..but I’m not classing it as a breakdown because I was on my drive. The engine seems to have a habit of shaking bolts loose. It has happened with a couple of bolts that hold the bellhousing to the engine.
But twice now, the starter motor bolts have been shaken loose so the starter pops out of its hole. You can usually tell when it’s happening because the starter gets progressively louder over a period of days before it pops out completely. But this time it did it just the once. I’d been up to Toys R Us with my daughter to get a birthday present for someone and it got louder. Came home. Then later I was going out in it, and it popped out, and I was left with a loud grinding sound.
I need to get under there to tighten them up again, but it’s raining…
This is amazing. Clarence Cleveland Curtiss bought his first car, a 1929 Ford Model A in 1938 for $10. It now has 200,000 miles on it, it’s unrestored and it still runs.
It has an amazing history. He bought it from a guy during the depression who was out of work and hungry. This was when he was 15. He drove it for a year without a licence.
When he was 17 he met his wife, Dorothy in the car. “She was the first and only girl I ever kissed in the car,”he said. “It’s priceless because of that as far as I’m concerned”
In 1940 he replaced the engine with a Hudson Terraplane lump which allowed him to go 80mph+ instead of the usual 55. They drove the the New York Worlds Fair in 1940, and to six army camps from Massachusetts to Georgia when he served during World War II.
He plans on passing the car to his family when he passes away.
Over on OldSkoolFord a guy named Fleet is secretly going back in time to the 70s and buying second hand Cortinas. He owns a couple of Mk2s with very low mileage, plus this lovely Mk3 with only 12,800 miles from new. It’s the only way he can keep coming up with these gems. That’s around 500 miles per year.
I missed the Vanfest show due to unforseen circumstances. There are some pics over on the 105speed.com forum. It was the Ford Fair too this weekend at Silverstone. Yes, I missed that too. I’ll try and get to a least one show before the end of the season!
How amazing is that? Eccleston owns a 1964 Ford Anglia Deluxe in his car collection that contains a Mercedes Benz worth around £3.25m.
Experts reckon the auction of 50 of his cars could raise more than £15m. Eccleston started collecting the cars when he was a second hand car dealer in Bexleyheath in the 50s.
Follow the restoration of my new 1967 Anglia Super. It's a race against the clock. It needs to be on the road by 2009. Will I make it?