Phil Ethier wrote:
>
> >Wait, how can you truly enjoy a TR without that first rally through a
> >fresh
> >few inches of snow? You should really see the tail end fly!! Besides
> >colder
> >air means denser air!!!
>
> Sorry, here in the rust capitol of the world, they start throwing salt and
> sand around at the first sign of a snowflake. Time to drive the Saturn
> because it does not rust and the Suburban because who cars that it does.
> The Lotus and the Triumph will be a nice, dry, saltless, 50-degree shop for
> the winter.
Hmmm, previous experience suggests that, perhaps, there is still fun in
the snow, if one is willing to do so. Where I lived, once upon a time,
in upper Michigan, there was what was known as lake-effect snow (a
University of Chicago radar station to study that phenomenon was located
about eight miles from my house).... That meant that the snow appeared
in large amounts in a very short time. I remember one morning when the
blue meanies at work did not call me to tell me the offices were closed
due to an impending snowstorm. I dutifully went to work, in the TR4, and
arrived to find all city offices closed (I worked, at that time, for a
municipal engineering office), so I steered to Sears for emergency
supplies before returning home. By the time I started back home, the
snow was coming down heavily.
After treading carefully back the twenty miles north from work, I turned
onto the road leading the five miles back to my house.
There was a slight incline up to the road surface from the main road,
and the TR4 was then plowing snow about two feet deep... it cascaded
over the bonnet and the only thing which got me up the hill were the
big-lugged VW snow tires on the rear, which, at about 3500 rpm in
second, acted like paddlewheels.
About two miles into this maelstrom of snow, I hit a very big drift,
about four feet deep. The car pitched sideways, and at full opposite
lock, the car depended entirely upon the throttle for steering. For
about three miles, I traversed the road nearly sideways, mostly staying
in my lane, and nearing home, had the good fortune to be able to wave to
my neighbors, comfortably propped up on the couch in front of the
fireplace and visible through their front window, through the windshield
of the TR4. At my driveway, I simply reversed lock and let off on the
throttle and slid, at high speed, into the driveway, as my then-wife
watched, horrified. I got out of the car, smiling, and went in to hear,
"don't you ever do that again, you hear me?"
Fun in the snow. The wife divorced me. Her loss. To hell with salt and
ill-humor. Drive, and the snow be damned. <smile>
--
Michael D. Porter
Roswell, NM
[mailto: mporter@zianet.com]
`70 GT6+ (being refurbished, slowly)
`71 GT6 Mk. III (organ donor)
`72 GT6 Mk. III (daily driver)
`64 TR4 (awaiting intensive care)
`80 TR7 (3.8 liter Buick-powered)
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