Less of a Hustle

 I have been complaining about Barry feeling a bit loose recently, wondering if it was the new rear tyres or dodgy brakes - and it then got suggested that wheel alignment was the problem. I had the alignment done 2 years ago and I thought that should last years but no, it seems some people do it every year!

So I went to Kwik-Fit, who offer a free alignment check and then just £130 to do the adjustment. The guy did the check and said it was out BUT he couldn't do the alignment because some of the bolts were seized. I called 911Excellence and they said new toe-arms (the most likely seized bit) and an alignment would cost me £750 - ouch! I considered asking Cearth to use his garage and do it myself but reading up, it's a real PITA job - I decided to bite the bullet and pay the man.

Car booked in and 1 hour after dropping it off, they called to say they had managed to get the bolts off, so no need for new toe-arms - brilliant! So the geo just cost me £300 (including new bolts). Expensive but less than I was expecting, so a result.

Today, I went up to Wimbledon for the monthly Southside Hustle, a car meet on the residential roads of Wimbledon Village. It was very busy with some interesting stuff:

The Corvette was refusing to start, hence the bonnet up  - typical classic car behaviour 😀

I went for a blat to see if the alignment had made any improvement - difficult to tell with the torrential rain and huge puddles everywhere but it's definitely better, although not sure if it's as good as I remember it. I'll have to check another time...

Trains, at last

 So after my failure a couple of months ago to go to a model railway exhibition, another chance arose this weekend.

First though, I met some of the Porkers at the Chalet for breakfast - finally got 5 of them to come out, although only one other in a Boxster. That was Chris, who has also decided to come on our Euro trip in June - he's bought his Tunnel ticket, so reasonably committed. Also, Dave (who I thought had sold his Boxster but hasn't) also expressed an interest for him and his son (who also has a Boxster). I've sent him the details...

We had a nice chat over a big breakfast - it was great to catch up.

I then had a 40 minute drive down to Bognor Regis for a quaint and surprisingly busy model railway exhibition. I'm hoping to retire early in a couple of years (probably won't happen but I can dream) and I need hobbies and I've always wanted to build a model railway - I'm not that bothered by trains, I just like the building, especially the small details, like this:

The main decision for a layout is what gauge to use. The 2 most common are OO and N gauge, N being much smaller and less common. However, I really liked the N gauge displayed at this exhibition - you can fit much more in the same space:

An enjoyable 90 minutes...

I drove home via the Goodwood cafe which has a weird pricing policy; sandwiches are £10 but 2 scones, cream and jam is £4.50 - no brainer for me. Weather wasn't great but that does keep people off the roads:

A nice thrash back via my favourite back route rounded off an enjoyable day.

New Year, New Caff

 Happy New Year to my 100s of fans 😊

New Year's Day is, surprisingly, a big car meet day - major events at Brooklands Museum and a few other well known places. However, I can't ever book these because I normally have a late night on NYE, so I'm not getting up in time for a 9am meet.

However, there is a new cafe that opened up a few weeks ago and it looks promising for future meets, so after getting in at 3am and sleeping until 10am, we thought it would be a good excuse to go there for lunch.

The place is called Fuel Road House and is just down the road from Torque Moto cafe, my normal go-to place. This place is much bigger inside, although it was very quiet on NY day, understandbly but I think it will get pretty popular:

On the weekend, my son and I went to a meet at Leatherhead golf club - a lovely sunny day but it was -4 degC when we set out and it took a while to drag itself up to just over freezing! Bitter but not too bad in the sun and some great cars on show:

Stupendous Aston - no idea what model but so gorgeous:

A Ferrari 812 GTS - very expensive:

This guy obviously does not have plastic gear wheels in his roof mechanism:

Being such a nice day, we thought we'd pop over to the new Fuel Road House cafe again, to see if it was any busier and it was:

Obviously, Barry was the best car there:

...but he is very dirty. I really should give him a wash but in this cold weather, I worry about the water getting somewhere and freezing, causing some damage. My son washed his car the day before and he couldn't close his passenger door in the morning - he had to get a hair dryer to unfreeze the lock! That's my excuse for not washing, anyway...