Engine Punk

The issue of car parking at the station made the front page of the Cornish Guardian last week and it was clear that the town councillors are unhappy about First Great Western's decision to introduce fees. Local residents who use the train were expressing concern that when the charges are introduced their driveways will be blocked in so even non-car commuters will be affected. There was a lot of huffing and puffing on the train and not because it's got a steam engine. To be honest, though, there is a great strength of feeling. It makes so much less sense for people to use the train now a lot of people I've spoken to will probably drive, especially if, like me, they have to drive into Liskeard to catch the train. FGW claimed they were charging in answer to rail user's requests. Nobody knows who these people were. They've probably stopped using the train out of personal safety, if they ever existed. I wrote to my MP, Colin Breed, and he replied to say that...

The other day I took my silver haired rellies out to St Ervan church. This little-known church in Cornwall was mentioned in a guide book on churches that one of them received for Christmas and the description was so interesting it even tempted a heathen like me to go and have a look. St Ervan lost its tower many years ago and the stump remained a stump until given a proper job roof as late as the 1950s. For many years an improvised tripod of tree trunks supported a bell in the churchyard and this was how a youthful John Betjeman found the church whilst on holiday in Cornwall. Betjeman visited Cornwall from an early age and is buried at St Enodoc. He championed Victorian architecture and Britain's railways when they were most under threat and had a knack of making the most mundane things appear special. But St Ervan was something exceptional, a strange place in a strange land. Betjeman found St Ervan when he was still quite a young chap and by chance - always the bes...

Continuing the occasional theme of Hillman Imp off-road thingies, this device is probably the ultimate. The Gillie was designed around 1970 by the Rootes group and endowed with hub reduction gearing and a shorter wheelbase. This combination gave it exceptional off road performance but made it a bit slow on the road. It also hadn't been consciously styled by the Rootes Group stylists so had a kind of honest-to-goodness lack or pretension. This photo is from a newspaper article supplied by Gary Henderson via Franka's excellent site. You can read more about the genesis of the Gillie here. The Gillie never went into production and remained unique. After a brief period on Lord Rootes' country estate, the one-and-only Gillie fell into obscurity. There were tantalising gl imp ses of it by Imp aficionados from time to time but it led a secret existence unrecognised for many years until recently, when it turned up - like so many things - on Ebay. And by now you'd never beli...

Adrian is sorting out the reconditioned cylinder head for my Austin Allegro. He's made up a mandrel that fits inside the new silicon bronze valve guides and drifted them into the head but when I dropped in the other day he told me that the old valves weren't quite as good as they might be. If we looked closely at the end of the valve, the area where it meets the rocker was slightly warn. I could actually see fine lines running across the surface and if I ran a finger across the valve I could feel them too. Adrian didn’t like the look of these. He said that these imperfections could lead to the valve being pushed over sideways, as the rocker levers it against the valve guide whilst the valve is off its valve seat. This would have increased wear on the valve guides and before long oil would be seeping passed and the engine would start smoking again. One solution would have been to clean up the end of the valve but when I saw that valves were only a few pounds each from Min...

I'd never seen one of these before. I saw it on the industrial estate at Doublebois just up from Adrian Booth's workshop and didn't know what it was, so just had to find out. And after a deal of scrabbling about, I managed to identify it as a Honda S-MX. If you wanted a cube on wheels with an automatic box and fold down futon-style beds inside then this is the car for you. It's a good example of the kind of speciality cars the Japanese do so well. Any other car producing nation would never even try something like this. "Oh no they would say, there'd never be any call for something like that." So despite the slush box, I start to like it because of the odd niche that it's aimed at. There's a kind of "can-do" approach that the designers have followed and I like that. I was dropping an A series cylinder head off at Adrian's to be reconditioned and he said there was a whole set of camping gear available as standard from the factory w...

Something lurks in the wood shed (Photo Jon Clark) Just like the Siva Llamas, another UAZ-452 has come out of the woodwork. The woodwork in question belongs to Jon Clark's neighbour's shed and the UAZ is a bright blue pickup version, registered in 1979 and with right-hand drive. Since September it's belonged to Jon and he's planning to re-commission the little wagon. Considering the stories I've heard about build quality the panel fit doesn't look too bad. The 2445cc 4 cylinder engine turns over and he's freed the brakes off by hammering and pulling it a bit with a tractor. Here's picture of this impressive machine, bodily pulling a Massey Ferguson tractor backwards up a steep slope. (Photo Jon Clark) Actually, for some reason this photo won't upload in any other orientation except this one. I've no idea why it won't lie down properly. Currently, the fuel pump is blocked and due to be replaced by an electric one sourced in blight...

My efforts last year at a re-design seem to have been endorsed. I went into my local bookshop last week because it's under new ownership and found the same staff behind the counter as before. I got recognised as a local author in front of the customers which was - I have to admit it - a very nice feeling! I asked how the shop was going and it seems it's doing well which is always good to hear. The lady behind the desk remembered that they'd returned The Horsepower Whisperer just before the business was sold. "I'm afraid we didn't have any luck with it," she said. She went on to mention that she didn't like the cover - then apologised when she realised that I'd done the cover. "Why didn't you like it?" I persisted. "It looked too cartoon-like," was her reply. This was the cue for me to take a copy of the new revised version of The Horsepower Whisperer out of my rucksack (I always have one to hand for just such an ...