Life in the Locost world
has been pretty good in recent days, with clear skies, sunny weather, fun drives, and no breakdowns.
The new Mustang wheels and Dunlop tires continue to impress us with their incredible response, ride,
and handling. Little to complain about other than the heat, which doesn't seem to bother the Locost
and its re-engineered cooling system. The car starts every time, idles smoothly, and runs like a
tank. A nimble, lightweight, breezy tank. No squeaks, no rattles, no parts falling off at speed.
Replacement alternator still alternating flawlessly
This recent spate of semi-reliability has us contemplating all of the repairs and upgrades we've
made since completing the car three almost four years and 40,000 miles ago, and more importantly, how well they've
fared. So we wrote them all down, or as many as we could remember, and we were shocked by how many
are still working. Yes, it's been less than four years and most automotive parts are expected
to last at least that long, but that's only on real production cars. The Locost is special. Most of
its parts are still in test mode.
Some of the repairs to the Locost had to be made right away, like when the water pump went out, or
when a spring broke in the distributor. Most of the time we put up with a lot of grief before we got
around to fixing anything. The fuel pump started going out at least three months before we replaced
it, and we had to bang on it a lot in the interim. Our old alternator was flaky for at least a year
before it died. We busted our knuckles on the dash a dozen times until we installed a bent shift
lever, and we don't even want to think about how many times we had to shift without a clutch.
Parts under the scuttle pretty much unreachable
Some of the repairs were easy. Unfortunately this was rare. Most took a lot longer than expected,
usually during the disassembly phase. It's not like we didn't give any thought to taking things apart
when we built the car, but we didn't give it a lot of thought, and parts that looked easy to remove
when we first installed them turned out to be less so after more parts were added. An exhaust hanger,
for example, with just two bolts would've been child's play to remove if you didn't have to first
remove the seats, seat belts, and interior panels to get a wrench on the bolts.
But we always persevered, and were generally confident that most of the repairs wouldn't last.
A few surprised us though, like a drop of superglue on the rear-view mirror stem, and the makeshift
spring on the distributor vacuum unit. Both were guesswork, and both continue to amaze. Also the
speedometer, fixed with parts from a ball-point pen, definitely not a sure thing. We still expect our
JB-welded intake manifold plug to fly out someday, and any time the coolant gauge starts to climb
we're sure the new water pump has thrown an impeller blade.
New water pump good for another 40 years
Some of the new parts failed immediately, or at least as fast as they could. Our early exhaust
hanger for example, clearly a mistake. The genuine Lucas lenses on our back-up lights cracked right
after we screwed them on, and had to be replaced with cheap aftermarket lenses. Rubber pedal pads
split and broke off quickly, sometimes during installation. Our first intake manifold plug blew out
in a week, and our eBay steering wheel hub separated from the splines in just a few days. We replaced
it with a Tourist Trophy hub from England, which lets us steer the car but not honk the horn.
We did make a lot of purchases on eBay, and we regret most of them. The engine mounts, for example.
One black, one gray, both sagging and in need of replacement. Many so-called 'Triumph' suspension
bushings with 10 mm tubes, since discarded. A 'refurbished' stub axle with fresh black paint sprayed
over dried grease and heavy rust, now on the Locost after hours of wire brushing. Add to that one
leaky radiator, two cracked hoses, a bent license plate bracket, a misrepresented valve cover, and a
frozen handbrake cable, now trash. And let's not forget about all the tachs.
eBay parts mostly expensive trash
But let's look at what has worked. In alphabetical order, we've fixed, fabbed, or replaced the
alternator, bonnet, bonnet latches, boot cover, carburetors, carpets, clutch, cockpit cover, cooling
fan, distributor, exhaust hanger, exhaust valves, fan belt, fan switch, fuel pump, fuel filler,
handbrake cable, header tank, intake manifold plug, mirrors, oil cooler hoses, racing stripe, seat
belts, shift knob, shift lever, spare tire mount, speedometer, steering wheel, suspension rod ends,
tachometer, temperature sender, throttle cable, tires, valve seals, water pump, and wheels.
Quite a list. You wouldn't fix that many things on a real car, not and want to keep it. The good
news is, all of these things are working now, with nothing we fixed or replaced showing any sign of
imminent failure. Eventual failure, sure, but nothing in the next week or two. Most likely. Some of
the fixes were simple replacements, like the throttle cable, the cooling fan, and the alternator,
while others, like the header tank, rod ends, carpets, boot cover, and racing stripe were upgrades,
improving the car forever. Based as always on our own definition of improved. And forever.
Full carpeting just like real cars
So we've made some progress over the years, and more than just improving the car's reliability, we've
improved the whole motoring experience. We didn't realize it before, but driving a car that keeps up
with traffic, remains relatively quiet, responds well to the controls, and doesn't blow billowing clouds
of black smoke every time you hit the gas gives you the impression of driving a real car. A
false impression, no doubt, but still, the power of the refurbished engine, the smoothness of
the new tires, and the car's overall reliability is pretty awesome.
Despite our recent successes, we have no doubt that the coming months and years will feature more
repairs and upgrades, which might be a good thing if for no other reason than it'll give us more to
complain about, possibly extending in perpetuity this incredibly lengthy and convoluted build log,
which is slowly turning into the Internet equivalent of the Winchester Mystery House, with its dozens
of useless essays, countless mismatched styles, unflattering decorations, and long-winded discussions
that seem to be going somewhere until they dead end at a blank wall.