Story time,
I just drove from Naperville, IL, to Rantoul, IL, Saturday night (240 mile
round trip) for the annual awards banquet for the Champaign County Sports
Car Club. It was 5dF when I left at 4 PM, and going to be sub zero by the
time I returned around midnight. So the car of choice would be the MGA, of
course. Okay, so I didn't say it was a particularly good choice, but it's
a matter of opinion.
The car hadn't had a good excuse to be on the road for nearly a month, and
I had just installed new carpeting (with extra padding this time), and I
had also just installed some plastic snap plugs in the 1" holes for bolt
access behind the front kick panels, and also fixed the pesky door latch
and the heater blower, so it seemed like as good a time as any for a little
test drive.
About 50 miles into the trip it seemed like things were a little colder
than expected, like shivering cold. It didn't take long to figure out that
it stays a little warmer inside if I keep the windows closed most of the
time. The sliding side curtains are getting a bit loose in the tracks
after 12 years of use, and sometimes the panels like to open themselves
with a little vibration and wind. Being chilly is a good incentive to keep
an eye on such things, so the rest of the trip was a little warmeer (or
perhaps a little less cold). With a 190dF thermostat and a working heater
it was going quite well, even with temperatures near 0dF outside.
Traveling down through Ford county on IL-115 the snow was banked several
feet high an both sides of the road in places. But we hadn't had any new
snow for 24 hours, and the plows were doing a good job, so the roads were
mostly clear and just snow packed and a little slippery. Even so, I
decided to hold it down to 60 mph most of the way, no particular rush. Of
course there were a few stints of 75 on the interstate highway sections.
After being parked in Rantoul for a few hours it started right up with
normal choke, no problem. And the trip home was quite uneventful as well,
except for one little issue. I began to notice that it was colder inside
while driving through small towns at 35 mph, and then a little warmer while
cruising at 60 mph in the open country. Well waddayano, fine time for the
pesky heater blower to take another vacation. It was still a nice trip, as
I had coat and hat and gloves and hardly noticed the lack of blower action.
At least my feet were staying warm, and most of the trip was moving
briskly to keep a little air flow going through the heater box. As it
turned out, the blower failure was a good test of the new interior
treatment. So the verdict is that the hole plugs and carpet padding do
make some appreciable difference in tameing the cool spirits.
Oh, and there was that awards thing in the middle of the trip. For the TSD
road rally series, 6th place for the year's points accumulation. I guess
that comes from getting lost three times early in the season for lack of a
navigator to read the route instructions in the dark for the night rallies,
and then having several of the day rallies cancelled for lack of
rallymasters. Optimistically, things WILL be better in that department
next season.
And for the autocross series, 2nd place for the year. Now THAT I didn't
expect, as the MGA was off the road for the first half of the driving
season for body work and paint, didn't get rolling until late July. I
guess all those begged and borrowed rides early in the season kept the
series afloat until the MG was available again. As I recall, one Plymouth
Neon, one MG Midget, one TVR 280i, and two dates in a Toyota MR2 (until I
broke the gearbox once, hee-hee). I also did well in a borrowed MGB at a
local club event, but having nothing to do with the down state series.
Well, aside from the awards, there were some other good things happening
for the MGA this last year. It got the promised body work and repaint
after 130K miles, as well as a new rag top and tonneau cover and new
carpeting. It also got another gearbox rebuild and another fresh spare
engine after the original one was retired (after 250K miles). It also had
a nice 1500 mile road trip to Chattanooga for NAMGAR GT-23, and an even
nicer 1800 mile trip to Niagra Falls to meet the Antique auto rally from
England. And one of the best happenings was a non-happening, it didn't
blow out any connecting rod bearings in the last year! And there were some
nice enhancements to the web site in the process.
So what's up for the new year? I've been invited to visit Newfoundland,
and I'm thinking about it. Also maybe the Canadian Grand Prix in June
(just a visit), and maybe a cross Canada jaunt from east to west, and most
likely NAMGAR GT-24 at Lake Tahoe in July, and maybe an extra week touring
around the Rocky Mountains before heading home. Anyone ready to start
guessing how many miles this MGA might do getting from Chicago to Lake
Tahoe and back via the wander route? Hmmmmm.
Happy new year y'all,
Barney Gaylord
1958 MGA with an attitude
http://www.ntsource.com/~barneymg
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