25-09-2020, 11:57 AM
It’s great to see the comments and photos. Colin, I think your version of Tam’s son death are probably correct for a least two reasons that I’d rather discuss in a private message than a public platform such as this (assuming you’re interested!). With regard to the car being shinier, it did have a cosmetic rebuild/repaint ? In the 1970/80s when Mike Bills owned it. Mike Costigan has asked me to write about the car for the ‘grey magazine’ and I may cover some of the interesting social aspects of the car such as its owners and fellow competitors at Brooklands that underlines something I’ve said before, that it’s often the people who are as, if not more, interesting than the cars! In respect of the starting handle, yes, you don’t see many in situ on pressure fed engines but VE4492 has always had one. In fact, with the help of Vince Leek, it took me the best part of 10 years to build a replica engine also with one, that’s currently in the car, and aspects of that build were so difficult that his words ‘I’ll never do another one’ are still ringing in my ears!