The 'E' Type Forum

Such a pity.

Having lived ten years in Cambridgeshire in two stints, I have every sympathy with the guy.

At the wrong time of day you can come out of an Alpine tunnel into the bright sun and face a black bear or a fen lion in the middle of the A10. Do you swerve to avoid the endangered species or risk plunging into the ocean at Littleport down a thousand foot cliff? Sometimes a lamp post jumping out in front of you is as good as it gets.

Pete

[*For non Brits Cambridgeshire is mostly a dead flat county with no coastline, but when filling out an insurance claim some vagueness as to details is permitted]

Very sad indeed. I hope it gets repaired. I did hear many years back of a bloke in the Swindon area who spent ages painstakingly restoring a vintage Bentley. On his first run out a twat pulled out from a side road right in front of him. The Bentley survived pretty much unscathed ...not surprisingly but sadly the driver was killed......no seat belts....take care out there....

?100,000 for a 1973? Is that for insurance purposes......

Rothman wrote:?100,000 for a 1973? Is that for insurance purposes......

Fully restored V12 OTS? Easily worth that these days I'd have thought ...

Rothman wrote:?100,000 for a 1973? Is that for insurance purposes......

I thought that, not because of the valuation, but the odd position of the car and its 'accident'. One wondered what course of actions precipitated such an event.

Indeed, the position is more than a little bit odd. Simultaneous brake and steering failure?

Insufficient spannering perhaps, maybe forgetting to tighten all steering rod connections. This was what frightened me most when driving to my first MOT the other day so everything was quadruple checked. And I was still terrified.

Reminds me of a time when a friend of mine had his Citroen Ami towed to a garage & 2 minutes into the journey his keys popped out of the ignition. The steering wheel lock deployed and he went straight on at a bend straight into a lamppost. Not much salvageable from the Ami & the MGBGT towing him suffered rear damage.

Oh please, no conjecture as to what happenend! Reminds me of an aircraft disaster and all the experts give an opinion as to the cause the following day. Ridiculous.

It is my carefully considered opinion ( based of course upon speculation as Angus states ) that the damage occurred when the left front part of the vehicle came into contact with a fixed object which looks suspiciously like a concrete lamp standard

I don't think it ridiculous to discuss even if it only reminds people to check stuff on completion of a restoration before hitting the road. I made the point entirely as that exact scenario was the one that had gone through my head repeatedly whilst I nervously awaited the first drive !

Clearly we don't know what happened (yet) and I feel desperately sorry for the owner.

Btw I'm very glad I did check everything as I'd missed the split pins out of the castellated rear hub nuts !

It's very easy to overlook things ... I thought I'd checked mine umpteen times over but had forgotten to check the speedo. After almost a year since it's first MOT, I was driving in tandem and had an opportunity to do a speedo check.

The car in front was doing 70 and mine only 56!

Chris, I can heartily recommend Speedograph Richfield to overhaul your speedo and get it within a few mph of correct.

Geoff