Radiator Testing

Checked the radiator today - hooked up the hose, closed off all the outlets - no leaks, at least at mains water pressure.

Just need to paint it now, after a bit of research on the TSSC forum, off I went looking for heat resistant spray paints and found this: Hammerite barbeque paint in our local DIY store. Just need to arrange some sort of grill on top of the radiator to hold the steaks!!!!

Also ordered some new Pacet fan ties from fleabay to secure the electric fan.

Radiator painting

No, nothing to do with DIY around the house, I happened to casually mention to a neighbour that I was thinking of replacing the standard radiator in my Spitfire 1500 as the existing one has sprung a slight leak on the header tank, when he said 'why not try the full width one I used to use in my Mk 2 Spit'

Not being one to ignore a gifthorse, I bit his hand off and away he went rummaging around under his workbench and lo and behold, an original Stanpart badged (Coventry Radiators) full width radiator emerged, somewhat dusty and grubby following a 15 year or so storage.


Incidentally, his Mk 2 Spitfire, currently in pieces since his son decided to restore it some 15 years ago will shortly be appearing on Ebay, having been replaced recently by a very low mileage Toledo 1300 in excellent condition.

Next steps are to test the radiator for soundness, - it was OK 15 years ago!, paint it as it is very grubby - see photo, and then install it in the Spitfire.

Stag Weekend

Well, not what you're all thinking - this was a weekend of using the Stag. I had an opportunity to join the beginning of the European Stag weekend organised by the SOC on Friday. This was a train ride from Tenterden to Bodiam on a specially chartered Steam train, appropriately titled the Stag Express.

It was a great start to the weekend, a nice leisurely drive down to Tenterden to join approx 50 other Stags in the Station car park, a leisurely ride through the Kent and Sussex countryside on the train followed by local beer (Shepherd Neame Spitfire of course) and beer battered Haddock and Chips at the Castle Inn on the sun terrace, leaving a short time to stroll around Bodiam castle before the ride back to Tenterden.

Returning to the car park to see 50+ Stags parked there was very impressive.

Saturday I was working so used the Spitfire on this occasion, parking it in the registry office car park whilst undertaking my duties there. When I came out to go home, I was confronted with the Bride and Bridesmaids of the wedding adorning themselves over the car!

Sunday was a Stag day again, met up with a couple of local TSSC members in their Vitesse convertible and Bond Equipe and convoyed along the M20/26/25 to Leatherhead for the SEM there making sure we blatted past any MG's we came across!

The SEM was a good turnout, unlike last year although there was little in the way of autojumble. Met up with TSSC Canterbury area and had a good day with them

Whe the time came to go home, Chris (Vitesse) and I decided to go home across country, as I used to work in Dorking some years ago I led the way down some very nice leafy lanes skirting Dorking, Gatwick, Lingfield and Tunbridge Wells arriving home about 1.5 hours later - great run. Only problem on this route is that all the nice leafy lanes I used to use are now 40 limited!

Stag went very well on both days, just getting a bit of misfire on kickdown at approx 4000 revs, but otherwise it is running very well indeed.