This is a nice story.
I had MGs when I was young, but my younger brother had a couple Healeys. One of them was wrecked when a woman made a left turn in front of us at an intersection. I was in the jump seat, and got tossed out the back, suffering nothing but a pulled shoulder from breaking my fall. He injured his lip and broke a tooth on the wheel. His friend went into the windshield and had to have reconstructive surgery. As the story notes, no standard seat belts back then (though I installed them in my cars after market).
I learned to drive in a ’49 MG-TC, which was my dad’s commute car. He and I rebuilt the wood parts of the body, and overhauled the engine and transmission, when I was about 15. That was the most fun ever, until the day when we returned from a drive, turned into the driveway, and the right front wheel fell off. (There was a machining flaw on the spindle which failed after abut 25 years of service.) Because of that, and other things, he decided it was too dangerous for us, and sold it to a local collector.
Of course, I bought my own, a ’74 MGB, a few years later. This was a peculiar MGB, since it NEVER LEAKED OIL. Must have been built on a Sunday by Angels, or something.
However, it was an MG, so: driving home from a Christmas dinner one rainy night, it stopped running. At 11:30 PM. In the rain. No phones around. I managed to get it under shelter, and popped the hood. Seems the heater valve was dripping on the distributor, and the ignition had failed. (Of COURSE the valve was mounted so it could drip on the distributor. What’s wrong with you?) I, being experienced in the Ways of Lucas, had parts in the boot. However, all I needed from the parts kit was a dry sock, with which I cleaned and dried the distributor cap. I tied the sock around the heater valve, genuflected in the general direction of England, and started the car. Ran like a top.
That damn car never, not once, failed to start the whole time I owned it.
My ’67 MGB-GT didn’t leak oil, but it burned it. My favorite feature of my ’60 MGA was that the brakes and clutch shared a fluid reservoir, so if you lost one to a leak, you lost both. Had to drive it home from northern MI one night without either. No problem on the freeway, but last mile was a little dicey. Had to be careful with light timing so I never had to come to a full stop.
My other fun time was when the SU fuel pump points got burned on the GT, also up north. I borrowed a doorbell switch from a friend, wired it to the pump, and pumped it with my thumb for two hours to get back to Flint.
Oh, man. I have SO MANY stories just like those. What are my kids going to remember about the Big People Toys from their childhood?
Ever drive a MGC-GT? My old man, a fighter pilot, said it was the most fun he’d ever had in a car.
I wanted one, but never had the scratch for it.
We didn’t own it. It belonged to a RAF friend of dad’s colleague in Surrey, England. Cool guy, that colleague. He took me on a tour of Concorde 001 on the ground in Toulouse. Fun days…