Introducing Bessie
Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2008 10:46 pm
Picked up 'Bessie' from James in East Kilbride last night after spotting his ad here.
I wasn't really thinking about another one, but it was a 1957 model (same as my wife), so I thought why not.
The car has only had 2 owners prior to me - originally from Caithness, then to James's dad in Thorntonhall. He had the car restored in 2001 after a long lay up (and at no small expense), but didn't seem to use it much judging by the mileage between MOT's.
When I collected Bessie, she wasn't running too well, and the thought was it was perhaps just stale fuel, and needing a good run - well it took me until Dunblane (45 miles) for it to perk up enough to cruise at 50 - 60. Prior to that it was 15mph up hills - not recommended in todays traffic. Fortunately my wife was riding shot gun for me, and ran her car behind me with hazards on (illegal I know, but kept me safe).
In fact I thought about calling the AA at one point (prior to a long hill outside Auchterarder), but the car must have known and picked up.
Driving impressions were pretty favourable - quiet gearbox and rear axle, plus engine seemed ok, just down on power. Brakes were a bit iffy, but again through lack of use.
The car came with an MOT fail certificate - brakes and a bit of welding, so today I got stuck in.
Brakes are now sorted - new drums had been fitted all round, plus shoes and some cylinders, so it was just freeing things off and adjusting properly. Engine is now running like a watch - just fouled plugs, and no oil in carb (suspected this), but it is quite oily, so will need some new gaskets (and cleaned).
I also valeted the interior, and it came up lovely, plus a quick T cut produced some shine on the paintwork.
The tyres were pretty old (esso crossplies on front), and had sidewall cracking although plenty tread. I therefore swapped the wheels over with some I happened to have lying around.
Future plans are to just run it as is, but with sensible updates.
Here's some pics:
As purchased
Cleaned up a bit
Filter off the fill carb - pretty oily
Now fitted with a set of slot mags from my son's Minor (still being sorted)
That's 8 x13's in there
Smaller wheel fitted
I wasn't really thinking about another one, but it was a 1957 model (same as my wife), so I thought why not.
The car has only had 2 owners prior to me - originally from Caithness, then to James's dad in Thorntonhall. He had the car restored in 2001 after a long lay up (and at no small expense), but didn't seem to use it much judging by the mileage between MOT's.
When I collected Bessie, she wasn't running too well, and the thought was it was perhaps just stale fuel, and needing a good run - well it took me until Dunblane (45 miles) for it to perk up enough to cruise at 50 - 60. Prior to that it was 15mph up hills - not recommended in todays traffic. Fortunately my wife was riding shot gun for me, and ran her car behind me with hazards on (illegal I know, but kept me safe).
In fact I thought about calling the AA at one point (prior to a long hill outside Auchterarder), but the car must have known and picked up.
Driving impressions were pretty favourable - quiet gearbox and rear axle, plus engine seemed ok, just down on power. Brakes were a bit iffy, but again through lack of use.
The car came with an MOT fail certificate - brakes and a bit of welding, so today I got stuck in.
Brakes are now sorted - new drums had been fitted all round, plus shoes and some cylinders, so it was just freeing things off and adjusting properly. Engine is now running like a watch - just fouled plugs, and no oil in carb (suspected this), but it is quite oily, so will need some new gaskets (and cleaned).
I also valeted the interior, and it came up lovely, plus a quick T cut produced some shine on the paintwork.
The tyres were pretty old (esso crossplies on front), and had sidewall cracking although plenty tread. I therefore swapped the wheels over with some I happened to have lying around.
Future plans are to just run it as is, but with sensible updates.
Here's some pics:
As purchased
Cleaned up a bit
Filter off the fill carb - pretty oily
Now fitted with a set of slot mags from my son's Minor (still being sorted)
That's 8 x13's in there
Smaller wheel fitted
