Good morning to you all on this very sunny (again) Tuesday morning.
I have been out and about visited Mitchell’s camp site just north of here he was and army officer and a surveyor opening up the country (Lieut Col Sir Thomas Mitchell apparently) he passed through this region in 1846.
Yesterday I noticed that the General Store would make our yankee members feel at home,. I got the front wheels balanced because I was fed up with the steering wheel jiggling about, so was walking about while they did it.
Morning all – another sunny day, summer has returned (temporarily!)
Had a bit of a surprise when I went to feed the beast yesterday evening. There was a strange car on the neighbour’s drive, at first I was a bit apprehensive about going in but then thought a burglar wouldn’t have parked on the drive (duh!). Found there was a lady and a child in the garden, my neighbours daughter and grand-daughter – they had used the side gate and were busy picking beans. The beast demanded cuddles again this morning – very unusual.
Busy day yesterday with housework and also decided to tackle the unpacked boxes which have been sitting in the spare room since I moved here 3 years ago (did I mention I am lazy!!). Have sorted through them and discovered a couple of antique candle holders (the small ones people used to carry around). Have cleaned them up and they are so interesting I think I will keep them. I also found a box of out of date foreign currency from our past travels
Can’t decide what to have for dinner tonight so will have a wander around the supermarket to see if anything appeals.
Good morning - Warm and sunny here. We might try a longish walk later but not to anywhere we can’t get back by bus. Maybe into town where Mrs mart can spend her Hobbycraft voucher. My condition is uncertain due to recent events and Mrs mart’s powerchair is new and untested. A nice day for it though.
Good Morning From Foxy’s World…
Very misty and cold when I turned out for my walk/jog, had to wear my gloves because at 8 degrees C my hands get very cold, can’t say the same for my legs so I’m still in shorts. Had to do quite a bit of running though to keep warm…
I feel a bit like a spare part this morning now I’ve finished the jigsaw…
There’s a bit of a story behind this particular jigsaw…
Back in the 80’s I owned that exact same car. Sorry about the quality of the photos, they are the only pictures of the car I have…No smartphones in those days…
When my daughter saw this jigsaw she just had to buy it for my birthday earlier this year.
I wish I had that car now, none of this computer rubbish and screens detracting you from driving…
Think I might go and clean out the gutters while the weather is nice…
A late check in this morning due to the usual household chaos and catastrophes but all is well now .
@mart your plan with Mrs. Mart sound relaxing and enjoyable. Leave it to you to plan a way back home just-in-case. I envy your option for bus service.
@SheilaP I like sound of your candle holders. It’s nice to be surrounded by little reminders of the past.
@OldGreyFox, what model and make was your car? It looks like fun to drive.I had a Datsun about that size that I loved. It had a manual transmission which was super fun driving around the foothills of Southern California.
@Bruce, you are too right about that general store. Americans spend much more on the care of pets per capita than any other nation (I wasn’t sure though and had to look it up . I like the architecture of the building and am surprised it is so young.
I’ve been getting things back into gear after our little adventure, but I stopped long enough to toss a salad and set up for dinner outdoors. Mother Nature provided the entertainment that had these fantastic cumulo mammals clouds (center, orange) that swooped diagonally after a while.
It was an Austin Allegro 1300 cc petrol. My Dad bought it brand new in the late seventies. It was a special edition with a black vinyl roof. He didn’t like it very much, him and my Mum preferred the smaller and lighter Ford Fiesta, so after running the Allegro for a couple of years sold it to me for mates rates…
I loved the shape and the handling, it was manual transmission (I would never drive an automatic ) but most of all, it was a similar engine to the ones in my previous cars…3 Mini’s, Austin 1100 and an earlier Allegro and I knew them like the back of my hand. I could remove an engine, refurbish big ends, valves, Piston rings and clutch within 3 days…
It was a good job that I was conversant with the engines because after just 3 years of motoring I had to replace the oil rings on the pistons, and while I had it stripped down, I also replaced the big end shells and took it for a rebore.
I kept it for another three years, and it ran perfect and covered lots of miles.
I would love to buy another but Mrs Fox isn’t keen…
You are talking about that computer rubbish that has halved the amount of fuel you use?
My Ford Anglia just about managed ,my 3 litre turbo charged diesel does about 33mpg. What was the fuel consumption on that Alegra without the computer rubbish?
The only thing I miss about old cars is the dip switch on the floor.
Ah yes Bruce, I think I was getting about 40 - 45 mpg on a good day back in the eighties, but petrol was cheaper in those days and nobody really cared.
Engine management in the cars I’ve owned, has been around since the nineties and just improved performance and economy.
Now they have gone too far and it’s like driving with another person in the car.
It tells me when I cross a white line…
When the car in front is too close…
It beeps at me incessantly while I’m reversing up my drive…
When a door is not closed properly…
Failure to wear a seatbelt…
When the add blue is running low…
It even tells me when my eyes close…it thinks I’m going to sleep…
It has a bloody great distracting screen in the middle of my dashboard…
You can’t adjust the heating because it defaults to what it thinks you’ll like…
It’s connected to the internet…
It tells me if there is a problem, and even puts on the sat nav with the nearest main dealer…
It’s practically driving the car for me…
I would gladly do less miles to the gallon if I could take the bloody thing out…
Signed…
Peed off from Doncaster…
I think for many of us, our first love was that first automobile! Practicality gets the better of us and we lose that sense of how good it was to be in sync with the road and the gears.
Those dip switches were great. Had one that would do one swipe of the wipers.
But also in the better-on-the-old models: triangle ventilation windows, air vents below the steering wheel to keep you cool, real wood-grain veneer and chrome on the dash, big fancy steering wheels, and colors on the dash other than - black.
Our Allegro wasn’t as good as yours OGF, We bought it second-hand and it seemed OK at the time. It wasn’t long before it started giving off lots of smoke from the exhaust. I wasn’t into engine rebuilds but I was a handy bloke to know when it came to repairing TVs and video recorders. I knew people in nearly all trades and we’d exchange skills when needed. One fellow was a mechanic, so he rebuilt the engine for me. I think I must have made a better job of his TVs and video recorders than he made of our engine.
This was in the days when Mrs mart was driving and the Allegro was hers. The engine still produced a lot of smoke, so much on one occasion that I could hardly see her in my rear view mirror. I couldn’t let her continue with it, so we part-exed it for a 1.3 Ford Fiesta. A great little car. I’m sure the Allegro was a decent car for yourself and others but ours went down in history as one of the worst second-hand cars we ever bought.
Hey! If we’d have lived near you, things might have been different.
The faulty oil ring on the pistons must have been an inherent fault on certain Allegros Mart.
The one I had before that one was fine.
Sorry to hear about your bad experience with the mechanic, I sorta specialised on the allegro engine. It was the same transverse engine they used in the mini, of which I had three. All of which needed engine refurbs or modification. My next car was the Austin 1100 which surprisingly didn’t need any major work on the engine, but the braking system and wiring diagram was the same as the mini. I only bought cars that had engines that I was conversant with, so the Allegro was the next obvious choice.
I got the front wheels balanced because I was fed up with the steering wheel jiggling about, so was walking about while they did it.
.
. I like the architecture of the building and am surprised it is so young.
) but most of all, it was a similar engine to the ones in my previous cars…3 Mini’s, Austin 1100 and an earlier Allegro and I knew them like the back of my hand. I could remove an engine, refurbish big ends, valves, Piston rings and clutch within 3 days…