May 16, 2012

In a country were the average rainfall nears 100 inches per year, you would think that they could make an automobile that doesn’t leak when it rains.  Granted, parts of the UK are quite dry, the low end regional average being about 18-20 inches of rain per year, but the upper limit regions being nearer to 190 inches.  That’s quite a difference; so you would think Enever, Thornley and Kimber would have sought to fit a proper fitting hood/top and appropriate weather seals.

Not the case, but I guess they did their best with 1940s technology, even though it was the late 1950s and early 1960s when they built and designed the damn things. 

Have you ever looked at all of the parts that have to come together to make an MGB hood?  It boggles the mind to think that a similar top, say on a Miata, has fewer bits, goes up and down at the flick of your wrist, doesn’t need to be partially disassembled to put down, and most of all doesn’t leak.  A friend has a Volvo C70 with the old style cloth top.  He only has to make sure that the handbrake is set before he pushes one dash button to watch the top go down automatically.  Best yet, it stores itself in a hard tonneau behind the rear seat.  Amazing!

I am convinced that continuous improvement can find a resolution to these issues, and as such I am off to find them.  It is one of the things that make owning one of the flying anachronisms all the more fun.  Just when one thinks it’s got you beat; man once again triumphs over technology,. Even if it is 50 year old technology!

SF