RACV Rally

Each January, the RACV holds a rally from Melbourne to Mornington (the Mornington Penninsula makes up the eastern side of Port Philip Bay, south of Melbourne). There are four starting points around the city, and hundreds of diverse classics travel together to all meet at the marina at Hastings (on the western side of the penninsula) before traversing the narrow and winding roads to the eastern side. They then travel along the beach road to Mornington, gathering for a display at the racecourse.

There were suprisingly few other Daimlers on the rally this year, but we did see this gorgeous 1930s Light Twenty.

Dressing to match your car is the order of the day, so Kathy and I and our friends Alison and Steve did our best to look late 60s. Kathy and Alison (who had very big hair - must have been industrial-strength hairspray!) did a lot of Twiggy-and-Shrimp-style lunging and posing. And while it's not a Daimler, Kathy does coordinate nicely with the blue 60s Fairlaine.

The weather was a bit wild, so our picnic ended up being eaten in the car - who needs picnic tables when you have the glovebox lid to balance your bubbly on?

We parked next to a close cousin - a Jaguar 240 which had evidently had no expense spared in its restoration. Plenty of people were walking past playing 'spot the difference'.

A fine day out was had by all, and Dame Zara enjoyed the run - despite carrying four passengers and a boot full of chicken and champagne, stop-start traffic as we headed from Melbourne to Frankston, and then some quite hilly going in the drive from Hastings to Mornington, we used just on half a tank on the 120 miles or so: close to 20mpg.

On the straight and narrow

Now, that has to be one of the easiest jobs I've done so far! Four screws and I now have a shiny black steering wheel centre instead of the motley-brown, sun-damaged one.

Before:















After:















The replacement came courtesy of eBay, from a 1966 Jag Mk10 being parted out in the US, and thanks to the slow period between Christmas and new year, it cost me less than a quarter of the price the parts places want for a repro.

The leather steering wheel cover, by the way, is from Wheelskins, and I heartily recommend them. For thin, sometimes slippery steering wheels, they add a nice amount of grip and some softness. I've actually bought four of them now: one for Kathy's previous car, Gussie the Hillman; one for her current car, Beryl the '75 Galant coupe; one for Dame Zara; and one for my dad for his '66 S-Type Jag 3.8.

I get them from this eBay seller in the US, who is very quick in supplying custom orders (Wheelskins doesn't have a retail distributor in Australia).

Sharp eyes might note the flouro orange markers on the tacho - they match the cruising speed of the car at important speed limits: 50, 60, 80, 100 and 110 km/h. The speedo is none too accurate at the best of times, and at the moment the needle is wobbling around like no-one's business!

The clock, which I used to be very proud to report worked - a rarity among Smiths clocks in cars - stopped for no apparent reason sometime before Christmas, but started up again the other day (for equally mysterious reasons) and is now keeping perfect time. I'll leave it well alone!