so greedy in the first place).

I also have to pay the annual rent for the garage along at the farm, which coincidentally is exactly 2 pence less than the Cerb's insurance. I have to pay it by Friday - well I don't really, he's not going to chuck me out for the sake of a few days, but it's nice to be nice. Especially when I might have a favour I need to ask him.

So I go along to the farm to pay my rent, and while I'm there, I take the two front wheels off the S, and bring them back to the house for polishing. I noticed when I took the car along that they were dull and had some surface marks and corrosion. Closer inspection reveals that they are "minging".

When I get home though, I can't be bothered actually polishing them, so I have a wee run in the Cerb instead.

:: Saturday, February 19, 2011 ::

Finally got around to polishing the wheels off the S. First a bit of wet-and-dry paper, to take the surface corrosion and marks off, then hand polish each wheel a couple of times over - the first time doing a tiny bit at a time, and wiping off, then the second time, doing bigger areas and polishing up to a shine, finishing with a dry clean cloth to really get them gleaming! They're not as good as they were when I first got them done, and past experience suggests they won't last long either.

The wheels on the Cerbera need no maintenance at all - you wash them and they come up great. I think I might get the S wheels powder coated as well - I just need to decide on a finish. Do I go for an anthracite grey? Or black? Or a shadow chrome effect? I don't know.

:: Tuesday, February 22, 2011 ::

I meant to get the wheels swapped over on the S today, and get another pair along to the house. Unfortunately work got in the way.

I decide, when I get home, that I'll try to protect the polished wheels a bit better. My son recommends "Wheel Guard" by Chemical Guys - he has some out in the shed (he won a whole range of car cleaning products years ago, and oddly, seems to have preserved most of them, while mine need regular replacement. Funny that, eh?) It's like an orange mousse, you spread it on, let it dry to a haze, then buff up, and repeat for an extra tough finish.

And this is how they look! I've also given the tyres a bit of a clean.

And this is the inside of the garage, showing how much rubbish I've managed to accumulate in all those shelf units.

I load the two wheels into the Cerbera (one in the boot, one in the back) along with the jack, wheel wrench etc. I don't have time to nip along to the farm tonight, but I'm ready to go tomorrow!

:: Saturday, February 26, 2011 ::

Well I didn't get along to the farm to swap the wheels "tomorrow". Or the next day, or the next. So I finally got along today, with 2 shiny wheels in the back of a Fiesta, and 2 grotty wheels brought back.

And this shows just how grotty they are. The surface is almost totally white, and there is absolutely no shine on them at all.

So the first step is a bucket of water and some wet and dry paper - 400 grade seems to be about the right balance between "rub like a bastard and not make any difference" (ie too smooth) and "oh shit they're scratched to hell now" (too coarse, for those who haven't worked it out). This is what they look like after that stage.

:: Sunday, February 27, 2011 ::

Right let's get these wheels finished.

The next step after the wet and dry is polishing. Like the other two, I hand polish them, the first time crossing the polish strokes so that I take out any sanding marks, and get a nice even shine. This photo shows two spokes polished (on the right) while the rest are still at the "rubbed down" stage.

I've reached the stage where kneeling down all day to polish wheels has one unfortunate side effect - I can't get up again. So I've set up my wheel polishing stand (patent pending). The good thing about it is, that nobody will steal it because it looks just like a blue wheely bin. This also has the secondary benefit of lifting the wheel into my range of clear vision...

Two polishes, and then two coats of protective wax, and then clean the tyres up, and they look as good as new (from this distance!).

I also notice that the tread on these two (these are the rear tyres) is down to about 3.5mm (by my 30-year-old tyre tread gauge), so they'll be needing replacement before long too. At least they are a lot cheaper than the Cerbera or Lexus tyres!