[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

I am going to set up a seperate thread for my metal model building. I don’t think it is a problem to occasionally show some things beyond automotive fiddling, using my tools and workshop.

I was going to suggest that

But I am not sure it is of interest to those who are primarily interested in fiddling with cars.

I think there is going to be quite a bit of interest. Many people here just love tools of all sorts.

Please post a link to the new thread on this one so we can be sure of not missing it

[Jeroen]

I will continue with the build of my next model engine project here:

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/techn...-building.html

This thread will return to (mostly) fiddling with my cars, small car events I attend, technical meetings etc.

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

Last night I noticed an odd bit sticking out from the back of the driver outside rear view mirror. Very strange, had not noticed before?





I remembered I had bought two identical rear view mirrors of Ebay about two decades ago. These things are pretty rare, as they are electrically operated and they were offered on Ebay for next to nothing, so I just bought them at the time.

Never had a close look at these before. Looks like the mirror is held in place with this one screw that locks under a mounting plate.



Checked the passenger side too:



I managed to tighten it up a bit more, but the little locking screw is still visible. I think they little bit of plastic that is supposed to hide the screw is (partly) missing. But what is strange is that the screw does stick out a bit, I can’t tighten it any further. So it would have always shown? I am going to check some of my old photographs. See if it has always been like that.

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

We took the Jaguar for a nice little tour today. We went and visited a car boot sale. Yes, we have those here in the Netherlands as well. What with Covid 19 some restrictions are in force, but this is probably our first event again, after some 6 month of staying home and every event, big or small being cancelled.

Nice to out, nice drive, lovely lunch along the way.

I found these (jeweller) pliers for one Euro!



Always good to have! My wife asked if I did not have enough tools. Told her it is to fix her jewellery. She told me to get some more!

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

This weekend some English friends who have been living in the Netherlands came to visit us. In a few months they will be moving back to the UK. Mike had been clearing out his garage and brought me some of his tools. Always useful and I don’t have any imperial size sockets!



This coming Saturday we are off on our annual Spider tour to France. I have written about this previously. We are 5 couples, one bachelor. And we all met through the Dutch Alfa Romeo Spider Register. All of us have been very active in the Spider Register. As board members, various committees, all sorts of stuff.

Whereas we are all still members, none of us are active in the Register. The batton has been handed over many years ago. But we are all good friends, visit each other frequently and we organise at least once a year a Spider event. Usually to our good Spider friends Cees and Annelies who are running a Bed & Breakfast in France. We were supposed to visit them several weeks ago. But France was still closed due to the Corona Crisis. I organised a little spider tour here in our area and you will find some photographs of us enjoying the day, having a picnic, visiting my friend Bernds car model museum.

But this Saturday it is happening: We will all meet at 08.30 in Maastricht. Which is already an almost two hour drive from where we live. Two couple live much further north then we, they have decided to drive down there on Friday evening.

Usually we travel on a Friday. But for some reason this year that would not work. So Saturday it is, but that means the roads going south through Belgium and France are going to be choked, bumper to bumper. Even in these Corona times.

So we want to set off early and leave the motorway early on as well. Nice rural road driving all the way down south!



Today I started to get the Spider ready. Really, it is always ready. But for these long drives (we will easily do 1500 - 1700 km in 5 days) I want to make double sure. It is also a bit of a ritual I enjoy. Fiddling with it, checking, thinking what I need to bring.

First thing is to check under the hood:

Fan belts; visual and tension: check
Any oil/water leaks: none! check
Oil level: Check!
Brake fluid level: Check
Clutch fluid level: Check
Cooling liquid level: Check
Window washer fluid: too low, so I quickly popped over to our local petrol station and bought some





Next, check the tyre pressure:

All good. Almost new tyres. I keep them a little higher on pressure than before and it feels fine. We will be heavily loaded too. Wifey plus lots of stuff!



Don’t forget the spare in the boot; I keep it always 0,5 bar higher pressure than the other four tyres. I don’t know what it is, but tyres that don’t get used, seem to loose their pressure quicker. Noticed that on my bicycle tyres as well as the car tyres.



In order to get to the spare I need to move a lot of stuff I carry as standard:



So this is what the boot looks empty, Only thing in there is the CD changer.



But behind the “secret compartment” lots of stuff. Mainly cleaning cloths, some water, some special mechanic soap and some latex gloves etc. All nicely tucked away.



As my wife is coming along, boot space is at a premium. Also we need to take picnic chairs as we will be doing a lot of picnic stops. So here is the very basic absolutely minimum that needs to come, before starting on actual luggage.



I need tools, quite a few, I need some spare parts, towing rope, lots of maps, the afore mentioned picnic chairs and of course our umbrella. The umbrella is operated by my wife. We always drive top down, even if it rains, snows. No problem when you are on the move. It will just blow over. But if you have to slow down for a red traffic light you are going to get very very wet. My wife will whip out this huge umbrella that covers just about the whole cockpit. When the light turns green, I will go pedal to the metal and she will have to stow the umbrella real quick!

I still need to attach the “fly-swatter” behind our seats. it keeps some of the wind out of the cockpit at high speeds on the motorway.

I need to see how much luggage we have and how to stow it all. Some will go behind the two seats, some in the boot. But I would like to take some more tools and parts as well.

We will spend four nights with our friends. On the fifth day everybody will drive home. We have just booked a nice little hotel in Trier, Germany. So we are going home via Germany, Moezel/Eiffel area. I am really looking forward to it. Weather looks very good, if anything a bit hot! 30-35oC.

Jeroen

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Mike had been clearing out his garage and brought me some of his tools. Always useful and I don’t have any imperial size sockets!

Snap!



I bought this set in 1970-something. The difference you might spot is that I replaced a sparkplug socket, that I don't use, with a separately-bought 25mm socket that I do.

I have to leave off reading your travel plans until tomorrow*, but... Have a good trip



*Known to most people as "later today."
4am bedtime.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

Snap!

I bought this set in 1970-something.

looks near identical! It does show that good quality tools will last a life time. My set is not complete. Some pieces are missing, some parts have been replaced. But it’s always good to have some more tools. And as I said, I don’t have anything in imperial sizes. No need for it at the moment, but who knows what the future holds in stock, car wise.

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

For some reason, two of the fluorescent tubes of my light arrangement went on the blink at the same time. They still flicker occasionally. Not completely dead yet, which is even worse!

Either the starter or the tube. I will have to figure it out. But it means moving the Spider and the Jaguar out of the way and getting up on a ladder. I will not touch these things with my cars underneath them!



I might still have one spare tube left. At some point in time I will need to upgrade these lights to something a bit more modern. We will see.

Got the Spider ready for the wife, by installing what is commonly known as the fly-swatter!



Installing is very straight forward. Just a bit awkward as you need to open the hood partially to get good access to the bolts/nuts. First fit the two supports:





Next put the fly-swatter screen in place:







It does make a huge difference when driving, especially on the motorway. But I have a bit of a reputation of a hardcore diehard top down enthusiast, so this is killing me. But lets just call it an act of true love.

I had to modify those brackets/support a little bit. Because my seat is very much at the far end of its travel and I also want to be able to put the hood up easily for when we park the car



Here in the Netherlands we do not have to use face mask at all. Except on public transportation. So I have a very simple mask in my bike bag for when I take the train or the ferry.

But both France and Germany have far more face mask regulations than we, so my wife bought us some proper facemarks;



Just a little reminder, that this holiday is still going to be somewhat different than before. Just very grateful that we get to go at all! We will be making the most of it!!

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

We are still on summertime here. Which means sunset isn’t till 21.45. So plenty of time after dinner to wash the Spider.

I like to drive a clean car, inside and outside. I am particularly fussy with the windows. And I have yet to find a good way to get windows really clean, no streaks. I have been using any and all means over the year. Some work quite ok, but somehow overtime, anything I have used, sort of begins to let me down and I start looking for new tricks, new products to clean the windows.





The Spider is now officially ready for our tour next week. Really looking forward to it. As I explained we do this every year. But this year, given where we are with the Corona Crisis, makes it feel even more special. It will be our first trip away from home since mid January this year.

This time of the year can get very busy on European Motorways. Especially during the weekends going south. There is this phenomena called Black Saturday in France. A couple of weekends were all French take to the roads to head out to their holiday destinations. Every year monumental queues and problems on motorways. People will be stationary for hours, bedlam at petrol pumps, tempers fraying. This year Saturday 8th of August is such Black Saturday.

So we decided to head out early. We will meet in Maastricht around 08.30. Two of the other couples, Bart & Marian, Ales & Bianca will be there already. They need to come from up north and will have overnighted. Niek and us will hit the road at around 06.45am. We will meet and have a quick coffee and start heading South at 09.00am. Maastricht is in the most southern part of the Netherlands. Surrounded by Belgium on the west and Germany on the east. We will pass the Netherlands Belgium border less than 10 km south of Maastricht.

We are going pedal to metal for about 1,5 hours after which we leave the motorway and start driving the remaining 3-4 hours on nice little provincial and rural roads. See the map I shared earlier. We are unsure about eating arrangements along our road due to the Corona situation. Normally it is not a problem. In fact we always enjoy finding a nice little cafe or restaurant.

We have decided not to risk it and we are all taking picnic provisions.

My wife and I are particular looking forward to our trip home via Trier, Germany. Lovely little town. There used to be a very nice toy museum that had just about all my old toys on display. I must see if its still there.

Your cat Daisy will be looked after by a real cat nanny, Petra. Which is a great arrangement. Gives us piece of mind that somebody looks after our home and our 18 year old cat. She is in reasonable good health, but she does need some special attention. Only fair at that age. Petra is besotted by Daisy and I know I will be getting a steady streams of photographs and video’s of Daisy throughout our trip.



The one thing we will miss is seeing our brand new grand daughter Bella for a full week. She just turned 12 weeks and not a week has gone by that my wife will visit at least twice a week and every week my daughter and son in law come and visit us with Bella and stay with us for the night.

Well, just means more catching up when we get back!

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

Last night we came home after our trip to France / Germany in the Spider. We had a great, but very hot, time! Europe is suffering from a heatwaves with temperatures up around 35oC.

As usual we all met up near Maastricht. Early morning for us, we had to be there 08.30.



We went cross country from Maastricht all the way to Buxurulles. We all had brought picnic stuff, so as not to rely on Belgium cafe’s. We were not quite sure what the Covid situation would be.

The ladies felt it was to hot to tour during the day, so we started touring very early in the morning. Just as the sun was getting up and it was still fresh and cool.









We usually came back to our B&B around 10.30 and had breakfast straight away. Afterwards the ladies went to lounge at the pool side and some of the guys set off for some more driving.









The Saturday happened to be the 20th wedding birthday of Alex And Bianca. I was there when Alex proposed to Bianca about 21 years ago. We were out on a Spider tour and staying at the campsite of the Nurnburgring to visit the Classic Grand prix. That evening Alex, in front of the camp fire went onto his knees and proposed to Biance. The rest is history as they say.

So a little speech and some presents of course for the happy couple



Something very odd happened during the speech. Our Spiders were parked just behind us. Had been parked for hours. All of sudden Bart’s Green Series 4 started to roll backwards. Just like that, out of the blue, in the middle of his speech to Alex and Bianca. That got everybody’s attention as you can image.

The garden has a very light incline. Bart always leaves his Spider in gear. Somehow it must have popped out of gear at that very moment and decide to roll backwards. Crashing into a garden sofa. Not much damage done to the Spider, luckily, just a bit of a dent in the fuel tank. The sofa was a total loss.

When Bart wasn’t looking we decided to load up the sofa onto his Spider, so he could take it home. After all, he has to pay for it, so now it is his to keep





Lots of driving. As usual, we use a large scale map to figure out a route and program that in our TomToms. Me and Niek debating where to go next.



Although this is the 4th of maybe even the 5th time we visited this lovely B&Bs owned and run by our friends Cees and Annelies ( https://leparadis.nl/?lang=en ) We keep discovering new things to do and site to see.

This time, amongst other we found ourselves a proper car museum, just outside Nancy! http://www.musee-auto-lorraine.fr

Obviously, we had to go and see it:



Some very interesting cars. Nothing big, just a nice collection of interesting classic cars, all kept in running condition.

[Cessna182]

Thanks for a lovely glimpse into your world. The car rolling back is scary, hopefully the root cause will be found and fixed. Good to see the loaded sofa on a convertible.

[Jeroen]

On Wednesday morning rather than an early tour, we had an early breakfast. Everybody was leaving and we wanted to make the most of the early fresh morning.

My wife and I had decided to drive home via Germany. I had booked us in a nice little hotel in Trier, on the river Moezel. We had been here before, many years ago. Very nice area.

Touring this part of France makes you realise how vast a country it is.



Took us about 3 hours to reach Trier, with two coffee stops, including walking around a nice fortified village somewhere still in France

We checked into our hotel at Trier and went into this little charming town. I recalled from earlier visits a nice toy museum. Sure enough, it was still there.

They had several of these models. They are kits, you need to assemble them yourself, including spoking the wheel



Some very nice toy, tin boats















I am still a bit of a railroad buff. Always like looking at trains. These are three famous engines!



When I was a young boy, I was absolutely fascinated with NASA, astronauts, and us going to the moon. I had this exact model Gemini Cabin, with two astronauts in it



I also had nearly all of these Matchbox cars. The garbage truck was my favourite. Apparently, according to my mum, when I was a little boy I wanted to become a garbage man and drive a garbage truck. Used to follow them around all over our neighbourhood.



Now, this is an interesting toy. Have a good look, it is a zepplin connecting Europe and North America!



Of course, had to take an image of this one:



Mrs D fascinated by the dolls. My wife is an avid doll/Barbie collector, so it is always a bit dangerous taking her into these places as she might be starting to buy up the place!



After some more sightseeing we went back to our hotel. Had a little rest and walked back into town along the river. Had a nice meal, overlooking the river, nearby a huge ferry wheel.

Very pleasant day and evening





The next day we had breakfast at around 08.00 o’clock. By 08.45 the Spider was all packed up. We decided to more or less follow the river Moezel all the way into Cochem. Another very nice and pleasant little old German town.

We arrived around 11.00 and wandered around a bit.





We got back in the Spider around 12.00. Put the TomTom on home, faster route. The first 20 kilometers is still nice country side, after that it is motorway all the way home! Just over 330km to go. With one short coffee/snack stop we were home at 15.00. Very good time!

I have already taken the fly swatter off, no need for that anymore. Vacuumed the car. Washing will have to wait a few days.

All in all, again a very pleasant and interesting short European holiday. We drove almost 1950 kilometer, in just 6 days. Most of that on little rural roads.

The Spider performed flawlessly. Only used about 0,5 liter of oil. Which for these cars, this age, is no oil at all!

Today we are taking the Jaguar and we are visiting spider mate Peter and his wife Judith. Looking forward to it. We have tickets to go and see a nearby Steam Museum where they are demonstrating, live, the running of the steam engine.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Very nice trip; very nice report!

I don't understand the purpose of the fly swatter? What does achieve, being behind you both?

[Sutripta]

^^^
It swats your flying hair into place! (Jeroen doesn't really need it!)

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

I don't understand the purpose of the fly swatter? What does achieve, being behind you both?

When you drive these sports car top down at speeds over 70-80km/h it becomes very windy in the cockpit, very turbulent. The fly swatter calms that down.

There is a whole "fly swatter" industry out there:

https://www.justroadster.com/blogs/n...ind-deflectors

Or even better a real life test:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-jspJUKkUI

Personally, I find fly swatters are for sissies and wussies. Spanner mate Peter and I drove top down to the North Pole in the winter time at -27oC. No fly swatter!

My wife loves coming out in the Spider, but hates driving it on the motorways top down. So essentially my fly swatter is just another declaration of love. Even if my mates ridicule me. Peter, of course, being the worst. However, that has come to a stop as his wife made him put one on as well!

The four of us met yesterday. Peter and I have decided to go on a proper full week, no fly swatter Spider tour in Scotland next year spring. Hopefully this covid thing is behind us then.

Jeroen