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| 19th April 2010 |
| Gaydon: Heritage Motor Centre |
Now, it seems that visiting the Heritage Motor Centre at Gaydon has become an annual pilgrimage for us, let me recap...
- 2007: start of the Lombard rally (with Richard White in his MGZR, appropriately) - we ultimately finished 15th overall
- 2009: the NEWS "run", an event where people new to road rally could navigate from N, E, W & S - so my youngest daughter navigated me in the 121 Amazon, our eldest navigated Emma in the P1800S, and Leighten/Matthea were in the PV544. We all set off from Bury St Edmunds
- 2010: WCR40 celebration...
So Sunday was spent in beautiful sunshine at Gaydon, we were exhibiting our 144 Camel, destined to drive from here to CapeTown on New Year's Eve, and Leighten had his homily to the World Cup Triumph 2500 on display. Naturally there was a huge Triumph attendance, and about 12 of the cars that competed on the Word Cup Rally in 1970 were there also.
Besides John Bayliss and his 144 (also going to CapeTown), we met great hordes of East Anglians at the event, which was an unexpected pleasure as CMC and SCCoN members amongst others came and said hello.
At 4.30pm Richard Atherton took the Camel - RA isn't a "Volvo Man", so this would be pretty much the first time he's driven such a car, and given that he's got 8,500 miles to do in 27 days we thought it a good idea that he used the car for 10 days to get a little familiar.
Which meant I got Richard's Mondeo TurboDiesel...
Now I clearly had the wrong shoes on: thick soled leather affairs, so I found the throttle very difficult to judge, but I got better at judging the difference between feathered throttle and heavy footed within 30 miles. At 70mph it was a delight - plenty of torque from that diesel when you wanted to pass slower vehicles, but very civilised at the legal limit.
And here's the nub: as soon as you get into junctions/roundabouts, you realise just how flighty a modern car is - there is a good reason that they run 5 and 6 speed gearboxes, it's because there's a lot of weight in a modern and they have stuff all engine tractability - I was forever having to changing gear.
Granted the 144Camel is supremely delightful in that you can take roundabouts and pull away in 3rd gear, 2nd may have to be used on rare occasions.
But the Mondeo needed 1st 2nd and 3rd to negotiate roundabouts without the engine cratering, and it's not a nice gearbox like the Volvo either!
This isn't of course a new phenomenon, but I'd forgotten just how limited modern vehicles are since we just don't have to drive them very often, and when we do it's always a delight to hand them back within a dozen miles.
The last time I had to make a decision based on this characteristic was in the early 80's: my friend Mark & I ran 2-stroke motorbikes, initially Suzuki GT250's (Mark had a desirable GT250 X7 in the Sudan if memory serves me) with 5speed gearbox; then I was tempted to the dark side by a the latest Yamaha RD250LC with 6speed gearbox (which was never as good a bike as the much older Suzuki). I used to ride that LC from Worthing to York at least 6 times a year before the M25 was built (actually difficult to remember the time when the M25 didn't exist!), and on the Northbound trip I could only get as far as Edgware in North London before my left (clutch) wrist gave up operating, and the rest of the journey was made with clutchless gearchanges!
Hence when in the late 80's I chose a bike again, it had to have a maximum of 5 gears: firstly a Suzuki GS550E, then in Texas we bought my cherished 1974 Kawasaki Z1A.
And since I'm rambling appallingly, I might as well mention how many in the Volvo world favour Japanese bikes:
- Amazon Cars: Kawaski Z1A
- Tony Barrett (latterly of South Service): Kawasaki Z1's
- Charlie Garrett over at Oxford, has been renowned for years as a specialist in the Honda 4pot bikes of the 70's, from the old Four4 to the 750 that forced Kawasaki to scrap their own drawings and create the 900cc Z1 - although I think the Honda was dry-sumped, so technologically the nicer engine.
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