Tonbridge Classic Music and Motors 23rd June 2019 Report
Well temperatures are up but the weather was all over the place. This weekend saw a Met Office severe weather warning for 30 mm of rainfall and lightning storms. Only for weather pundits to cancel any severe weather warning on Saturday night and replace them with good forecasts for the show on Sunday. Myself, Tony Twyman and Craig Archer met up for a bacon roll and coffee on the M2 services. Craig, not having time to prep his Duetto Spider for display due to other commitments, assisted with the gazebo, which always needs several magical incantations to assist it into my boot.
Consequently, due to the original forecast only three of our club displayed their vehicles. Myself in the MiTo, John Dray in the 4c and Tony Twyman in the GTV. That said we were visited on the club stand by Nick Koleszar and Charlie Johnson as well as a new member Terry Grimwood who owns a series 3 Spider. Terry (on the right of the picture below) sadly could not display the S3 as it had broken down.
Some of you will remember that Terry Grimwood was the editor of the “Cars and Car Conversions” Magazine that ran for 40 years until its untimely closure in October 2003 and is quoted by many as their reason for getting into motorsport in the first place. Some blamed the closure of the sudden appearance of the internet and others blamed it on IPC media using the excuse that, “nobody messes with their cars anymore.” Either way Nick Koleszar rated the magazine as without doubt the best car magazine ever! Back issues of the magazine are still being sold on e-bay for £6. Not bad considering that the March 1983 edition below sold for 70p….. And yes I did sell Terry a badge and windscreen sticker despite being warned of the consequences of a conversation with me by Tony Twyman. Interesting chap and I hope we will see a lot more of Terry!
I wonder if Terry remembers Terry Kaby winning the Car and Car Conversions Championship back in the day?
Nick is sorting out his 147 and couldn’t display it as it’s due for an Italian tuning session or in other words a good fast drive down the motorway at reasonably high revs to make the vehicle run smoothly again. Charlie expects to be buying another Alfa by the end of the year. I, admittedly, did “purloin” Charlie’s Facebook photo as Charlie and Nick are a hoot!
Like with the majority of the Chris West shows, Tonbridge was no different with some funky sounds by a period rock band who did a splendid version of The Boom Town Rats classic, “ I Don’t Like Mondays,” to a reggae beat and an ABBA cover band that really thrashed through all the ABBA favourites.
Wandering round one of the other stands I came across an Alfa Zoe yellow spider that caught my eye and I had a bit of a conversation with the owner Ian Unsworth, who I am sure will be joining in with AROCKES activities very shortly having been supplied with a membership application form. The solar powered rotating model spider on the dash I thought was a nice touch as well.
There were other non-Alfa cars on display and quite a few took my eye during a wander round and one that caught my interest was an Austin Martin Lagonda.
A Mercedes 190 SL.
A Frog Eye Sprite.
And something that we could not work out whether it was a kit car with Jaguar running gear or an actual production model?
Last but not least was the constantly improving and very valuable P1800S owned and maintained by Laurie Harrison. It does in fact have a two litre engine but I think Volvo ran out of badges and it is a genuine quirk of this particular vehicle.
The carburettors have recently undergone a complete re-build and the engine bay is really starting to look pretty spectacular as well.
Car shows are coming in thick and fast as the summer heats up and the weekend of the 30th of June brings National Alfa Day at Bicester Heritage or Wrotham Classic Steam and Transport Rally, depending on how far you want to travel as well as the really strange weather we have been having lately.
Wherever you end up, TTFN till next time, Ciao!
