In a message dated 96-11-09 16:37:43 EST, drded@ix.netcom.com (David Deutsch)
writes:
<< And you call you're selfs enthusiasts. .....
Barney, drop a line when you arrive home and thanks for coming over >>
The Gymkhana in Brooklyn was a hoot! We got to run the New York Police
training course, same setup the cops use for practice. It had a few straight
sections but was very narrow in places and had some VERY tight turns. I made
it in a bit over 36 seconds, but I can't imagine trying to muscle a police
cruiser through there. I'm glad noone was taking video tape, or the NYPD
would probably be using the MGs as a training example.
I had a few Lucas problems on the way home, really unexpected, because all
these problems were with new or freshly reconditioned parts.
First, my six month old professionally rebuilt generator crapped out in the
middle of Ohio, in spite of a new control box installed at the same time.
Must be loosing smoke or lucasaide somewhere, so I pull in at a rest stop to
check. Big snow flakes just starting to fall, still 430 miles to go at 9 pm,
got to fix it! One brush down to a frazzle and the comutator badly burned,
looked like the brush may have been hanging up in the holder causing a lot of
arcing. Checked the tool box, no spare brushes, they went into a friends car
last week. The burned brush is so small that the spring can't reach it, so
getting creative, I drop in a #6 hex nut on edge behind the brush and set the
spring on top of it. Not much of a patch, but should hold the lucasaide in
for a while. Only 30 minutes delay an back on the road again. In deference
to the patch job, I figured to keep it under four grand for the rest of the
trip.
So much snow came down in that half hour that I was pushing about an inch of
the wet stuff off the car before restatring. The roads were thick and mushy,
could just make 45 mph steady if I stayed in the tracks, and here and there a
car in the ditch. Just five miles down the road the ignition sputtered a
couple of times and then cut out completely. I was parked in the mush on the
shoulder with a trouble light under the bonnet for about five minutes when a
patrol cop stopped to join me, not that I really needed help, but the company
was nice and I got to entertain him for a while.
All colored piping properly connected, juice to the coil OK, rotor turning,
points opening, cap OK, still no go. The cop was contemplating a tow, but
that wouldn't be sporting. I told him I had rebuilt the car from the ground
up and I was an engineer and ought to be able to figure it out, so hang in
there a bit. He didn't seem very impressed, said something like "Just give
me a new car every few years and I'll be happy". I held the big coil pipe to
the block, cranked it and got a big flash, so checked the fuel flow. Plenty
of fuel going to the carbs, so back to the coil side. With fuel and flash it
ought to run, so put all the piping back on, switched on the key, and pulled
the starter from under the bonnet. No go, but a loud snapping sound and a
bright flash as lucasaide was leaking across the top of the new Lucas Sport
coil. It wasn't wet, the leakage was appearantely from a small crack at the
base of the big center connection tower, with the juice leaking onto the dist
connector.
The cop was still thinking tow, but I wasn't finished yet, so "Stand there
and hold the light over this way a bit", felt good telling a cop what to do.
I had to plug the leak, needed something to plug it or cover it, so I
grabbed the big roll of fiberglass strapping tape I use to fasten the rallly
computer to the dash. I put several turns of tape around the tower neck, but
it was still leaking. So I started wrapping lengthwise around the coil,
putting about ten layers of tape down between the center connector and the
dist connector. When I put all the piping back onto the connectors and gave
it another crank there was no crack, no flash, just a good pop from the tail
end. So I slid inside, pushed the little pedal, pulled the S button and it
started right up, smooth as glass. So I drove off and left the cop standing
at the side of the road with his eyes bugged and his jaw hanging down.
An hour down the road the snow let up and everything went OK for a few more
hours, then just as I was crossing the line from OH to IN the lucasaide
indicator turned red again, accompanied by an intermittent squeeling noise,
so I figured the brush patch was a gonner and the #6 nut was singing its swan
song. Well that dynamo has a 2-year warantee, so it's going back for a free
exchange on Monday. 200 miles to go at 4 am, a new plan emerges. Tired of
fiddling with the lucasaide leaks, I invoke Plan B. I figure to run on the
battery with the lights on for about an hour, get it recharged while I stop
for breakfast, and run the rest of the way by daylight without the lights.
No sense coddling the dynamo anymore, so back to real road speed.
Well, mother nature has her own way of doing things, and 20 minuter later it
was snowing big time again. Things got pretty slow, time was wasting, and
the lucasaide was leaking out fast. I was soon reduced to following a big
truck as guide so I could kill the lights and keep the engine running until I
could find an exit, finally getting into an oasis 20 miles west of South Bend
with less than 100 miles to go. Wouldn't you know it! No service garage
here and no battery charger. So time to invoke Plan C. I called home for
reinforcements at 6 am, asked the wife to grab the spare dynamo and jumper
cables off the shelf and come hither. In the end that killed about another
four hours but got me home OK. But by that time it was too late to make the
road rally in Champaign, so chalk up one missed event due to my being fresh
out of spare brushes for the dynamo.
Home and warm and dry, now I laugh at it all. What a weekend! Can't wait
for the next MG adventure.
Safety Faster,
Barney Gaylord
1958 MGA, still with an attitude
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