It’s Alive! (Again)

Well, I had a fair amount on Monday checking the plugs and then, on discovering that they were thoroughly coated in crap, wondering how the poor Minor ever ran! The kind thing to do was give them a good clean and chuck them back in, which would be rewarded by the sound of a much healthier car. Or not. It was another one of those delightful key turning but non-starting moments.

Today… all the ingredients were right to undo this wrong.

Having procured a set of leads and plugs and swapped them without any ado about anything I turned the key to the sound of a delightfully healthy(ish) 1098 block chugging along happily. No longer does the car kick out plumes of blue smoke either! It did start to produce some steamy looking smoke after running for a few minutes though, so I imagine the head has gone but I do need to check some other vital statistics (as well as borrow a head compression tester) before getting too excited.

One revelation, on driving the car forward and backward a few feet, was that the clutch isn’t… erm… well… great. When I pushed the pedal down I was greeted with a sound and heart-wrenching feeling that I could possibly equate to the moment the last dinosaur died. More investigation will be needed in this respect…

Still, progress is progress. Time to move on to the battle of the Algerian visa.