Noel, thank you so much. I phoned around friends as soon as I read your post and I now have my own copy of The Modern Motor Engineer. The car is ex-William Balfour of Kelso in the Scottish Borders. It is in pretty good shape though not without problems. The doors have dropped slightly which means they need to be closed very carefully to avoid them coming open. That is the next problem to be addressed. The carburettor has caused a few difficulties as the needle valve leaks and the banjo bolt thread was stripped. I have helicoiled the thread and a new needle and seating is on the way.
Longest journey so far has been a couple of hundred miles each way, almost all done on back roads. Anyone who knows the Gloucester area will know Stanway and Sudeley Hills. It coped well with those though down to second when balked on Sudeley. The road was single track and the horse riders had been joined by a cycle time trial, so progress for a few miles was intermittent. Our first impressions are that it is as good as expected. It joins two Morgan three wheelers and a chaingang Frazer Nash so you can tell we are not at all accustomed to Lancia levels of sophistication. It is nice to have an old car that does not leave you after a run looking like a stoker on a steam train.
Plenty of learning to do and, who knows, perhaps after enough study and subsequent work, we will have a petrol gauge that does not read four gallons regardless.
Stuart Tallack pp Andrew Tallack
