Engine Punk

You can tell it's a special Special from a distant glance Among the invited sports and racing cars at this weekend's meeting at Wiscombe Park was this fascinating device. No one was around to answer my many questions but I was free to snap away at it. The programme listed it as Austin 7 Shelsley Special, dating from 1928 and driven by Nick Allen. On what you might call the timing side is the drive to the blower I could see it sported a complete Austin 7 powertrain turned through 90 degrees and mid-mounted behind the driver. On one side, the gearbox drives a chain back to the solid rear axle, while on the other is a supercharger. On the drive side are cunningly fashioned chains  and sprockets There is so much to like about this bolide as our French friends are wont to call fierce voiturettes . I enthused about it to a mate of mine and he recalled reading about what he called the Austerity Special somewhere. He was adamant about the name and I can't imagine there could be tw...

I am very interested in Infra Red photography and the haunting images it provides once converted to black and white  Engine Punk began as a means of promoting my writing but this blog has grown a life of its own. The Vintage Things and Fire Drakes that I've happened across are noteworthy and I want to share my enthusiasm about them at a very personal level.  Steamers at Boconnoc. I believe we will one day come to think of the internal combustion engine as fondly as we do those that are external. They are even making new steam engines sixty years after destroying so many! There simply aren't enough to go round. Engine Punk is also a record of my low budget motorsport activities. There have been so many of them, they become a blur, a blur not through speed but from confused memories over a surprising length of time. I discovered across the Pontsarn viaduct one frosty moonlit night, appearing across the valley as I crested the hill. Actually, it was late summer but you get the pi...

Patchy coastal fog wasn't forecast at Blue Hills 2 this Easter but tyre smoke was.  Richard Hayward suffered a blow out but may have cleared the section otherwise. It was a huge disappointment to not even make the Bridgwater start of the 2025 Land’s End Trial after all the work on the car. I drove the car up in heavy rain but making steady progress with the Arkley-MG’s single speed wiper. I fuelled up in Cullompton and the new fanbelt squeaked as I started and pulled away. No problem, thinks I, I have two 13mm spanners about my person for this very purpose. As soon as I was at Sally’s place, I made the most of the dimpsy daylight and adjusted the fanbelt. However, the alternator’s cooling fan was just touching the adjustment bracket. Then one of Sal’s friends wanted to move her car and instead of a “Vroom!” I got a “click, click, click” and a suddenly shy ignition light. “Bolleaux” as our continental neighbours might say. It wasn’t having it. It didn’t wanna went. Sally’s niece and...

Despite an interest in light cars (and medium-sized ones I suppose) I also like lumbering great beasts. This is a particularly fine example that belongs to some friends of mine. Gravitas in metal For many years, this Bentley Mk VI James Young saloon languished in one half of a two-car garage, a mournful shape without front wings or radiator. It had been left to my mate's grandmother by the old man for whom she had once kept house. Jerry’s grannie was not a large lady but could still see over the steering wheel and reach the pedals. However, one day the handbrake cable snapped and the Bentley went into a supermarket plate glass window. It then sought retirement at the back of his parents’ garage for remedial work. Time passed – as it always does – and more remedial work began to mount up. I couldn’t really make out the Bentley’s shape properly where it stood. There was just enough room in the garage to squeeze behind the wheel, make engine noises and pretend you were a “Bentley Boy”...