BACK UP TO SPEED
Only one way to see if the Robin’s speedo has been fixed – test it!
1990 RELIANT ROBIN
THE STORY SO FAR Miles driven 102 Total mileage 64,536 What’s gone wrong Nothing – apart from a blown fuse
There was an awkward moment, halfway down a busy dual carriageway, when I discovered that our Robin’s indicators had gone on strike. As had the windscreen wipers, fuel gauge, voltage readout and heater motor, for that matter. We just don’t get that sort of mid-journey mishap in our £900 Mitsubishi Galant.
But crucially, after several weeks of bodging, misplaced diagnoses and having to compete with other niggling faults, our bargain basement Reliant Robin finally has a fully-functioning speedometer again! Having finally traced the suspiciously high water temperature readouts to a duff voltage stabiliser ( CCW, 24 July) Reliant Owners’ Club guru, James Holland, and I reconvened to diagnose why our £600 car was driving everywhere at 0mph.
Having already established that the Robin’s original speedometer was working just fine, the lack of reading could only be down to one of two culprits – an issue with the drive in the gearbox (which James has only come across once before on a Reliant three-wheeler) or a knackered speedo cable. After jacking the car’s rear end up on to axle stands, starting it and carefully bringing the clutch up in first gear, we quickly discovered that it was the latter. One £15 replacement later and CBA was back to its usual happy self.
So the following day I decided to see just how accurate the freshlyfettled Smiths speedo really was. We’ve reported before on proposals that motorists could be penalised for straying just 1mph over the limit, so I was keen to find out whether our car’s speedo would land us in hot water should such rules ever be made a reality. But before that we had to sort out the Robin’s decision to throw an electrics-related wobbler.
CCW contributor, Richard Gunn, and I both suspected a blown fuse, and although they all initially looked fine we eventually discovered one with some very faint scorch marks at one end. Sure enough, the offside indicator blinked back into life the instant we swapped it for a spare. CBA was back on the road!
A few minutes later it was pressing on in the outside lane of one of Peterborough’s many dual carriageways, where it soon transpired that the Robin’s speedo is in line with most cars in that it under-reads by a few miles an hour, depending on how fast you’re going. So no chance of blaming iffy Smiths dials should the Reliant ever get flashed by a speed camera.
More importantly, our factfinding journey brought about an even more amazing realisation – I think this could be the first time that I’d ever driven the Reliant when there’s been absolutely nothing wrong with it.
It’s a long way from being as bombproof as our other £1000 Challenge contender – the intergalactic mileage Mitsubishi Galant – but it’s wonderful to know that it’s finally reached the point where we can just get in, start it up and whizz into town and back without worrying that it’s going to overheat or cut out. Or both. It’s come an awfully long way from the rotten chassis and sorrylooking pile of parts that we introduced a year or so ago.
And I wasn’t the only one to be impressed by it; Richard, who captured this week’s experiment with his camera, was so won over by its cheeky demeanour that he asked if he could borrow it for his next visit to a classic show.
No pressure, then…