[Fot] Road America - Part 1 of 3

[Keith Files]

Hi Everybody,

We have just arrived home in the UK after what can only be described as one
of the most wonderful racing experiences that I have had in the last 20
years.

Some of you may know that I purchased my TR4 from Larry Rossi in November
2005 and ran it for the first time at Road America in May 2006 with mixed
success (actually more failure than success as we broke 2 heads, the
transmission and, ultimately, put a rod through the block!!!). We went away
from RA last year vowing to return and do a bit better next time :-)

Over the last year Jon Wood of Classic Racecraft in the UK built a new
engine and transmission for the TR4 whilst Jack Drews just about rebuilt
everything else from rear axle through to new cooling and exhaust systems.
As usual, despite ordering my new crank 2 days after returning to the UK
last May, it eventually arrived late February (so what happened to the
promise of a 6-10 week lead time; maybe Farndon meant months!!!!). Jon
worked his usual magic and turned everything round so that the engine and
transmission were ready for shipping by the end of March; unfortunately this
meant that I had to air freight them both which at 330kgs was a bit of a
shock to the wallet - for those with an interest in these things it cost USD
$1300. 

Joe Alexander and Jack had a trip to Chicago to pick up the crate and
despite the usual song and dance routine with Customs eventually got
everything back to Geneseo for Jack to install everything and have the TR4
running after 2 days; what an amazing guy is our Jack.   

Btw the crate is a work of art and was a one-off build by a UK company
designed to protect all the components and to meet the very strict US
regulations, Joe has this stashed away in one of his storage units and I am
sure it will come in use again some time in the future. 

End of part 1