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2 years ago
The little car that could…
… drive across the United States - and back.
I returned to my driveway last night, October 7, 2009, with 5,992 miles on the odometer in eight days of driving to and from California from my home in Valley Forge, PA. I had a four-day break at the Triumphest and VTR National meeting in San Luis Obispo, California.
It was a great trip in so many ways. This is indeed a very big, beautiful country. I am so glad I drove across it, coast-to-coast (almost), and even more so that I did it in this lovely old car. This was one item for my bucket list.
Once I had resolved the ignition issue - a failed condenser - that had me on the side of the road four times until I fixed it by swapping it out for a good, used part, the TR4 has been amazingly willing and ready. It has started at first request every time, each day and gassing up after half a tank means a lot of stops. While returning 30 mpg over the whole trip, it has never stalled or struggled, whether at sea-level or at 7,500’. It has cruised at 65 - 75 mph, hour after hour, it has climbed mountains and crossed deserts and plains. It has been a wonderful companion for the road.
This car is now approaching its first 100k road miles (today, 99,495 miles) from manufacture 48 years ago. 6% of those miles have been in the last fortnight.
I have read on the Triumph list many issues with cooling the TR engine. This car’s radiator was re-cored years ago. The hole for the hand-crank is gone, and in terms of cooling this is a good thing. Otherwise the system is fairly stock.
- It has a stock 4-blade water impeller
- It does not have the bypass hose impeded
- It has a standard, mechanical fan
- It has no electric fan
- It has a non-skirted thermostat
I mention all this because I was worried about over-heating. So worried that I took with me 3 fan belts, a thermostat, two radiator caps, a full set of hoses and a water pump. Three fan belts? Yep. One to help you out when yours broke and still feel I had myself covered. I also had a gallon of water - for me or the car, whoever needed it first. It was never opened.
In two situations on this trip, the risk of overheating was extreme. The first was crossing and then climbing out of the Mojave Desert. It was mid-afternoon at 118F / 47C. The climb out was steep, long and arduous, rising 1800’ in just a couple of miles.
The second was on the Interstate coming into a blistering Albuquerque, New Mexico. I was flying at 70 mph on the highway, then hit roadworks and a very hot standstill for 10 minutes or so, before we then crawled through the city for 30 minutes. Moving a car length at a time, we crept through and out of town where a fender-bender on the far side of the town had compounded the impact of the roadworks. The car survived both situations without the temperature moving beyond high-normal.
Take a look at my temp gauge. It’s in Centigrade:
Once up to operating temperature, the needle is steady in the little box around 70 degrees, to the left of the 70 mark. In the two extreme cases I describe above, the needle moved to the right side of that box. It never went beyond. The only time the needle has ever gone beyond that box was after a refresh of coolant in the radiator after a flush. I ran the engine. The car had not yet ‘burped’, and the needle quickly flew over to the far right.
My point in all this? I have read a lot about people struggling with over-heating and spending a lot of money on electric fans, 6-blade impellers, improved 4-blade impellers, special thermostats and so on.
If your car overheats, make sure the cooling system is able to work as designed and only then ‘upgrade’ as necessary. I’d start with a really clean system: flushed block and heater. Remove the radiator and back flush it (turn it upside down and put the hose on and leave it for an hour or two. Try one of the tins of flush stuff in your local FLAPS. On replacing the radiator, make sure your radiator shroud is well-fitted to the radiator.
After this, assess where you are and invest as you see fit. I have proved to my satisfaction that this car can handle pretty extreme conditions without auxiliary cooling equipment.
As for oil pressure, I saw it drop below 50 lbs when cruising, for the first time. That was in the desert heat of Arizona and California. Even though the water temp remained constant, after 3 or 4 hours of hot, fast Interstate driving, the oil pressure would decline slowly as the oil lost viscocity. After a 15 minute gas break, it would return to 60 lbs plus, for about an hour (not the 70 lbs plus I have at start up and through full warm-up) then gradually drop again to around 50lbs. In the Mojave, it dropped to 40 lbs, it was that hot. If I lived out west, and drove highways a fair bit, I think an oil cooler would be a useful investment.
This speedo started flicking wildly on the last tankful, coming home last night. I’ll start with lubricating the cable and see where that gets me. If that fails, I’ll work through the terrific speedometer repair manual researched and written by my fellow Delaware Valley Triumphs club member, Tony Rhodes. Tony has written several excellent technical articles: http://home.comcast.net/~rhodes/ the links on this page include the speedo manual that I’ll get intimate with tomorrow.
This was my first long road trip in the TR. Some may think I over-packed. There are certainly some items I wouldn’t take again - like a car cover. By the time I could have used it, the car was dirty.. scratch, scratch.
Here’s my packing list for next time - a photo was quicker than a list:
I did not use the luggage rack. The boot was full. Behind the seats was full, and the passenger footwell. To save space, some of the spare parts were bubble-wrapped and stuffed out of sight around the fuel tank, behind the back-board. I had recently replaced the generator, battery and starter. I trusted that they would do the job for me.
Matt Bates’ Triumph Rescue (http://triumphrescue.com/index.html) installed a rebuilt transmission and overdrive for this trip. I could not have contemplated such a journey without overdrive. It has literally given the car a new, additional dimension. The overdrive worked perfectly, at each and every asking.
Among the spares I carried: ignition set, plus extra points and condensers, fuel pump, fuel pump rebuild kit, facet fuel pump, fuel line, fuel filter, oil filter, a full set of gaskets plus gasket material and hole punches. Water pump, a full set of hoses, thermostat, two radiator caps, a set of spark plugs, brake and clutch hydraulic rebuild kits, fuses, flasher unit, inner tube and band … the list goes on. In the picture above, the leather bag at the back was for me.
It is amazing what can be fitted in if you are organised.
Here is a closer look:
All the tools on the red blanket fit in the grey bag top, right. All the small spares and consumables fit in the blue bag with red handles, centre. All the electrical portables fit in the green bag, bottom, right.
The most useful item after the GPS was the CB radio. The information shared by Truck Drivers is invaluable. If you need help, they are always very willing - such as suggesting work-arounds with roadworks, or where Smokey is ‘taking pictures’ (using a radar gun to trap speeders). If you try this, you’ll hear that them address each other as ‘Driver’, not ‘Trucker’. I am surprised at how many Drivers are women.
I chatted with a few of them about the car and my trip, as we rolled along through some State or other. ‘This is a Triumph, not an MG, but thanks anyway’ was my first contribution after a passing Driver asked his road colleagues if they’d just seen that lovely red MG. A couple of others at different times noticed my antenna as I passed them or they passed me. ‘Got your ears on, TR4?’ one said. I had a good chat with him and his road buddies travelling in convoy (yes, they still do) about where I had been and where headed.
Here’s a conversation from yesterday, as I was headed in to Indianapolis. Many cities are undergoing road construction with the stimulus money. Longer term it will be better, but there are an awful lot of cones in the roadway just now…
“I’m eastbound on I40, going into Indianapolis. I’m headed on to Philly. Are there any roadworks I need to workaround?” I asked, 20 miles before the city. Indianapolis has a ring road, if I needed to avoid issues on the direct path.
“Only problem is going north from Indianapolis” one said
“No problem, just go straight through, you’ll roll by without slowing down” said another.
“Thank you, driver.” I said, to each response.
Others agreed, and so it was.
Other times, a Driver would report something like: “They are taking pictures at 132 over 8, in the middle, eastbound.”
No-one responds, but all who listen take note.
In the states where .1 miles are staked, the whole number is above the decimal, hence ‘132 over 8’ = 132.8 miles. ‘The middle’ is the median, with a radar gun pointed at eastbound traffic. Its difficult to not feel a little smug as a hot Japanese hatchback with a blacked-out windows, low-profiles and a big noisy can speeds by you and by mile post 132.8, to then see him stopped a mile or two down the road.
If you want to try CB, buy a no-frills low-end radio with a good name like Cobra or Uniden and invest in a good antenna. My local radio shack has a decent compact Cobra radio on sale for $20. Just sit it on the passenger seat and plug it into your cigarette lighter. (If the speaker is in the bottom side of the radio, add a remote speaker for $15.)
A good antenna can be had here: http://www.firestik.com/ I attached mine to the luggage rack. Brackets could be made to fit under side mirror fittings, or onto fender brackets. Standard antennas need to be grounded to the body of the car. No Ground Plane antennas do not. If your paint isn’t too precious, a magnetic base antenna would be easiest to fit and remove.
I could possibly pack quite a bit less for my next trip. I wouldn’t skimp on spares though. In fact, I might take more than I have here. Not because I don’t trust the car, its just ‘insurance’ and peace of mind for me.
Thanks for those of you that sent me messages of encouragement while on the road. It was great to hear from each of you. For everyone who has enjoyed reading this trip blog - thank you.
See you on the road,
Brian
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