This could be a big day. I had been summoned to fetch two
gallons of petrol to Westmead so that the engine could be fired up. Dick had
called Chris earlier demanding that they should ‘get the thing going’: and so
they did, but not before a few mishaps.
The fuel was poured in and fed through the system revealing
the odd leak around the pump plus the carburetors. Not a major problem in
itself but the streaming petrol, just
like a spilled drink, looked more like a flood than only a few millimetres of liquid. Clips were tightened, closely checked
after which the offending fuel mopped up. There was a full spark from the new
electronic distributor; the fuel needed one last siphoned suck from Dick to
signal that the engine was ready to be started. The ignition switch was thrown;
the starter button gently pressed, the Burlington jumped into life burbling and
thumping, strikingly reminiscent of a big old straight four. Mon bloody Dieu! Suddenly
there was smoke emerging from behind the dash under the scuttle, somewhere
along the loom a wire had gone to earth burning out by more than a metre of
filament. Luckily, Dick was sharp enough to cut the power by removing one of
the loosely held battery terminals thus limiting the damage. So rapid was the
spread that seconds later the entire car may have been toast, an electrical
fault can be so devastating.
Once the engine had been running other leakages of
oil and water had been exposed mainly from the front mounted cooler as well as
another one from the side core plugs. Dick swiftly embraced the crisis by
replacing the burnt out earth, tightened the oil cooler connectors and tapped
in the core plug. The engine sparked back in to life grumbling, plodding
rhythmically, the oil pressure flickered at 70, the fuel gauge hardly lifted,
but eventually rose softly; the rest of the other gauges slowly breathed life.
Chris and Dick stepped back to enjoy the moment. It’s nearly time to open a tin
of chunks.
No comments:
Post a Comment