I’m trying to sell the XJR and the MGB GT, both via free internet ads. This has worked well for me in the past (on occasion) but this go-round I’m getting all of the bums. My short list of peeves about the process:
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This is what I like most about bikes: You can buy a bike that will out-perform the mightiest of cars for a very small fraction of the cost.
Now whether it can actually out-perform those cars with an old lady like me riding it (and a fat old lady to boot), is another question. But just knowing you’re on a machine capable of such performance is exhilarating.
This is my one completed ground-up restoration, of which I’m both proud and a bit embarrassed–perhaps like you’d feel if a loved one made a nude painting of you.
It turned out beautifully, but a lot of my work needs some retrofitting. For example, I’m not riding it much at the moment because the front forks leak like a sieve. I need to pull the front end apart and put plumber’s tape on all the threaded bits of the hydraulic tubes…didn’t know when I assembled it and I’m dreading the job.
Of course, the other reason I’m not riding it is that the repro carb on it is terrible. Caught the bike on fire, no less, once.
Among certain enthusiasts, the call of the Jaguar isn’t a snarl, it’s a sweet siren’s song. It lures us towards the rocks where we’ll inevitably be smashed, yet we’re powerless to resist.
Welcome to Rusty Heaps…the blog’s name has its genesis in my bride’s catch-all term for any and all of my vehicles. Sadly, she’s very observant.
This blog isn’t meant to be a restoration diary, though some of it may end up looking like that. I fell in love with British cars when I caught my first glimpse of what I now realize was probably a 1969 MGB*–this would have been in 1982 or so, when I was 15. I was fascinated by the driver’s mirror on the door and the passenger mirror way up the fender…it seemed exotic and cool. I realize now that the mirror was just a silly affectation, it had zero practical value. But try to explain that to a 15 year old.
In any case, that mirror has led to my owning more than 20 British cars over the past 20 years…most tired old dogs, because that’s what my wallet leans towards. My wallet has never learned the lesson my head knows instinctively (and which my heart refuses to acknowledge): tired old dogs always cost more in the end. Always. I’ve mouthed that platitude numerous times to others and yet I’ve never taken my own advice.
In any case, join me as I attempt to justify, or at least record for posterity, my involvement with old cars, trucks and bikes.
* I’m sure I saw MGBs before this, but I just didn’t care in the same way that a soon-to-be-driving teenage boy cares.
