Well, I finally took a reasonably long day trip today- not distance, but time.
I will start at the beginning:
I arranged for an interesting first date a few days back, and we decided to
take a ride in the Herald 1200 convertible- So, last night I did what every
triumph owner does the night before a ride- I pulled the dash board to repair a
bad hinge mounting on the glove box, decided to replace the whole dash board,
stripped, sanded, stained and coated another one, in somewhat better shape, and
proceeded to go to bed at 3 am with no dash in place, and two candidates. My
date was supposed to begin at 1pm.
Awakening at 8, I went down to discover new dash not quite dry. Fine- old one
back in, car washed by 10:30, then left at noon for Philadelphia, via local big
roads. Boy- it was GREAT! My fully restored little 12/50 engine was
magnificent. Highway speeds (60+) most of the way, with power to pull away and
overtake slower cars! I topped out(my top- the car still had some more, didn't
want to push it) around 80, though she indicated higher a few times. Very easy
to handle, motor turning over like a Swiss watch.Up to NE Philadelphia, out to
Valley Forge via the Schyukyll Expwy., puttered around all day (after lunch in
King of Prussia) and back. Around 150 miles all told. Very comfortable. And she
liked the car, too! I did discover the value of maintaining momentum up hill...
Dropped into granny when we got too slow( about 3 mph, in 2nd...) she jumped up
that hill, and I was able to shift up again. That was on a small road at VF
National Park.
A great, sunshiny day, for an open air Triumph convertible ride.(And she was
laughing about all the guys checking out the car! Especially the two in a 67
Alfa-Romeo Spyder, who stopped me to ask about the car!
Scott
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