Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[roverdriver]

(Previously posted as 'MG Story due to a senior moment when writing!! Dane)

A good friend sent me the story and photo below and kindly gave me permission to post it. I hope you enjoy!

“The Party-Crashers.”


When you’re twenty-something, drive an Austin Healey, live in the country and the year is about 1968, you find that a simple trip to the city becomes a quest for all the action you can fit into a couple of days.
Peter Dowdle and I seemed to often find ourselves fitted into the above scenario.
I was able to benefit from his local knowledge, he being a past resident of Melbourne, and he had a wide circle of aquaintances. He rarely had any problem finding a party on a Saturday night in or around Melbourne.

This particular Saturday night we were on our second party, or we would be soon, just as soon as we parked the two cars, my 100/6 and Peter’s 100/4
We had found out about this party second-hand, and we didn’t know anyone there, but we were not concerned, in fact we were confident we’d be able to find some way to move in on it.
There were a lot of cars in attendance, and we found the only parking spaces available were a fairly long but downhill walk short of the house, which was situated across the road from the beach at Mount Martha.
With our spirits up there and hovering between hope and expectation, we nosed our cars into the grass at the road’s edge, alighted, locked up and began the walk down the hill.
I turned when I heard Peter catch his breath, and following his gaze, I was horrified to see the flickering of a small flame in the darkness beneath his car.

We knew what we had to do even before we got back to the Healey, and we hastily pushed it back out of the grass and onto the road where we would be more able to assess the situation.
The fuel pipe, which runs the length of and along the lower edge of the chassis rail, had been cut at some time in the past and had been rejoined via a short length of plastic tubing. We couldn’t tell how it had happened, but the plastic was gone and the petrol dribbling from the open end of the pipe was alight and being fed by probably several gallons of the stuff in the tank.
After we got over the initial shock and could manage some clear thinking we decided that the answer lay in the abundance of beach sand, which bordered the asphalt. We then launched into a frenzied attack on the flames by throwing handfulls of sand in their general direction. This was largely,… no, totally unsuccessful due to the minimal Austin Healey ground clearance. Thankfully we were able to gain some respite from the dangerous situation by pushing the hapless Healey steadily forward, which wasn’t too hard, seeing as it was downhill anyway. Basically, what we had was the car moving ever forward and down the hill with a small trail of flame following it, and at the same time, gradually heating and igniting other flammables in the immediate area under the car. Whenever the car became stationary, the trickle of flame would turn into an ever-increasing pool of flame. Of course this couldn’t go on forever, so we never relented with our efforts to extinguish the flames. First Peter, then I, would do our best to get that lucky shot with our handfull of sand, thrown from as far under as we could reach. The problem was made greater by the hot exhaust preventing any action on the left side, which of course is where the bulk of the sand was as we continued to push the car along beside the asphalt. A dozen or more times, we would stop or steady the car’s progress, lay down beside it and throw a handfull at arm’s stretch underneath only to have the flames go out and be relentlessly re-ignited at the same time.
In spite of it being downhill, our energy was being sorely sapped. After a lot of puffing and grunting and sweating, willing helpers began to gather as the word spread through the party about the drama unfolding as the hot Healey in its mad, scrambling, slow and desperate ascent continued toward their front gate. The gate which, ominously, was at the bottom of the hill. The helpers, growing in numbers, were full of suggestions and even bearing containers of water, all to no avail.
As the car finally reached the bottom of the hill and the inevitable point of no return, all of the partygoers were out on the road. Peter, clearly at the end of his tether, made a monumental decision.

“Stuff it ”, he said between clenched teeth, “ let it burn, it’s beaten us!”

At that very moment, an idea came out of the darkness of despair, and within 30 seconds the flames were extinguished. Other spot fires which had caught here and there around the car were put out and we collapsed exhausted on the sand, totally drained of adrenalin and energy.

With that we came to the realization that the party we were intending to crash had in fact come to us, in a big way.


Question… What was the idea that saved the day?



Answer.. A large mound of sand was hastily formed in front of the car, which was then pushed forward, the fuel pipe burying itself , open end first into the sand, snuffing the flame and cutting the flow of petrol at the same time.



The above photo shows both Healeys in yet another happy circumstance!
This shot was taken as part of the annual Corowa Show Grand Parade, and depicts "Miss Showgirl" in my lead car, and "Miss Junior Showgirl" in (on) Peter's car behind.
The caption behind the photo says April 1966, so the "party crashers" would probably be more like Jan or Feb or March that year.

(The town of Corowa lies adjacent to the Murray River which forms the border between the states of New South Wales and Victoria. Hence one car has NSW registration and the other Vic registration.- Dane)
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Dane- roverdriver but not a Viking.

[peter scott]

Hi Dane,

A scarey tale indeed!
Where do the MGs fit into the story? Was it an MG event that they were heading for or are Healeys just considered as part of the MG scene in the form of BMC?

Peter
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https://www.nostalgiatech.co.uk
1939 SS Jaguar 2 1/2 litre saloon

[Ashley]

What a miserable experience, glad it resolved.

My son is 940 miles into a trip across France, over the Alps into Italy, back through Switzerland, Germany and back to Friends in France before coming home, so I hope he has better luck. He's in my Healey with his long suffering wife.

[roverdriver]

Sorry Peter. I have edited the title now. I really have no idea why I wrote 'MG' except that just before posting the story I had read an article about MG's.
Regards
Dane.
_________________
Dane- roverdriver but not a Viking.

[Ashley]

Www.drinkaware.com

[baconsdozen]

Desperation is the mother of improvisation.
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Thirty years selling imperial hand tools for old machinery(Now happily retired).

[Ashley]

This seems like a good place to tell an Austin Healey story of today.

Mine is a 1963 BJ7 with a carefully built BJ8 engine and carburettors, it's very fast for a standard Healey engine, but had only done a few hundred miles after the engine and gearbox had both been re-rebuilt. Misunderstanding led,to wrong syncromesh in gearbox and a dreadful engine rebuild in the States meant I had to do absolutely everything again at vast expense.

My son and daughter in law decided to have a holiday in it, but nothing gentle. In the event, they drove down the left side of France to stay with friends, crossed to Avignon to stay with more, then over the Alps by minor roads, possibly the Stelvio and down through Turin and Milan to Lake Guarda. They crossed on the Ferry to Switzerland took a railway through an Alp into Germany and drove up to Luxembourg before crossing back into France to stay with another friend before the journey home arriving midnight last night.
2,400 miles and 2,350 without overdrive because of a **** Lucas relay. The big nut on the bottom of the overdrive came undone too and the points needed resetting as well, but otherwise fine.

On one day they did 370 miles on a French motorway in 35 degrees, which was hell, but the car managed it.














I'm waiting for them to come and tell me all about it, I must admit that I was worried lest it would let them down, but it seems to have made it okay and I reckon it'll count as the holiday of a lfetime. Not comparable with certain antipodean expeditions, but a fifty three year old car with 25% of the petrol used to propel the car and 75% to provide heat in a Continental summer....

Ash