Paul Richardson wrote:
>This spacer above the front left spring on several GT6's reminds me of a
>factory mod made to Triumph Heralds when I was in my apprenticeship. The
>first Heralds developed a list to port resulting in a high volume of
>ladies, whilst driving to the shops, steering their cars whilst sitting at
>a disconcerting and considerable angle off vertical.
SNIP
>The official factory mod, and I did hundreds, was to fit an aluminum spacer
>on top of the left front spring and shocker unit to 'lift' the left hand
>side of the car. We also had to paint the spacer black so that customers
>didn't spot it!! The fault was due to sagging springs or 'slight'
>imperfections in build quality. I WONDER??
There was one Herald to my certain knowledge that never had this spacer for the
simple
fact that it was irrelevant. My mother owned it - a Herald 12/50 cancelled
export order
for Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Among other things, the car was called Marie
Antoinette -
reason in a moment. Among other delightfully desirable fixtures and fittings,
the car had
heavy duty suspension which comprised two extra leaves in the rear spring,
beefier front
coils - shocks that were never made to telescope and 5.75 heavy duty Dunlop C41
cross-plies. The seats were also covered in an extra heat resistant vinyl,
which in the UK
winter, was as comfortable as sitting on a piece of 1 inch steel plate and
about as
unyielding. In terms of ride comfort, it was OK if you drove the car along a
road that was
Pool Table smooth but encounter a coin and the resulting shock waves through
the steering
column allowed you to work out if the coin was heads or tails up! Pot holed
road surfaces,
cobblestones and others of that ilk brought an entirely new meaning to the term
"terminal
discomfort" and the car jumped as it went along the average UK road.
At the time, my dear mother, perhaps best described as a more than amply
proportioned lady
all over - was about to take delivery of a slimming machine. This comprised a
belt
attached to an electric motor with eccentric shafts. The concept was that by
leaning
heavily on the jiggling belt, excess weight would be dispersed to other places
where it
didn't matter. When the machine arrived, my father sent it straight back,
claiming that an
absolute maximum of 5 miles in the 12/50 had precisely the same effect as 15
minutes on
the belt, it didn't need to be parked in the bathroom - and you could do the
shopping at
the same time. He also suggested the original prototype heavy duty Herald had
been tested
in the French Revolution to take prisoners across Parisian cobblestones to the
guillotine - hence Marie Antoinette.
At a later stage in my life, I visited Rhodesia and sampled its roads outside
the capital.
At that point, I fully understood why the order had been cancelled. "Life as we
know it,
Jim" inside that car would have been impossible. The human frame would not have
withstood
the shock levels and vibration.
Jonmac
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