This is it on that glorious weekend we had in the middle of May when me and Sam decided we were going to give it a damn good clean. I know - me, cleaning a car! We cleaned it, T-Cut it, waxed it, cleaned the black mildew off the hood, the whole nine yards. At the last minute, though, Sam decided he didn't want to be in the picture...
This is the mighty 2.3 Pinto, carburetted, C3 auto, a real performance piece. Not. It only had about 20,000 miles on it, and it breezed the MoT. The only problem is, I set the timing by ear, and it turned out to be gutless even by smog motor four-pot standards. It hasn't got enough power to pull back a dead wombat's foreskin. I checked the timing after the test and I'd set it to about 25 degrees BTDC. I turned it back to where it should be - 6 degrees BTDC - and it promptly stalled. It'll run at about 12 degrees, but anything less than that and it shudders and hops about on its mounts like a nit on a griddle. Any ideas?
On the same weekend, I also gave the daily driver Fox a bit of a wash and brush-up.
See, you can polish a turd! I even tried using the electric mop thing to T-Cut it, but the extension lead would only reach far enough to do the bonnet and nearside wing, and reverse gear's packed up and I couldn't be bothered to move it, so it has a really shiny bonnet and part of the driver's door and A-pillar.
Some parts of the A-pillar aren't that shiny, though, like the bit around the top hinge which has rusted so much that the door drops noticeably when you open it. This discovery was about as welcome as a sudden and violent bout of fizzing bum-honk in a wedding dress. A rented wedding dress. During the service.
The Thursday after that I was at Millbrook for work, and had to park the car nose-in to a guardrail. There was a shuttle-bus service to the place I was going, and just after lunchtime it threw it down with rain so I thought I'd bugger off. I got in the minibus along with this old Irish dude, and the driver asked us which our cars were so he could drop us off. The old Irish guy said "A red Mini", and I said "A Ford Mustang." "Oh yeah, I know that one," said the driver. Shite, I thought, has it leaked all over the place, caught fire, has the door fallen off? Nope, the driver has a Mustang too, a 1970 notchback. The old Irish guy started telling me how he'd just been in San Francisco, at some museum or other, giving a talk and how they had some lovely Mustangs etc. A really nice guy. When we got to my car, he said, "Sorry, who are you?" I told him my name, and he said, "Nice to meet you, my name's Paddy Hopkirk." Fist me bandy, Paddy Hopkirk! I didn't recognise him until he said that, but after that it was really obvious! I resisted the temptation to say, "Hey, I've got one of your roof-racks!"
On the way back from there, I dropped by at Santa Pod. It was the Peak Performance Test'n'Tune before the Main Event, and I wanted to see Steve's Bentley run, but Santa Pod was awash. The road from the ticket barrier was flooded, and caused my alternator to cack its knickers and stop charging. I got to the pits, and found Steve's Bentley on stands in a couple of inches of water, and nobody to be seen - everyone was sheltering from the weather, apart from one bloke down by tech inspection who was building a boat and loading it with animals. Mark Todd came running in - he was crewing for Steve - and said that they'd run an 8.4 with no boost that morning, but nothing had run that afternoon. So I buggered off, fording the river again and got to Wellingborough before the alternator kicked back in. Unfortunately, the combination of piss-wet-through driver and nice warm heater caused half the car's vinyl headlining to come detached from its cardboard backing and slap me on the back of the head.
The following day I had time to prepare the car for the first UK Power Tour. I prepared by slinging the race tyres in the boot and sticking the headlining back up with a bit of masking tape. Much later, I remembered to check the oil. James and I convoyed down the M40 - I'd forgotten how much fun the convoy thing could be - and arrived at Rye at about 1.30am. Par for the course. The following day, we headed for Rye Mini Drag Strip.
This was the NSCC contingent at Rye, with Derek seemingly saying, "OK, come on, really, where's the strip?" It's the most basic of grass-roots places but it had a place to race, a bog and a tea wagon so what more do you want? It's only a 120-yard dash with an 80-yard bum-clenching shut-down, but, speaking to the owner/promoter, there's more to come from this place.
After that it was up to Shakey for Yanks/Gary's on the Sunday, but the place was rammed and a few oil-downs meant plenty of queuing time and few runs. That evening we all headed up to York where there was a VW festival with a huge marquee and a couple of decent bands on. On the Monday, in the brackets, I found I was way ahead of my opponent so laid on the anchors and went over the line with the wheels locked. I'd still broken out massively, but was two hundredths off my PB, so God knows what it'd have run if I hadn't anchored up. Even at death's door, there's still life in the old bugger!
Talking of life, it was good to see John Sleath's Duramax diesel pick-up out, shaking down gently with two low 10s and a 9.8 on its first ever test. There's more to come, though, as those turbos are the size of dustbins.
Now all I have to do is try to coax another month or so out of the Fox while I save up for a tax disc on the orange Pinto!
Eugene
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