leaked rapidly when you were stopped and slowly when you weren’t, although, before this happened, it did have to be raining). The water pump was soon repaired and although no water leaked, the car still managed to boil regularly. I found that at 30 MPH stops were needed every 15 mins, but at 35 MPH, they were needed every 10 mins, I was too scared to go any faster. One of the first major trips was to Whangarei, about 100 miles. This took 5 hours of driving and 8 gallons of water. The car ran beautifully there and back, even over the Brynderwyns’ in second gear. A few weeks later another trip was on, this one to Whitianga and up to Kuaotuna. Once again, much water was consumed, particularly over the Tapu Hill, but the joys of driving at 20 MPH on a hot day along a dusty road, wearing my worst hat, and having the front windscreen opened out, far outweighed the slight inconvenience of these frequent stops. The absence of shock absorbers made the ride somewhat pendulous, particularly on the road north from Whitianga, where the entire contents of the back seat transferred itself, in a parabolic motion, to the front seat, and thence on to the floor. While getting petrol at Whitianga, I was approached by an old joker who said he used to work on the cars before the war and hadn’t seen one since. He poured over the car for several minutes, recalling memoirs of 40 years. On just about every outing now, I am approached by someone who used to own one or drive one or ride in one as kids. One day when out, I had a guy proudly tell me that he drove one over the cliff at Eketahuna just after the war! 16
The actual decision to restore was not taken lightly. I had owned many vehicles previous to this, but had never restored one. I had dismantled several, with good intentions, but had run out of money, space, the ability, knowledge, or time. So, with a determination to see this through I drove the car into the shed and started the dismantling process mid May 1978. Not having any manuals or guidebooks at all, I decided it best to record every detail of the operation and now have three volumes of descriptions starting with: 1: Bonnet - 2 screws, Front - 2 screws, Rear All screws, nuts, bolts, and small parts were placed in individual envelopes with a description written on the outside of the envelopes. Often it was necessary to draw a picture of a part or set of parts and I reproduce here, those relating to the ignition timing. There were timing marks o anything except on the crankshaft and camshaft sprockets where there were two “T” ‘s (for Top). With typical British reasoning, the No. 1 cylinder was about to fire when the T’s were both at their lowest point. (See diagram on page 16) Believe it or not, when the assembly time game, this method of setting camshaft and ignition timing, turned out to be precisely right and no adjustment was necessary at all. The basic order of dismantling was lamps, bumpers, guards, radiator, seats, steering box, firewall, gearbox, motor, front and rear axles, doors, dashboard, upholstery, windows, floorboards. The body shell was left on the chassis, but everything else was removed, cleaned, inspected, labelled, stored and then attended to bit by bit.
