BMCU Newsletter

A Chapter of the North American MGB Register
A Zone of the Vintage Triumph Register

Mt. Nebo Fall Colour Tour October 2
We'll once again renew the BMCU tradition of circumnavigating Mt. Nebo to enjoy the brisk air and fall color. This is a long (200 mile+) but very enjoyable tour and will treat your eyes and clean your exhaust valves.

Rendezvous at the R. C. Willey Clearance Outlet, 9010 S. Redwood Road, at 8:30am. Our route will take us south on Redwood Road (route 68) to Lehi, along the west shore of Utah Lake to Elberta, east on route 141 to Goshen, south through Goshen Canyon (a sports car treat), along the west shore of Mona Lake, to the Walker Bros. Phillips 66 /Wendy's truck stop at route 132 in Nephi, whence east and north on the Mt. Nebo Loop road, emerging via beautiful Santaquin Canyon.

Bring warm clothes and lunch, which we'll eat at a picnic area along the Loop. Logistics minimalists can pick up the latter at Walkers.

Organizer is Bill Walton, 969-8948. If you plan to join in along they way, e.g. in Lehi or Elberta, please let Bill know.

Miners Day Parade
September 6 in Park City
The 2003 Miners Day Parade provide an enjoyable day for all. Lets all turn out for another great day in Park City.

BMCU will again be represented in the Annual Park City Miners Day Parade September 6. Lineup will be around 10 AM in Swede Alley. This event is fast becoming one of the most enjoyable outings of the year for our club, with the traditional informal car show in the City Park, burgers, and drinks. Bring your coolers, picnic baskets, and chairs or just buy the burgers from the Rotary Club at the park. Just come. Contact Floyd Inman at (435) 645-8460 if you need more information. floydinman@earthlink.net

State Street Cruise and Dairy Queen Night Sept. 18
It's time to go Cruuuuzin down State Street on a Saturday evening. Bring back those memories of younger days by sauntering down State Street with us. This is a great in-town event that always seems to bring out a large crowd of British cars, so join us for an evening of cruising and talking.

We'll start out as usual in the parking lot behind the Capitol. Meet there at around 5:30 for a 6 PM departure. We'll leave the Capitol and head straight down State Street on through downtown and south to Sandy. Once we get to 90th South well head east up the hill to 1300 East and the Dairy Queen. There we can order food and snacks and gab for a while. This is a great time for the whole family so bring along as many as you can pack into your car. Well probably wrap things up by 8:30 or so for folks with other Saturday night plans.

Note: Lucas Calendar alert - change State Street Cruise from September 19 to September 18th!!! DQ isn't open on Sunday, so we have to move to our normal Saturday evening.

The Lucas Calendar
This calendar works about as well as its namesake, so use it with care. All events are subject to change. Check our web site for the latest information.
www.britishmotorclub.org
September 6: Miners Day Parade in Park City. Floyd Inman, (435) 645-8460.
September 13-17: Western States Jaguar Meeting, Park City. John Green, (801) 451-5776.
September 18: State Street Cruise Night. Mark Noeltner (801) 352-2743 and Joe Chou. (801) 619-1688. Note date change!
October 2: Fall Color Tour to Mount Nebo. Bill Walton (801) 969-8948. October 23: End of the Season Dinner. Gregg Smith.
November 13: Tech Session. High Performance Coating (HPC) for heat/durability. Mitch Johnson.
December: No event.
January 2005: Tech Session. Suggested topic is powder coating. Date and organizer needed.
February 12, 2005: Potluck and Annual Business Dinner.

Healey Days 2004 Held in Park City
Healey Days in Park City.
[From the August 2004 Bonneville Banter, the monthly newsletter of the Bonneville Austin-Healey Club]

This years Healey Days was held on July 31st and August 1st at the Radisson Inn at Park City, Utah. It was a great weekend that was highlighted by a Classic Sports Car Show on Saturday, an Awards Dinner Saturday night and a Scenic Tour Sunday morning. Sixteen cars, including Healeys and other British cars, participated in the events.

Healey Days has become a yearly tradition and is one of the highlights of the Bonneville Austin-Healey Clubs calendar. The Classic Sports Car Show is open to the public and attracted many spectators to see the handsome cars on display. Most of the cars represent months and, in many cases, years of hard work and considerable expense spent in the restoration of fine British cars that are no longer being manufactured.

The Saturday night Awards Banquet was held outdoors under the stars and was attended by over 30 people. In addition to a great meal, a special presidents gavel was awarded to President Jim Pearce by Jim Thornton and Jon Hanson to help him perform his duties and maintain order at club meetings.

The Sunday morning Car Tour went through Peoa, Wanship, Coalville, Echo, Hennefer, East Canyon and ended at the Sun and Moon Cafe in Emigration Canyon capping off a great Healey weekend.

We appreciate everyone who participated in and helped to make the 2004 Healey Days a great success. The club is grateful to the sponsors who contributed door prizes and merchandise to the event. Special thanks goes to Doug and Ann Lewis for their expertise and hard work to keep this great tradition alive in grand style.

Alpine Loop Run and Raffle Another Great Success!
Well gang, Saturday August 21 saw yet another fun and successful event. Yes, it was the club's much honored and anticipated Alpine Loop Run. Those of you who were in attendance I'm sure need no reminding of what a beautiful and enjoyable event it was, and for those of you who weren't in attendance I have this to say: You really missed out.

Those of us from destinations north met up as usual in the SouthTowne Mall parking lot. We were all blessed with the Queen's weather, despite some concern that it might rain. Some of us were further blessed with an unscheduled tour of the suburbs of Draper. (Note to self:When in these situations be sure to follow someone who knows where their going!). No harm was done however and we quickly got back on track, and as far as I know we all ultimately made it (Although we might have lost a few stragglers that I didn't notice, I guess that would just be the British car world's version of survival of the fittest).

The group headed up past Timpanogos and on to the Loop, which was of course breathtaking, and as always well worth taking out those much adored, but admittedly persnickedy British cars.

From there the group headed into the Heber Park, which was of course the location of our much anticipated raffle (We had lunch there too, this may have been more eagerly anticipated than the raffle for those of you who forgot to eat breakfast).

Ticket sales were brisk, and as usual the most entertaining part of the Raffle was the presentation by Rob Green, Mark Bradakis, and Gary Lindstrom. We had lots of great prizes to give away thanks to generous contributors. You'll all be pleased to know that we made lots of money that will help us in the coming months to bring you this newsletter. (Don't think that this excuses you from making further contributions though!)

This year contributors included: Ray Agutter; BBM Auto Restoration (Larry, Mary and Suzanne Bishop), Checker Auto in Kaysville, Eastwood, Sharon Forster, Wasatch Jaguar Registry, Griots Garage, Hemmings Motor News, High Performance Coatings, The Little British Car Co., Moss Motors (Bruce Shilling), The Oasis resort in Mesquite, NV, Kimberly Owens, Pep Boys in Sugar House, The Roadster Factory, TP Tools, Union Jac's, Victoria British, Doug Wimer, andXK's Unlimited.

If you skipped the previous paragraph please go back and read it. It is these generous contributors that help to make this event so great. So be generous in your support of all of our kind contributors. They were all very gracious in helping us to make this one of the most memorable, not to mention successful, Run's ever.

In attendance (and glad they came) were: Gary, Sandy and Margaux Lindstrom, Joe Chou, Larry Farrington, Todd and Connie Pixton, Mike and Sally Pennington, Clayton and Sharon Merchant, Brent Anderson, Floyd Inman, Bill and Julie Van Moorhem, John and Barbara Progess, Susan and John Hermance, Jeff Porter, Gregg Smith, Don and Julie McEligot, Kevin McCloskey, Kem and Pat Gleason, Rich Goodman, Nan and Rob Green, Neil and Susan McCasland, Leigh Mercer and Dan Kasha, Kendall and Connie Dewsnup, Dan and Sharon Forster, Mark Bradakis, Ray Agutter and Carol Sonntag, Mike and Becky Chambers, George and Sandy Wright, Grant Clayton and Gail Madsen-Clayton, Michael and Mary Scoggins, Rob Wiseman, Doug and Ilene Wimer, Mary and Larry Bishop, Mitch Johnson.

Autojumble
1970 MGB-GT , $450.00 or more as I fix things. Very complete unchanged car. Absolutely straight except for garage ding damage to the aluminum hood. Now has air where once there was rust in many of the usual non-structural areas which can be fixed with Moss repair panels. Near perfect rust free doors. Missing a fuel gauge. Brakes, suspension, wire wheels, hubs, motor and transmission mounts, cooling system, electrical, interior and paint all need reconditioning or replacement. Excellent sounding engine, serviceable exhaust system. jonathan_hermance@atk.com , residence 801-583-5846, 1437 East 900 South, SLC, UT.

TR3 , complete in pieces, must sell due to moving, $1,000. Call Jim, 571-0331.

'67 MGB-GT . Wire wheels, extra spare wheels, pre-Nader hard dash, needs body work but is restorable. All original parts present. $700 -- call Kim at 364-7848.

Buy a Jaguar, help save a marriage!!!
1986 XJ6 Series III $3,500 OBO
1993 XJ6 Sedan $4,800 OBO
1994 XJ12 Sedan $9,500 OBO
1990 XJS Convert $7,500 (Needs new top)
1997 XJS VDP 45,000 miles, beautiful wood and leather, rear damage, with parts needed for repair
1998 XJ8 front damage, with parts needed for repair
Many extra parts for above models are available.
Dave or Debi Hobson 801-224-9313.

Chinese Fire Drill During Heber Days Parade
If it could go wrong, it did at the Annual Heber Days Parade this last August 7. To begin, I must apologize to Doug Wimer for the parade starting time error in last months BMCYU Newsletter. We had the starting time listed at 6:00 PM when it was actually 5:00 PM. We did, however, have the requested line-up time correct at 4:30 PM.

Those in attendance: Floyd and Kathy Inman, Doug Wimer, Jon Hermance, Bob Jahnke, Mitch and Diane Johnson, Kendall and Connie Dewsnup, Troy and Sherri Graser, Larry Farrington, Gary, Sandy and Margaux Lindstrom.

As we lined up behind Dougs TC (back on the road after a complete restorationnot quite finished) the parade officials waved us into position. Only problem was that Doug was out looking for any late stragglersin particular our fearless leaders Gary, Sandy, and Marqoux Lindstrom. So, we headed into the parade without our Leader nor our Organizer.

It was a slow haul up Main Street behind a group of Junior High School Cheerleaders that had to stop every 100 yards to perform. As the cars heated up and the legs working the clutch became obvious, there was one driver whose patience and stamina finally got the best of herQueen Kathy and Hyacinth. So to solve her problems she just surged through the cheerleaders, the bands, and the horses and headed directly to our meeting spot for dinner. The rest of the group watched in both amazement and fear.

Doug Wimer and the Lindstroms finally arrived at Don Pedros and we all (well most of us) proceeded to enjoy the moment and the conversation.

All in all about 12 cars and their occupants got through the Parade without any breakdowns or collisions, so we can only hope a good time was had by all. Floyd Inman

Whitworth, Nuffield, BSF and British Association Fasteners Essentials for a Britmobile Owner of a Certain Age . . .
Gary Lindstrom and Bill Van Moorhem
(Continued from last month's newsletter)
Part 2: British Pipe Threads
The Brits, of course, used different dimensions and TPI for their pipe threads too. Pipe threaded fittings are not common on B-Cars but do occur, for example on the heater valve on Spridgets. For example, both the Brits and the U.S. have what is called 1/8 pipe. The British Standard 1/8 pipe has an outside diameter of 0.383 and has 28 TPI. In the U.S. 1/8 pipe is 0.4.05 in diameter and has 27 TPI. The same thing happens for 1/4 pipe, where the British standard is 0.518 and 19 TPI, while the U.S. standard is 0.540 and 18 TPI. Since pipe threads are tapered, the diameter at the beginning of the thread is less than at the end, a U.S. male thread will likely start into female British fitting, but since the TPI are different, the two will likely bind up before they seal. Everyone I know that has tried to mate U.S. and British pipe threads has generated a slow but consistent leak.

Part 3: BA Machine Screws
BA is short for British Association Form -- originally developed by the Swiss for very small watch and clock screws. BA sizes range from 0BA (larger) to 16BA (smaller), though 2, 4 and 6BA seem to be all that appear in British cars. Beware: the diameters and thread counts are deviously close to common sizes, e.g. a 2BA has the diameter extremely close to that of a #10 machine screw, but -- believe it or not -- a thread count of 31.4 TPI rather than 32! The result is that some BA screws are almost, but not quite, interchangeable with screws obtained from your local hardware store.

BA screws are used in instruments (e.g., Smith and Jaeger), on carb throttle and enrichment stops, and certain body trim parts.

Part 4: Lord Nuffield's Mad Metric Form
Now the plot really thickens. There is no official name for this thread form, which appears on Mowog (Morris Wolseley Garages, e.g., MG) engines and gearboxes. The story goes that MG engines and gearboxes were made in a factory originally set up by Hotchkiss, a French munitions company. The tooling was all metric, but the workers all had Whitworth wrenches. The result was international detente in the form of metric threads on bolts with Whitworth heads. Fortunately, only one thread size really matters to us: 8 x 1 mm -- which, being a French size, is different from the more common 8 x 1.25 mm size. There seems to be no rational scheme for wrench sizes here, but 3/16 BSW and 1/4 BSW seem to cover all the bases.

Part 5: Recommended tools
The following table is our recommendation for the Whitworth sizes that are needed by a 1950's and earlier British car owner:

3/16 WW, also known as 1/4 BSF, 1/4 WW (5/16 BSF), 5/16 WW (3/8 BSF), 3/8 WW (7/16 BSF), 7/16 WW (1/2 BSF), 1/2 WW (9/16 BSF)

For taps and dies, the most useful are 1/4 x 26 BSF and 5/16 x 22 BSF, plus 6BA, 4BA, and 2BA, as well as 8 x 1 mm.

Two other items that are extremely handy are screwdrivers: a hollow ground "gun smith" screwdriver for turning those fiendishly narrow and shallow slots on Lucas terminals, and a Reed Prince screw driver -- akin to a Phillips, but less pointy -- fitting those cross headed screws with radial marks between the cross arms, and where the normal Phillips screwdriver always slips.

Part 6: Resources
To read up on this "fastenating" story, try the following references:

2) "The #%@! Wrench Won't Fit!," by "wkv", BMCU Newsletter, June 1990, pp. 3-4, and

3) "Whitworth Sockets & Wrenches", on the British Tool Company website, www.britishtool.com .

Suppliers of British tools and fasteners include:
1) Moss Motors and Abingdon Spares -- well known to MG owners

And oh yes, British tools do show up from time to time on Ebay! Just stay away from those BSW taps and dies.

Jaguar Meeting September 13-17
Every two years the Jaguar Clubs of North America holds a national meeting called the Championship Challenge. In the other years, a Western States gathering is held. This year the Wasatch Mountain Jaguar Register is hosting the event at the Yarrow Hotel in Park City.

If youre a Jaguar owner you probably know of the event, and are participating. For other lovers of British cars, there are spectator events, including a slalom at Deer Valley on Wed. Sept. 15, and a concours at the Homestead on Thu. Sept. 16. For more information, contact John Green at 801-451-5776.

This Newsletter is published by the British Motor Club of Utah, Ltd., a non-profit corporation of British automobile owners. The group holds monthly events such as drives, picnics, technical sessions, and more. We welcome owners (or potential owners) of British cars, in any condition, to the group. Membership is free, but we ask for a donation at events to support the Newsletter and other activities. If you would like to join the group, send your name, address, and a list of British cars owned to:
Bruce Schilling
917 East Mill Creek Way
Salt Lake City, Utah 84106
or to Bruces email address shown above.

Beginning balance			$1,793.47
Income:
	Refunds	$ 260.00
	Advertising	$ 40.00
	Interest income	$ .62
		------------
		$ 300.62
Expenses
	Printing & Mailing	$ 274.00
		------------
		$ 274.00
			------------
Ending balance			$1,820.09

In kind support of the BMCU by ZenZoey's Copy Shop (487-9915) is gratefully acknowledged.

Finally, Grille Badges!
In response to many requests, BMCU grille badges will be available once again. The new generation will be full color enamel, with two holes at the bottom to secure to badge bars in the classic style.

At first we thought $35 would be required, but we have found a nice quality supplier at $25 each.

The order will go in on September 15. If you want one, please (1) email Mitch Johnson stating how many you want, and (2) mail him a check payable to BMCU for $25 each. Mitchs address is 316 W Mutton Hollow Rd, Kaysville, UT 84037. You can also phone him at 801-547-1087, but be aware that he will be on vacation and unavailable Sept. 512.

BMCU Newsletter - SEPTEMBER 2004 Volume 16 Number 12

BMCU Newsletter - SEPTEMBER 2004
Volume 16 Number 12