:: Diary - January 2015 ::

:: Saturday, January 3, 2015 ::

Yes, I’m still alive!

Only just, mind. I’ve barely set eyes on the TVR except when chucking cardboard boxes, garden tools, bits of carpet and empty suitcases into the garage all around it. Well today, I decided to tidy up a bit, mainly so that I can get the car out tomorrow to go to the first TVR meeting of 2015. After emptying the garage and filling a wheely-bin with cardboard, I’ve got working space again.

A quick check for any wee jobs - I’ve cleaned the car since the last time I used it, and I can’t remember anything else on the list. The only item obviously needing attention is the steering wheel again - it’s gone all mouldy again. Time for more drastic action.

To prevent any drips onto the seats etc, I remove the steering wheel - pretty easy, one 22mm nut on the end of the column, one good yank and it’s off. Then I get some better mould killer - house decorating stuff if you must know, and brush it into the leather, making sure I get into all the stitching etc, and leave it to dry. Then I give it another application of leather cream, and buff it up, then refit it.

:: Sunday, January 4, 2015 ::

It’s TVR meeting day. It’s been frosty overnight, so I have a dilemma - do I take the Porsche for the heater (the heater is amazing - takes a few minutes to get going but then it’s bleeding hot in there. Settings range from “kinda warm” to “full tandoori”) or do I take the TVR seeing as it’s dry and the sky is blue? Sod it, let’s go topless.

So I set off to Dave’s (Jim’s not going, he’s on holiday) and then have a very pleasant drive to the meeting. I discover within a couple of miles that my driver’s side windscreen washer points almost vertically, so the right hand of the screen is soon smeared badly. Another job added to the list.

There’s only a handful of TVRs at the meeting (5 I think) and another owner turns up in a Porsche - that’s 3 TVR owners who also own a Porsche, although the other 2 are much newer than mine, and they’ve got antifreeze in them and other modern stuff.

The chat ranges over the normal eclectic range of random pish, including health and safety, railways, bridges, white lines, chainsaws, quite a lot on opticians, weddings, and other stuff I can’t remember. The lunch was pretty good as well, although it’s noticeable that prices are increasing gradually.

Then it’s back out into the freezing cold for a little more chat and a quick windscreen clean, before the drive home as it’s getting dark.

On the drive out, I was doing a lot of gear-changy revvy stuff, which was fun. For the drive back, I was hanging on to higher gears and letting the engine just torque the car along - that’s also good fun.

I put the car back in the garage with the speedo on 99,345 miles - only 655 miles to go till the big 100,000, which should come up later this year. I bought the car on about 55,000 miles, so I’ve done 45,000 miles over almost 12 years, with home maintenance only and no garage visits (apart from MOT, tyres and the tune-up man - oh and a slight bodywork repair after planting it in the side of my SAAB when I wasn’t even driving it… see 22 July 2005 if you want a laugh…).

It’s still running like a sweetie - but I fear the day is approaching when it’s going to need a complete rebuild, and I’m not entirely sure that I am up to it - it now takes me ages to get down to work on it, and even longer to get up again. Age doesn’t come itself, you know. But sod it, I’ll deal with that if or when it happens - in the meantime, I’m going to enjoy driving it.

It’s “value” is irrelevant - I’ve had my money’s worth out of this wee car over the years, any residual value is a bonus - but it’s not relevant because it’s not for sale.

:: Monday, January 5, 2015 ::

While I remember, I decide to realign the windscreen washer. This turns out to be a wee bit of a buffer because it’s got “stiction” - you put a needle in but it won’t bloody move - then it suddenly jumps through a huge angle - so you push it pack and it jumps back to exactly where it started. As a result, you have a choice either washing the screen of the car behind you, or directing the jet strength into the wiper when it’s parked, and then it doesn’t spread far enough across the screen. After 10 minutes of “up-a-bit-no-down-a-bit-no-up-a-bit” palaver, I finally get it to spread across the screen where the wiper can then spread it properly.

Meanwhile, I phone the Porsche man - it’s going in tomorrow to get the rusty front wings sorted, so I decide I’ll have a last day drive. Except it won’t start. It won’t even turn over. The lights are bright enough, the battery isn’t flat, but after a couple of failed starting attempts, I find it won’t lock or unlock either. It’s the alarm / immobiliser. What was I saying in November about immobilisers being more of a hassle for the owner than any potential thief?

I check the key blipper doodad - that’s working ok. I check the car battery voltage - just under 11 volts. Maybe not quite enough to work the alarm thingy? I plug it up to a trickle charger and leave it a couple of hours. When I go back it locks and unlocks normally, the engine turns over, but there still isn’t enough oomph to start the car. I’ll leave the trickle charger on overnight and supplement it with a booster pack in the morning (also now on charge!) to get it moving.

I think the car’s battery is failing - it was completely flat a couple of weeks ago and I thought that recharging it had revived it - but sometimes you can only prolong the inevitable. Fortunately it’s a standard battery available from Halfords, Kwik Fit and hopefully, my local motor factors.

:: Tuesday, January 6, 2015 ::

No TVR work today - I have to take the Porsche to the bodyshop man.

With the battery fully charged, it starts fine! After I’ve cleared out various bits of clutter, I take it 20 miles or so to the bodyshop, where it will be getting new front wings, two rear wings repaired, a sill / B-pillar repair, and another repair under the rear screen. Hopefully there’s nothing else too drastic hidden away underneath, but you can’t tell until you take it to bits!

It’s coming up for 26 years old. It’s done 135,000 miles, near enough. It still drives like a new car - these must have been fantastic when they were actually new! I drop it off, and get the train back.

A girl gets on the train at the next stop. Our eyes meet. She flutters her eyelashes. I get blown over backwards. She’s got false lashes on, that look like those brushy draught proof strips that you put on the bottom of a garage door to stop stuff blowing underneath. I mean I know lots of girls wear them but these are bloody enormous. And thick. What possesses girls to think that looking like Barbara Cartland on an off-day is a good look?

Anyway, for some reason I briefly contemplate chopping the Porsche in for a Lamborghini Miura. Can’t think why.

No Porsche for about 2 months. This makes me sad.

:: Monday, January 26, 2015 ::

Right, boys and girls. Can anybody spell “rust”. It’s ARR-YOU-EFF-ESS-TEE. What’s that? There’s no “f” in rust? That’s where you’re wrong - there’s loads of effin rust, and most of it seems to be in the sill of my Porsche.

I’m not going to show photos, for those of a nervous disposition, but they have taken the wings off, and have started the repair. The driver’s side sill had a jaggy hole, about the size of a penny, above the jacking point. Now, if a Porsche 911 is gonna rust, then that’s where it’s gonna start - just where the B-post meets the sill, under the door lock. I’ve seen one where you could open the door and see right through the outer sill. And the inner sill. And the stiffener in the middle, right through to your little tootsies on the ground below.

Mine isn’t as bad as that. The outer sill is rusty over about 4 inches, cut that away and the end of the stiffener has rusted away where it meets the inner sill - but there’s no damage to the nearby torsion bar suspension mount, so it should all be easily fixable.

The other sill is fine, oddly. It’s as if the car has been jacked up badly at some time, under one side, and damaged the rustproofing. The front wings are ok apart from the area around both headlamps, but it might be more economical to repair them than replace - new wings are about £1,000 apiece including the dreaded Very Arbitrary Tax, and you can buy a lot of labour for that if you still have to paint the bloody things anyway.

The rest of the car is basically pretty sound, apparently.

Back to rust. I gave the TVR wheels a wipe down after I used it last, but there was obviously still salt on there - the wheels are now covered in a coating of while oxide dust. More polishing required!

The advantage of fibreglass cars is that all of the rust is hidden underneath. That’s been a distinct advantage to some, who enter their cars for shows and then hope nobody looks underneath. I’ve seen some “winners” whose engine bays and chassis look like the engine room of the Titanic - not when it was built, but now!

That’s also a disadvantage of course, because somebody can buy a tidy-looking car and then find that it has crumbled to dust underneath. Seen that as well.

Not happy with the amount of rust I already own, I went out and bought some more.

It’s a pedal car. Built in 1960 or 1961 by Triang, based on the 1957 or 58 Vanwall, as driven by Stirling Moss (the best driver never to be world champion) and Tony Brooks (the most famous driver that most people have never heard of). Here’s a photo of the great Stirling in action rounding Tabac at Monaco in 1957 (did I ever mention that I’ve been to the Monaco Grand Prix? I did? Oh ok then, as you were):

Mine has been repainted in “omelette yellow” (or possibly just rolled in omelette, judging by the Artex-like texture). It needs a couple of dings bashed out, a bit of a repaint, some new bits including a steering wheel and a windscreen.

Best of all, it fits in the space I have left in the garage!

Don’t ask me what I’m going to do with it when (if) it’s finished - I haven’t a clue. I won’t be driving it, that’s for sure.