The story starts, as so many of these do, with e-bay.
A late evening surf of the web with the old man, turned up the usual overpriced, rotten classic Fords.
To make a point, I did a search for Triumph Dolomite.
When I did, this little beige beauty popped up:
Yes, it was in a god awful BL colour with brown velour (which is actually kinda cool in a 70s chintzy way), but it also looked EXTREMELY clean and tidy.
Something one can rarely say of old BL tin.
Having lusted after a Triumph for some years, phone calls were made and plans were hatched to go and view the little Dolly.
No mean feat considering I live in Nottinghamshire, and the car was only 20 miles from Lands End!
So, one early Sunday morning, myself and two close buddies (both of whom own and have owned their fair share of classic tat) climbed into my modern Eurobox, and made our journey to Cornwall.
First off, Maccy D's breakfast (none of us were really awake):
Then, time to hit the road:
It was a long old journey, enlivened by the occasional bit of chod spotting:
.....and amusingly named, cartoon 'Channel 9' style lorries:
Eventually, we made it to Helston some time around 3PM.
There, sat on the forecourt, was the little car I'd travelled all that way to see.
We crawled all over it, looking VERY carefully for rust.
It soon became obvious that the car had been resprayed at some point in its life - however, that was a looooooong time ago.
It increasingly looked like I was looking at the rarest thing of all - a rot free Leyland car that had been lovingly cared for (in this case by an old gent for 20 years).
I took a quick test drive in her, and a few minutes later had cut a deal, and she was mine!
Now - the little car had only done around 150 miles a year, between MOT's, and she'd been laid up for 5 years.
We were now going to drive her 350 miles back to Nottingham in one go.
Needless to say there were 'issues'
On the test drive I noticed the clutch was on the floor.
She'd just had a new clutch plate and hydraulics.
By the time we'd done the paperwork, and sorted some tax out, the clutch had almost disappeared.
A few miles down the road, we tried bleeding the clutch to see if matters would improve.
They didn't!
I took the decision to carry on though, as there was *just* enough clutch to allow me to pull away in 2nd, and then rely on well timed clutchless changes and the overdrive to keep me going on the open road.
We hit the road again, and a few little isuues showed up: An occasional nasty misfire (ignition), binding brakes, and worryingly, occasional transmission slip (believed overdrive).
Pulling in at Maccy D's again - the 'hot' smell I'd sensed up the road became obvious, as there was smoke pouring off the front wheel, and one rear drum was scalding hot.
We figured that the time it took us to down a mountain of burgers and nuggets, would give the brakes time to free off.
Amazingly, it worked!
With the brakes now freed off, even with the engine running like a bag of curse word, it was clear that this was actually a sprightly little car.
I was loathe to use more than 3500RPM to keep as much stress off the cooling system as possible.
However, in O/D top, that was quite adequate to hold decent motorway speed.
We took it in shifts to drive the two cars. And to allow a passenger to swap around between cars and get some rest.
Stepping in to my Golf from the Dolomite was like stepping into a spaceship.
There's no doubt though, that the Dolly dash won all the points for style:
Just under 2 hours to go until home, I was trailing the Dolly, when I noticed Matt bringing the road speed *right down*.
I followed him into a services, where he told me the whole car had suddenly started shuddering.
We immediately suspected one of the cracked, tired old tyres had started to delaminate.
Sure enough, jacking one corner of the car up and spinning the wheel showed the tyre had gone oval.
I owe Matt respect for having the sensitivity to slow down when something went wrong and to pull off the motorway.
At this point, we were an hour from home. Could we make it back?
Thankfully the spare tyre was in reasonable shape - and all the others were holding air just fine.
Topping them up with air, I took the wheel and we set off again.
All seemed well - other than the shonky aftermarket car stereo deciding enough was enough. A pity, as listening to 70s Hard Rock and Heavy Metal felt oddly appropriate!
One more driver swap, and with great relief, we rolled up on the drive.
I'd personally driven 700 miles that day, and man did I need a rest!
A late evening surf of the web with the old man, turned up the usual overpriced, rotten classic Fords.
To make a point, I did a search for Triumph Dolomite.
When I did, this little beige beauty popped up:
Yes, it was in a god awful BL colour with brown velour (which is actually kinda cool in a 70s chintzy way), but it also looked EXTREMELY clean and tidy.
Something one can rarely say of old BL tin.
Having lusted after a Triumph for some years, phone calls were made and plans were hatched to go and view the little Dolly.
No mean feat considering I live in Nottinghamshire, and the car was only 20 miles from Lands End!
So, one early Sunday morning, myself and two close buddies (both of whom own and have owned their fair share of classic tat) climbed into my modern Eurobox, and made our journey to Cornwall.
First off, Maccy D's breakfast (none of us were really awake):
Then, time to hit the road:
It was a long old journey, enlivened by the occasional bit of chod spotting:
.....and amusingly named, cartoon 'Channel 9' style lorries:
Eventually, we made it to Helston some time around 3PM.
There, sat on the forecourt, was the little car I'd travelled all that way to see.
We crawled all over it, looking VERY carefully for rust.
It soon became obvious that the car had been resprayed at some point in its life - however, that was a looooooong time ago.
It increasingly looked like I was looking at the rarest thing of all - a rot free Leyland car that had been lovingly cared for (in this case by an old gent for 20 years).
I took a quick test drive in her, and a few minutes later had cut a deal, and she was mine!
Now - the little car had only done around 150 miles a year, between MOT's, and she'd been laid up for 5 years.
We were now going to drive her 350 miles back to Nottingham in one go.
Needless to say there were 'issues'
On the test drive I noticed the clutch was on the floor.
She'd just had a new clutch plate and hydraulics.
By the time we'd done the paperwork, and sorted some tax out, the clutch had almost disappeared.
A few miles down the road, we tried bleeding the clutch to see if matters would improve.
They didn't!
I took the decision to carry on though, as there was *just* enough clutch to allow me to pull away in 2nd, and then rely on well timed clutchless changes and the overdrive to keep me going on the open road.
We hit the road again, and a few little isuues showed up: An occasional nasty misfire (ignition), binding brakes, and worryingly, occasional transmission slip (believed overdrive).
Pulling in at Maccy D's again - the 'hot' smell I'd sensed up the road became obvious, as there was smoke pouring off the front wheel, and one rear drum was scalding hot.
We figured that the time it took us to down a mountain of burgers and nuggets, would give the brakes time to free off.
Amazingly, it worked!
With the brakes now freed off, even with the engine running like a bag of curse word, it was clear that this was actually a sprightly little car.
I was loathe to use more than 3500RPM to keep as much stress off the cooling system as possible.
However, in O/D top, that was quite adequate to hold decent motorway speed.
We took it in shifts to drive the two cars. And to allow a passenger to swap around between cars and get some rest.
Stepping in to my Golf from the Dolomite was like stepping into a spaceship.
There's no doubt though, that the Dolly dash won all the points for style:
Just under 2 hours to go until home, I was trailing the Dolly, when I noticed Matt bringing the road speed *right down*.
I followed him into a services, where he told me the whole car had suddenly started shuddering.
We immediately suspected one of the cracked, tired old tyres had started to delaminate.
Sure enough, jacking one corner of the car up and spinning the wheel showed the tyre had gone oval.
I owe Matt respect for having the sensitivity to slow down when something went wrong and to pull off the motorway.
At this point, we were an hour from home. Could we make it back?
Thankfully the spare tyre was in reasonable shape - and all the others were holding air just fine.
Topping them up with air, I took the wheel and we set off again.
All seemed well - other than the shonky aftermarket car stereo deciding enough was enough. A pity, as listening to 70s Hard Rock and Heavy Metal felt oddly appropriate!
One more driver swap, and with great relief, we rolled up on the drive.
I'd personally driven 700 miles that day, and man did I need a rest!
