FORD MUSTANG
RUN BY Lizzie Pope OWNED SINCE October 2017 PREVIOUS REPORT Feb 2021
Lockdown 3.0 has provided further opportunities for ticking off jobs, all of which will hopefully mean that going out for a drive just for the joy of it won’t be interrupted by mechanical malady, when nonessential journeys are permitted. Well, that’s the plan at least. And by then the sun will be shining and the roads will be salt-free – in theory.
For the Mustang, the major surgery involved the rear brakes. The aim was to improve the handbrake’s operation and, upon inspection, the rear shoes had become contaminated with oil and needed replacing. They’d also previously been fitted the wrong way round… New items on each side, installed correctly, can only help matters. Given that even our moderns are barely getting any exercise right now, I suspect it will be a little while until we go for a proper test drive to prove it.
There was a light-bulb moment under the bonnet. The hoses on the water pump had never fitted neatly, and any changes undertaken in our ownership simply followed what was there before. Until we realised that two hoses were the wrong way round. With them swapped over, everything now sits much better.
Another quick job was to replace a leaking rocker-cover gasket. We’ll know if this provides an adequate seal and stops the seepage when the oil change (next on the list) is done and the engine is running.
While we were there, we decided to change the fuel line to the carburettor, simply because it tidies things. It also meant exchanging tired rubber for shiny chromeplated steel: who doesn’t love a bit of underbonnet bling?
There are always jobs that can be done, of course, but now that all the essential work and maintenance has been ticked off, all we need are places to go, people to see and the freedom of the open road.
I had yet more fun and games with the Range Rover’s alternator at the beginning of the year. Soon after fitting a new-old-stock Lucas unit towards the end of 2020, the charging light came on at anything above tickover, though the battery didn’t appear to be discharging. Optimistically I decided to ignore it, which was fine until the battery actually did start discharging.
On the way into Cirencester on a bleak January night, the headlights seemed a bit dim. As that thought settled, the engine began to miss and by the time I got to the traffic lights I was all out of sparks. There wasn’t even enough of them left to fire up the hazard lights and, uncharacteristically, I hadn’t managed to get out of harm’s way. It just sat in the middle of the road, a great dead blue hulk, too heavy for me to push uphill alone. I tried.
I got the warning triangle out and, feeling a bit silly, called the AA. You now have to listen to an annoying lecture before you can speak to a human. When I finally got said alleged human to understand where I was, he decided I was ‘vulnerable’ and summoned the local plod who, after helping to push me to a safe place, did a routine check on my numberplate.
Ah… It appeared that sir’s vehicle was neither Mot’d nor taxed. But it was insured, which probably saved me from having it impounded, or even crushed.
I thought the Range Rover, born in 1980, was now immune. I must have been confusing it with another car because RAY 606W, actually sold new in April ’81, doesn’t go tax/mot-free until April. Whoops.
To compound my pain, the AA told me it wouldn’t come out and rescue an ‘illegal’ car unless I paid up front. In the end, with judicious use of a jump-pack I managed to get home. Once Mike Connor had fitted new brushes I took RAY for an MOT (it flew through) and coughed up for six months’ tax, just in case the cops came good on their promise to dob me in.
I certainly got use out of it in the autumn during a mammoth shed move and, later, when my father-inlaw donated a tonne of logs from his golf course. The weight in the back made the steering disconcertingly light as we weaved up the A419.
Meanwhile, I have added to the ‘to do’ list by snapping yet another window-winder handle. I have also dented the nearside lower quarter-panel with another car in my much nicer, drier but rather smaller office-cum-storage facility, which takes 10 cars tightly packed rather than the previous 15-plus with room to burn.