VOLUME 20, NUMBER 2 Mar-Apr 2015 INSIDE THIS ISSUE UPCOMING EVENTS EDITOR’S BIT Member’s Cars 1 Saturday, May 16, 2015 - Vancou- Just starting my 6th year as editor John Clarke Visit 6 ver ABFM at Van Dusen Gardens. with one of our longest editions to Hearts and Tarts 8 See Western Driver online for more date. Thanks to all of our contribu- Mount Baker Run History 10 details or call Joan Stewart at tors for making it such a great issue. New Member Profile 12 604.736.6754 May 5, 2015 - Shop There was just too much good stuff Rear View Mirror 13 Tour at Rovalution Automotive (Land to leave out or postpone to a future Fort Langley Run 14 Rover Specialists), 867 3rd St.W, issue. Welcome to the OECC / North Vancouver, B.C. 7:00pm. Go Also, don’t forget to “like” our Face- The Boot / At the Wheel 15 for coffee and dessert afterwards. book page and join our new Face- (see website for more events ) book Group. Thanks! Cars of Branch Members and Their jobs was to remove the exhaust from a Rover P4 Cyclops, I must have been bitten by the Rover bug at that point. Stories The first car I owned was a “Ford Special” built on a Brit- ish Ford Prefect chassis and made to look a bit like a By Walter Reynolds Morgan. An accident involving a snow bank in the severe winter of 1963 resulted in a total strip-down and rebuild - another great learning experience. The Cars of Malcolm Tait Soon after arriving in Vancouver in 1966 we bought a Rambler “American” for very little money just to have something to get around in. It had problems so the next This month we hear about the cars of Malcolm and Bar- purchase was a 5 year old white 1962 Austin A60 Cam- bara Tait. Here is their story as told by Malcolm. bridge, a car I knew something about. When we pur- chased the Austin it had done about 50,000 miles and over the next 13 years we put more than 100,000 addi- Why British cars and why a Rover? tional miles on it. In 1971 Barbara got her Canadian drivers license and we needed a second car. I was looking From a young age I had an interest in mechanical things. at the Volvo 142 which had just come on the market; I The father of a school friend owned a small garage, just liked the mechanical aspects but was not keen on the himself and one mechanic. In the summer of 1958 I was body style. We lived close to Gordon Bros. Motors at 10 th asked if I would like to work there while the owner was and Alma in Vancouver. When I came home from work on holiday. It was the Castle Garage in Newcastle-on- one evening Barbara said she had seen something inter- Tyne right next to the 12 th century castle and the work- esting at Gordon's so she took me to have a look. It was a shops were two arches of the railway bridge. red Rover 2000 TC that had caught Barbara's eye. We were both impressed by the Rover 2000's we had seen in the UK before we left but thought something like that was out of our league. The Rover bug bit again and I did- n't need much persuading. Barbara had selected the Rov- er and it became primarily her car. The two arches where Castle Garage used to be located. (Google photo) My main job was to take care of the petrol pumps so that The happy couple with their new P6. the mechanic could work with minimum interruption. I (Malcolm photo) got on really well with the mechanic and he soon gave me jobs to do when I wasn't busy with pumps. He was a great teacher and I quickly learned a lot. One of the first Continued next page... Purchased: Next problem was me questioning my ability to tackle the job. I considered it to be much more sophisticated than July 1971, Gordon Bros. Vancouver – used as a demon- any other car I had worked on, the workshop manual is strator by Mr. Gordon, 4000 miles on the clock. excellent but it was a bit intimidating and led me to be- Problems: lieve that a large selection of specialized tools would be required. There was a slight steering shimmy when braking and this was annoying but not serious. Several attempts were made to cure the problem under warranty: Brake pads replaced, discs machined, wheel bearings replaced, wheels aligned and balanced – no improvement. We put up with this annoyance until someone recom- mended Jay's British and European Motors saying “Jay is expensive but he does the job right”. I removed the front calipers and took them to Jay. As I suspected, the calipers were partly seized. Jay overhauled them – problem solved. 1980: At about 75,000 miles the Rover began to run a bit rough. The problem was a burned exhaust valve on cylin- der #4. Non-leaded gas had recently been introduced and this was considered a possible cause. Malcolm in “uniform” dismantling a P6 at ABC 1993: The B.C. Air Care exhaust emissions testing was Parts. (Ruth Burgess photo) introduced. Jay tuned the car as best he could but it failed Taking the approach there was nothing to be lost I bit the and it was in need of other mechanical work. I was ex- bullet and got started and quickly gained confidence. At tremely busy at my work with no time to spend on the car least taking it apart was not as difficult as I imagined! so I took it off the road and it sat in the garage. I hated The car was now nearly 20 years old so the next question opening the garage door to see it gradually looking in an was “are parts available?” ever increasingly sadder state and hated contemplating that I would have to scrap it. Several years prior to this I had a bad experience in the UK. My father owned a 1967 Austin A60 so while I was there I offered to do a few minor jobs. At the parts depart- ment of the main British Leyland dealership in Newcastle I was told “We do not stock parts for old cars”. So with this in mind, what were my chances with an even older car in Vancouver? At Bradner Hall, November 2007. (Walter photo) Retirement and Restoration. 1998: I retired and it was decision time: Do something Engine bay restoration. Steering box is at right with the Rover or get rid of it. Was there really a choice? rear with steering linkage in front of firewall; a Theoretically I now had time to work on it. I say safety feature – no steering wheel into the chest in “theoretically” because the biggest myth about retirement event of a frontal crash. (Malcolm photo) is “that one has all the time to do whatever one wants”. VOLUME 20,NUMBER 2 THE ROUNDABOUT PAGE 2 A friend had recently had a TR6 restored and when I told Stories: him what I was attempting he suggested that I contact Ken Bailey at Lancaster Restorations who had done the Trips to the Rockies: work for him. I phoned Ken and as soon as I mentioned Will we get back to Vancouver? “Rover” he said the person I needed to talk to was Ruth Burgess at All British Cars. On December 3 rd 1999, I met When we purchased the Rover we kept the Austin A60 Ruth for the first time. I gave Ruth a list of engine and which was the daily driver and the Rover was used main- brake parts that would be needed and after looking over ly for longer trips many of which were to the Rockies. The the list her response was a reassuring “no problem”. (As I first time we took the Rover to Banff we were parked at type this it is exactly 15 years to the day since that first the view point at Mount Norquay, a gentleman from Cal- meeting). gary came running over and said “I had one of those cars” and regaled me with a tale of woe about how it spent more time being fixed than on the road. It made Barbara and I really worried that we might not make it back to Vancouver. Thirty years later at the Van Dusen Car show a gentleman from Calgary came up to me and told me a similar story, I am sure it was the same person. Problem Bear and Problem Parent: Another incident on a trip to the Rockies with the Rover involved my father. At a roadside picnic site there was a black bear with two cubs – very photogenic - so I pulled in. Despite having given my parents lectures about bears Dad was out of the car like a shot determined to get the perfect picture. Mother bear left the cubs and came round Diff and in-board rear calipers ready to be re- the car and placed one paw on the trunk and the other on installed. The assembly is designed to operate with the back window right behind my mother who became the De Dion rear suspension. (Malcolm photo) hysterical. We got Dad back into the car and fortunately Ruth overhauled the cylinder head and the brake calipers. the bear returned to her cubs.