IN THIS EDITION
CHAIRMANS CHAT
COMING EVENTS
MESSAGE FROM OUR PATRON
KATIKATI 150YEAR CELEBRATION —— OUR MID MONTH RUN.
A POST BY MEMBER PETER LAWN
UPCOMING NATIONAL RALLY EVENTS
ED’S RAMBLINGS
ITEMS FOR SALE
CHAIRMANS CHAT
Donn and Sam working on “
April 2016
Max the Mazda”
IMPORTANT NOTICE FOR SEPTEMBER CLUB NIGHT
THE NEW VCCBOP CLUB BOOKLET HAS BEEN UPDATED AND PRINTED AND WILL BE DISTRUBITED TO ALL CURRENT MEMBERS ATTENDING
THE SEPTEMBER CLUBNIGHT BY EDITOR KERRY ELTON.
AT THE CONCLUSION OF THE EVENING
ENSURE YOU COLLECT YOUR COPY
A MESSAGE FROM OUR PATRON ALASTER JONES
Editors Note: I think it goes without saying Alastair, that the BOP VCC Club would be too quiet a place without your presence and the club look forward to many more years of your involvement.
BOPVCC committee member Doug Brown is liaising with the Katikati 150 year organizing committee re the involvement of our club for their anniversary parade. This will be our mid month run and It would be wonderful to see you all there. .
An update will follow soon from Kaaren Smylie via the Buzz.
MOVIE NIGHT
In spite of the Spring weather, eighteen hardy souls arrived at the club rooms for the movie night BYO get together to enjoy the romantic comedy romp Breakfast at Tiffany’s, kindly supplied by Joe and Jill Scott. The usual ice cream intermission provided a sweet break.
September end of month movie night film will be the 1977 Australin comedy classic “The Castle” starring Michael Caton as Darryl Kerrigan. The film is celebrated for its humour, its “little man versus the system” narrative, and its portrayal of fairness and justice prevailing, making it an iconic classic.
The DVD has been offered by Treasurer Keith and Jane Perkins and I am looking forward to the viewing. Come along for a great evening entertainment and BYO meal. Doors open at 6pm.
NOG N NATTER
August meet-up at The Rain Bar, Papamoa, was an excellent get together with a very enjoyable meal.
September N&N will be at the Tauranga Citizens Club at 6pm. See you all there for a fun night.
55 years with a Ford 10 Special By Peter Lawn
I was driving a 1947 Ford Prefect and saw a MGTD for sale. Dads opinion was that it was too fast for me. When someone wrote off my Prefect, I purchased a 1953 Prefect and swapped engines to make up a good car.
I read a book about building Ford Specials and went to acquire another Prefect. It had a broken front crossmember, so I was directed across the road to the remains of a Microplas Mistral plus four good large tyres and an accessory Ford water pump all on a drivable chassis. This was towed home along with the remains of the fiberglass body, all purchased for $80.
Friends and I stripped, cleaned and painted the chassis and running gear and then went about designing and building the body out of 3/8” square tube and 20g alloy panels, after which we got a WOF with the body work just polished alloy which was hard to keep clean.
Rear shocks were deemed necessary with the front shocks coming much later.
After a few trips in the rain, a hood seemed a good idea. Dad had acquired a covered roof rack off an early 1960s Ford station wagon, The cover was cut up to make a hood and side screens.
Mums sewing machine could not handle the material so I hand sewed it and this lasted about 25 years. The present top was made about 30 years ago by my neighbour in Palmerston North.
I purchased a new pair of 1 1/4” SU carbs and made a manifold to suit and with a modified camshaft being obtained, the block was ported and polished. With the non-adjustable tappets, the valves were too short but a drop of GP bronze on the valve stems solved the problem.
Racing at the Levin Circuit resulted in engine oil pressure problems with boiling and surging, so I made a high capacity pump from side valve V8 oil pump gears and a portion off an oil pump body.
A larger sump with baffles was tried to solve oil surge and a later modification was made to give clearance around the pick-up area.
The Ford water pump had a short service life due to the bronze bush wearing rapidly with 6000 revs being obtained. It was later machined to fit needle roller bearings and a ceramic seal which lasted about 30 years before needing attention.
At times, a valve would pull through the collets or the collet broke. After running out of good collets and guides, I made new replacements.
I purchased a close ratio gearbox out of a Lotus 6 but could not afford the overhead valve engine.
The gearbox gave me much strife. The first motion shaft lost a tooth and I had a new gear made and welded on. later, second gear started jumping out of mesh, I tried building up the outside of the bronze bush which only lasted a short time and collapsed internally, so I had a new bush splined internally and then finished the outside to suit.
Second speed became noisy with three teeth breaking off the cluster second gear. I spent much time building up the teeth with weld and filing to suit.
The end of the mainshaft was worn down to .025” so gear mesh was not great at 5000-6000 rpm in second and more noises eventuated from two teeth breaking off the first motion shaft.
- continued -
By this time I had acquired a better lathe, milling machine and dividing head and I bought the correct grade of steel to make a straight cut set which I test fitted and case hardened to a depth of .030”.
I decided to key the gear to the first motion shaft as I believe the heat from the welding resulted in the teeth becoming brittle and although still noisy in 1st and 2nd gear, this seemed to work well.
10 years later 2nd became very noisy, my welded teeth had failed after 21 years and the straight cut gears lasted 10 years and I refitted the standard ratio box.
I rebuilt thr close ratio box, as I had made two sets of gears.
I noticed oil and water mixing in the sump, so removed the sump and side plate and pressurised the block with a garden hose and found water spraying out behind No2 inlet valve.
I cleaned the block with washing soda and applied a bottle of Holts Wonder Weld, this sealed well for years.
The current block had a similar problem, the block had rusted out above No3 inlet valve guide seat so I pressed in a cast iron insert. The last two engines I converted to a full flow oil filter system using an MG Midget oil filter remotely mounted.
Racing at Levin, I had the misfortune to roll the car when the right hand steering arm broke.
It was noted by the marshalls that prior to the accident, the car had been on two wheels during most laps around that corner.
When racing at Ohakea, I had valve bounce at 6000rpm. The plug gap closed and I lost one cylinder.
Some weeks later, when driving on the road, the head fell off a valve and destroyed the engine.
Again, some years later, a strange misfire developed and was traced to a closed tappet clearance on one valve. The valve had stretched!
Inlet valves lasted well but exhaust valves burnt rapidly
As I was using unleaded fuel, I fitted a Fuelstar kit. The valves still burnt but the seats did not suffer as much and internally the engine was cleaner.
I also fitted a Fuelstar kit to the MGYA and I have not had the head off the MGYA in the last 50,000 miles.
I tried various wheel and tyre sizes, 165x15,600x16 and 650x16. 600x16 was found to be the best and would produce 90mph at 6000rpm in top gear. 650x16 produced 80mph at 4900rpm.
Some thirty years ago, I decided to repaint and fit better mudguards which were originally flat alloy.
I acquired fiberglass front guards and to build the rear guards, I overinflated a large inner tube and fiberglassed a section to make a mould. Extracting the mould was not easy, I then fibreglassed the inside of the mould to make the guards and again this proved to not be easy to extract the finished guards.
Over twenty five or so years, I have raced events at Levin, Manfield, Ohakea, Tahuna Beach and Nelson covering hill climbs and gymkhanas and have covered over 90,000 miles travelling and towing to these places with the car often being ’A’ framed behind the MGYA.
Since moving to Katkati in 2000, the car has been used for commuting to and from work.
Peter Lawn.
Continued
Editors Note; A great story Peter. Many thanks for sharing it with us. Proves the love of motoring never goes away
UP- COMING NATIONAL RALLIES
Eds Ramblings
A large collection of over 100 motorcycles were on display at Adrenalyn Motorcycles 2nd August. Also in attendance were two motor cycles from BOPVCC. It would have been great to have seen more bikers from our club showing the flag. Come on guys, please show your support at the next event.
From 1st September, vintage, veteran and classic cars WOFs will become an annual inspection. Make sure that the sticker you receive, reflects this.
Restoration Awards are taking place at the November BOPVCC Show and Swap Meet. If you have a newly finished restoration to enter, please contact Alistair Jones or Ron Elton now.
The clubs constitution has finally been completed and we are now an Incorporated Society. Also on the agenda was the Daffodil Rally with teams Hughes and Maredith putting in the hard graft and the national push to get Ford NZ on board won by our Club Captain Kaaren Smylie. Much respect goes out to all the helpers , committee and other dedicated people who ensured our clubs success in these events.
November Swap Meet, Car Show and Restoration Awards will be our chance to do it all over again!
Restoration or parts project. Contact: Draydon Olsen drayolsen@hotmail.com
BOP VCC COMMITTEE 2025-2026
CHAIRPERSON DONN WHITE (CHRIS) 027 4764465
IMMEDIATE PAST CHAIRPERSON N/A
SECRETARY MICHAEL THORMAN (JANE) 07 5444291 0274 742625
TREASURER
CLUB CAPTAIN
COMMITTEE
KEITH PERKINS (JANE) 0275 781231
KAAREN SMYLIE 021 664341
ALASTAIR JONES (GWEN) 07 5761124
COMMITTEE ELWYN PIRIE (PAULINE) 0274 914600
COMMITTEE ALAN MACKENZIE 0275 647785
COMMITTEE GEORGE HOWARD (LYNN) 0204 0427624
COMMITTEE DOUG BROWN 021 668117
COMMITTEE
RUSSELL HULBERT (JULIE) 0274 784599 VALUED VOLUNTEERED POSITIONS HALL
(MARION)
KLAXON EDITOR
FACEBOOK WEBSITE
0274 742625
GEORGE HOWARD (LYNN) 0204 0427624
DEIDRE RENNIE (TONY) 021 665875
WELFARE AND FIRST AID MERILYN ANDERSON (JACK) 07 5766346
KITCHEN CO-ORDINATORS
HEALTH AND SAFETY
VIC/DOMAS CERTIFICATION
CLUB NIGHT RAFFLES
APPAREL
ELWYN PIRIE 0274 914600
PAULINE PIRIE 027 6669494
RUSSELL HULBERT (JULIE) 0274 784599
RON ELTON (KERRY) 07 5799621
GEORGE HOWARD (LYNN) 0204 0427624
ALASTAIR JONES (GWEN) 07 576 1124
JANE THORMAN (MICHAEL) 07 5444291
ELWYN PIRIE (PAULINE) 0274 914600
PROJECTIONIST
BUZZ EDITOR
MOVIE NIGHT CO-ORDINATOR
CLUB CAPTAIN
KEITH PERKINS (JANE) 0275 781232
GEORGE HOWARD (LYNN) 0204 0427624
KAAREN SMYLIE 07 5674180 021 6643
GEORGE HOWARD (LYNN) 0204 0427624
KAAREN SMYLIE
Email: kaaren@smylie.co.nz
NEW MEMBER MEET, GREET AND INTRODUCTIONS. ALASTAIR JONES, KAAREN SMYLIE
KLAXON EMAIL
BOP VCC CONTACT INFORMATION
Klaxoninfo@gmail.com
CLUB WEBSITE www.bayofplentyvintagecarclub.com
SECRETARY EMAIL bayofplenty@vcc.org.nz
CLUB POSTAL ADDRESS
FACEBOOK PUBLIC PAGE
11 Ridgemount Terrace. Welcome Bay. Tauranga 3112
Bay of Plenty Vintage Car Club
CLUBROOMS ADDRESS 29 Cliff Road. Tauranga
For Club Enquiries at any time, please contact Kaaren Smylie 07 576 4180 021 664341
BOP VCC MONTHLY OPERATIONAL INFORMATION
CLUB NIGHT (EXCEPT JANUARY) 2nd Monday of the month @ 7.30 pm.
For members birthdays, please provide a plate on the relevant months club night
Contact The Secretary for your free club name badge
Please wear your name badge to all events and meetings
CLUB COFFEE MORNINGS
PARTS SHED
EVERY MONDAY MORNING 10AM EXCEPT JANUARY
OPENS 7PM CLUB NIGHTS AND COFFEE MORNINGS
Please donate all your surplus parts, they may be just what someone is looking for.
MID MONTH RUN
END OF MONTH RUN
COMMITTEE MEETING
WEDNESDAY FOLLOWING CLUB NIGHT
LAST SUNDAY OF THE MONTH
LAST MONDAY OF THE MONTH
LIBRARY THE LIBRARY IS ACCESSABLE DURING CLUB HOURS
The library will accept good clean car service manuals or books that relate to automotive history or travel
MONTHLY OPERATIONAL INFORMATION CONTINUED
NOG AND NATTER (Social Get Together at the listed restaurants)
Held on the third Tuesday of February, April, June, August and October at 6pm at the Rain Bar Restaurant. 30 Gravatt Road. Papamoa (Off Fashion Island shopping centre)
Held on the third Tuesday of March, May, July, September and November at 6pm at the Tauranga Citizens Club. Corner of 13th Avenue and Cameron Road. Tauranga.
For instant updates you wished to be Buzzed, please contact Kaaren Smylie. For material relevant for the club website, please contact Deidre Rennie. For items/stories to be published in the Klaxon, please contact George Howard.
