BLOG: A tale of two lucky VDP's - part 8

by Andy Perman

One thing I like to do is take one of my VDP’s out for a drive on Christmas Day if the weather is not too wet or icy. This is something that started in 2013 and it was great fun driving into the city and the seafront on mostly deserted roads. (Who knew what was coming in 2020???) I had noticed during the Winter the starter was struggling a bit, especially with the low temperatures and long spells between starts, so decided to take a look before the show season kicked off.

However, I got the nod early in March about a show at Brooklands, a place I’d had on my visit list for a while so decided to go before I’d had the chance to look over the car. Brooklands is a fascinating place with as much aircraft history as it does racing, so much so I couldn’t get round everything so made a note to come back on New Year's Day for the main open event. The Barnes Wallace lab and stratospheric chamber were particularly jaw dropping. I was definitely going to take a better look.

Later the same month I removed the starter only to find they are not designed to be un-mantled and repaired, just binned and replaced. In the absence of suitable replacements, the auto has a number of special to type parts, the starter is one such part. I decided to ‘have a go’. After an hour of chin-stroking and Hmmm ing, worked out how to get the solenoid apart, which I was sure was the problem. Ten minutes with the soldering iron and small spanner set I had it in bits and bingo, the top main contact was badly oxidised, hence the problem of slow cranking. Quick polish with a fibre glass brush soon had that shifted, then I could re-mantle the solenoid. Quick test and all good, sorted!

May saw the annual Allegro show which was held at the Needle Museum in Redditch. Another very interesting place showing how needle manufacturing was done during the industrial revolution and all water powered. Also had an opportunity to line up a MK1, 2 and 3 VDP. Never been done before and made for a nice line up.

Next appointment was my son and daughters prom. I have twins so it was going to be a busy night! The old girl was polished to as shiny as you can make mirage and all the bright work detailed. I had a fabulous evening ferrying back and forth to the Holiday Inn where their evening function was. Highlight of the night for me was a nod to the Italian Job with three Mini Coopers dropping off and then powering out simultaneously. Goosebumps.

I’d received an invitation in August to the Vanden Plas show and been told it was almost a concourse type show - not one of my favourites but decided to give it a go. When I rocked up I was directed to the 1500 parking area and found myself alongside a D registered model which was odd as VDP production stopped in 1980. Turns out the original owner stored the car until the registration EES came up as they were his initials. He’s also responsible for the two tone paint work. Definitely a marmite car but the picture of mine next to it represents the earliest and latest surviving VDP’s.

The show over I headed home and you get a feel for when something is not right. The shimmy on the steering seemed slightly more accentuated than before, and the car seemed sluggish. After about an hour the shimmy turned into a shudder, coupled with a nasty crunchy grinding noise and a definite loss of power. Fortunately I was on top of some services so I pulled in and ground to a halt, literally!

Great, I was 100 miles from home and it was 6 o’clock on a Sunday evening! I rang the recovery services and booked a relay home, was warned it maybe a significant wait as there had been a large Ford show in London and that was already keeping them busy. So what to do, I spotted a burger place so went and got a bite to eat. That done I had a quick look at the car and quickly worked out the passenger front wheel bearing had done something nasty internally and now it had cooled down had seized up pretty tight. There was still a lot of play in something though which I was sure wasn’t the bearing, but with the light fading whatever it was would have to wait.

The recovery home wasn’t as bad as feared, but it was done in several stages due to the way the AA works with zones. It was almost 2am when we arrived back so got the guy to unload the car onto the drive for me to sort out the next morning. Weirdly the following morning the wheel had freed off somewhat, but still sounded nasty when you turned it. That odd play looked like the lower radius arm; something was not right about it. As the car could be moved I backed it into the workshop and went in search of a new wheel bearing and radius arm thingy. All £20 each. It’s the rules.

A week later, both the parts had turned up so lifted the workshop door to place the parts inside. What greeted me was like a scene out of demolition derby. My workshop doubles up as my materials store for my business as well as a place to store and work on the car. Something in the roof had obviously given way and all my timber and tubes had dropped and been deposited on top the car! Once my heart had stopped hammering out my chest I looked around more carefully it appeared the majority of the stuff had glanced off the car and slid down the side. The only way to inspect further though was to pull it all out and get the car out. I was going to need some strong coffee!

An hour later I had a pile of stuff and a car on the drive. Remarkably there wasn’t a mark on it. Obviously made of strong stuff. It took me the rest of the day to clear out the workshop, fix the roof problems and get everything stowed safely. The next day I lifted the front of the car and removed the passenger side hub complete with the drive shaft. On the bench and stripped apart the wheel bearings literally fell out, some of the balls were in half! Fitting the new bearing was quite an unpleasant job, it just felt very tight in the hub and on the drive shaft, but it seemed to go back together OK. Next I removed the lower radius arm; the inner bush was sheared off its housing entirely. Why? At the time I’d no idea, but alarm bells should have been ringing. With the new arm fitted and the hub re-installed I went for a road test. All seemed OK. No crunching and the shimmy was back to the level it had always been. Again, alarm bells should have been ringing, but being a humble plumber, all seemed good.

My final appointment of the year was at the NEC in November where my car was going up on a stand. I had lots of detailing things to be getting on with in the meantime to keep me busy. But what about that shimmy?
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To be continued...