0 The British Invasion returns

Once again it's time to head for Vermont, for the British Invasion

Here's a preview of a few of the cars we are bringing:

Please join me on the show field, and meet the crew from Robison Service.  We will have cars in Land Rover, Jaguar, Rolls Royce, Bentley and Triumph classes.

Detail: The British Invasion returns

0 Two days at the British Invasion, 2009

This article also appears in print, in the Rover News
Words and pictures (c) 2009 John Elder Robison



It’s that time of year again. Last weekend, I left my Massachusetts home for a trip to the wilds of Northern Vermont, all in the name of British Motoring. I’m a diehard Land Rover lover, but the 2.5 diesel Defender is too slow for a five-hundred-mile road trip and the Range Rover was out of town. And this year I wanted plush. So I climbed into the Big Red Bentley and headed north. I moved out onto I-91 and muscled my way past pugnacious thugs in Escalades and granola-powered Prius drivers. My speed climbed as I approached the border. I tried to hold it back, but there's only so much one can do.

The car had a nasty shake at 85, but it smoothed out nicely over 110. Most cars struggle to attain those speeds but this brute takes them in stride. At the century mark the engine is just above fast idle, at 1,900 rpm. You’ve got six inches of travel remaining in the gas pedal, and 2,500 rpm to go on the tach. There’s a certain magic to five hundred horsepower. I wish Land Rover had a product like this. Perhaps one day I will stuff a Turbo R engine into a 110 County to create one.

We ate up the road all the way to White River, where I took a left onto 89 North. My Beast coasted down as the exit approached, rolling past the Exit 30MPH sign at a smooth 75. I hit the bend and slewed my way around, exiting onto 89 with a subtle trail of smoke. A tip of the throttle and I was back to speed for the final run in to Stowe.

I reached my hotel only to find it was Under New Management, a euphemism for, "I'm sorry sir, your room reservation has vanished." Grabbing the hapless clerk by the throat, he regurgitated the key to 124, the room I have occupied for years, which to his great good fortune was as yet empty. I wandered down the hall, where a wedding dinner was in progress. I shared some fine wine and cheese before being found out and evicted. Afterward, suitably fortified, I cruised down the hill into Stowe.

By the time I arrived the block party was in full swing. I made sure my car was well hidden out behind the hotel before walking over the covered bridge to town. A Beatles tribute band was playing, and an intoxicated female dragged me into a dance as I passed. I tried to extricate myself as two drunken revelers snapped pictures. I was saved by the arrival of a freak in a Chicken Costume, singing at the top of his lungs while swinging a golf club to clear a path to the bar.

A short while later I was joined by my friend Dave Rifken with his 1997 Defender 90



Dave and I headed to the Blue Moon Grille, where we were seated and fed immediately, thanks to the economic collapse. In better days they’d have taken a reservation for next weekend, if they fed specimens like us at all. I ate grilled scallops as Dave texted his kid, who was lost somewhere on the highways of rural Vermont.

I remember being lost like that myself, years ago. In my case, it was a result of eating mushrooms. I don’t know what Dave’s kid’s excuse was. Thirty some years ago I found myself hungry and deranged in Rock Island, Quebec, where the border crossing had apparently closed for the night. When I chose the self-service option and took the old 88 through I was rounded up and detained by bad tempered Customs Agents for almost eight hours. By the time I got loose, the mushrooms had worn off and my money was gone. All in all, that was one bad trip.

Our reverie was interrupted by flashing lights and sirens. We saw Police outside the restaurant, and we slouched low in our seats. We didn’t think we’d done anything arrestable in Stowe but you never know . . . Sometimes the Natives get greedy, and invent laws to extract revenue from sweet innocents like us. My mind went back to the Shamokins of rural Pennsylvania, who rolled boulders into the highway so they could stop motorists and rob them. At times like that I regret leaving my preacher outfit home.

Fortunately, the cops were merely clearing the riffraff from around the stage. No one was after us. When we emerged from the Blue Moon, we refrained from song, and our refined and upright appearance made us seem the farthest thing from rabble. We passed unmolested. As the shouting subsided to the snick of handcuffs we slipped back up the hill. Our rigs were safe, surrounded by British cars in all the important colors: red, white, black and most of all, green.

We awakened to a crisp, cool Vermont morning. The fires from the previous night’s bacchanalian debauchery had burnt themselves out, but the smoky smell lingered in the air. It was a pleasant odor for anyone whose house or car had escaped destruction, and I was pleased to be part of that group. We cranked up the Rover and the Bentley, and headed for the Invasion.




We arrived at the show field early, but the scene was already mobbed. Hundreds, thousands, maybe tens of thousands swarmed through the gates on Weeks Hill Road in Stowe. We parked our machines among others of their own kind, and set out to wander the field.



Within minutes, three Guardsmen showed up in a Series III Air Portable, parked near Dave, and emplaced a heavy machine gun to survey the field. I ducked and passed as they shot off a test burst or two. Everyone was well behaved after they arrived. I was lucky to pass when I did, because I heard they began collecting tolls from passerby but I didn’t pay a cent.



Their actions reminded me of some City Parking Lot Attendants who worked a lot down the street from me when I worked at Pink Floyd's sound company in Long Island City back in the nineteen-seventies. After watching them all one summer, I was surprised to arrive at work one day to find them gone, and the lot chained up. It turned out they had not been City Employees at all. Instead, they were Enterprising Lowlifes with Bolt Cutters who had seen an opportunity and seized it. I wondered if the same thing might be occurring today, but I declined to mount a challenge.

Land Rover was well represented at the show. In fact, one 1959 Series truck actually won the concours, something I have never seen accomplished with a Land Rover. I don’t know if the judges were drunk, bribed, or what, but there was some heavy competition out there and they putted away with a trophy. What a sight – an old Series truck sandwiched between a massive Rolls Royce limousine and a dainty Morgan roadster in the winner’s parade.

The Guardsmen also won an award for the tailgate picnic, but it’s not clear if they earned it or merely menaced the show’s managers with their weapons. Either way, though, they exited as winners. And I don’t want to give a false impression – they were not thugs. Far from it; they were clean and very well behaved and their heavy machine gun certainly had a calming influence on every rowdy who exited the beer tent. Robert Heinlein said it very well: An armed society is a polite society.

There was a good field of Land Rover entries, starting with some Series trucks from the late fifties all the way to the current Range Rover Sports. Series trucks made up the biggest contingent but the P38’s made a good showing this year too.

You find many kinds of car enthusiasts at the Invasion, but the ones I love the best are the Rover owners. One of them lounged behind her rig,



while another handed me a beer



after opening it on his back bumper. Two Canadian females at the next Rover fed me kiwi fruit while extolling the virtues of cross breeding strawberries.



All the while, the sound system played vintage tunes from the Kinks, Pink Floyd, and Jimmy Buffet.

Who wouldn’t identify with that?

With 650 British vehicles on the show field, there were some noteworthy non-Rover entries. For example, some deviant with a welder had shoehorned a blown Hemi into a yellow MINI Cooper. The idea seems shocking at first, but upon reflection, you realize that’s exactly what every MINI dreams of turning into, when it grows up.



I saw a genuine Elva, yellow with a red stripe, parked near a fine red TVR. Out behind the cars, revelers sat, drank, and told stories, and I stumbled and bobbed my way through their midst. At one point, I encountered a six-hundred-horsepower supercharged Aston Martin, an authentic Morris Moke, and two Norton Commando motorcycles.

I left as the bikers were fighting over tent poles for the Motorbike Joust. I did not get to see how it turned out, but I’m sure the details appeared in the town Police Log.

We dined at the Olde English Pub, where I had Bangers and Mash followed by a Spotted Dick washed down with tea. All in all, a respectable British feed. Alex had a problem with the concept of Spotted Dick, but I introduced him to Patrick O’Brien’s excellent writing, including his cook book which includes the Dick, and he calmed.

The next morning dawned colder and clearer than the one before. Tops on the day’s agenda was the backseat driving contest. In that competition the driver is blindfolded, and the navigator guides him over a complex route from the backseat. When someone told me the course started on the show field and ended at the Lake Champlain Ferry I decided to get out while I still could.

Until next time . . .

Detail: Two days at the British Invasion, 2009

0 Summertime means cruise nights

You know it's summer when the Monday night cruise nights begin. Yesterday Cubby said, "Let's head over to Atkins," and we did. Here are a few of the cars . . .

Detail: Summertime means cruise nights

0 The Amherst High School Car Club Visits John Robison's House

This afternoon, I invited the car club from Amherst High School to my house. Last winter, one of the kids had read Look Me in the Eye, and he'd asked to come see the cars. Today, he bought some of his friends. These 10th graders told their story in words and pictures, and I thought I'd just turn their email into a blog post on this fine Tuesday evening.

My son Jack was on hand to help pull cars around, and he took the car club members for rides around South Amherst. We pulled the Corniche convertible out for the first time since last fall, and he even took a carload to the gas station. This is their story:

Arriving at John's House



Stefan looks great in the Mercedes 560SL


Isaac and Noam in the Jaguar XJS


Checking out the ex-British Army Land Rover Defender



Noah's favorite



Who wants to ride the Harley?


Checking out the Bentley Turbo R


Filling up the Rolls Royce


Jack was our chauffeur



Cruising in the Rolls



And then there were cookies


Thanks, John!

Detail: The Amherst High School Car Club Visits John Robison's House

0 Getting our cars ready for spring

Getting cars ready for spring

Rolls Royce Bentley service

Jaguar service

Land Rover service

Antique car service

This is the time of year when fancy cars are coming out of storage all over New England. When the cars emerge, folks bring them to our shop with the request to “service them as necessary.” When these cars were new, it was easy to know what to do. We’d follow the guidelines in the factory service booklets. However, now that the cars are aging, a different plan is needed. This is an excerpt from a longer 3,200 word piece I wrote for the Rolls Royce magazine where I set forth my ideas on what should be done, when, and why.

You'll be able to read the whole article next month when the magazine comes out.



Here’s where we start - the basic service. Depending on what kind of car you have and what's wrong with it when we check it over, this can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days.

We begin by changing engine oil and filter. At Robison Service, we use genuine Crewe filters and Mobil Delvac oils. Delvac is meant for use in diesel trucks, so it has a durable and strong detergent package to keep our vintage engines clean. It’s available in synthetic and non-synthetic formulas to suit either taste. Similar oils are available from Shell, Castrol, Quaker State, Amsoil, and others.

While the oil is draining, we inspect the undercarriage for damage, leaks, broken pieces hanging down – anything out of place. You’d be surprised what we mechanics find. A fellow in Florida sent me a photo of a live coral snake he found nestled in a rear spring last year. Don’t reach where you can’t see.

Using a squirt can, we oil the moving parts on the parking brake system, and we tighten the calipers a few clicks. It’s important to keep this system oiled so it doesn’t freeze up. Many states require the Motor Vehicle safety inspector to apply the parking brake and then put the car in drive to make sure it holds. If your cables and calipers are not oiled and free they may not work at all. Even worse, they may work but not release, leaving you to crawl under the car and pull the mechanism free by hand in the yard of the inspection station. That may be a fine thing to do with a $200 clunker but it’s an extreme embarrassment to a proper Rolls Royce driver.

We look at the belts and hoses. Belts are checked for proper adjustment and cracking on the inner faces. Hoses are checked for swelling and flaring at the ends – two signs of deterioration. We check the air filter and oil any moving parts under the hood. That includes the hood latches, the throttle linkage, and the hood hinges.

At least once a year, we remove all four wheels. While they are off we clean corrosion from the hubs and apply a bit of grease. We also lubricate the wheel locks if the car has them, and we rotate tires if appropriate. People who skip this step sometimes find their wheels frozen onto the car by corrosion – a terrible problem if you have a flat tire on a Saturday night.



When you look at the tires you can judge the need for wheel alignment. Some people put the car on an alignment rack as a matter of course, but collector cars are often driven so little and so gently that scheduled alignments end up being a waste of time and money. When alignment problems do appear they are most often the result of wear or breakage in the suspension, so repairs are often called for first.

While the car is on the lift we check (and lubricate) the entire suspension and driveline – some older cars have grease fittings in the front end, and some models have grease fittings in the drive shafts. The electric shift mechanism should be oiled occasionally, as should every other linkage piece under the car. When the car is lowered we lube the door hinges and latches, and spray dry lube on the weather strips. We put graphite in the door lock cylinders and make sure they turn smoothly. Sometimes owners with pushbutton entry neglect this step, only to have the key snap in the lock when the pushbutton entry fails one cold night and the locks are too corroded to move.

Moving back under the car, we take down the drip tray that covers the brake distribution valves and clean the oil residue. It’s normal for these valves to have a tiny bit of leakage, so some spots on the tray are normal. Heavy leakage signals a problem, which is the whole reason for the inspection. The drip tray gets refitted once it’s clean.

We check and top off most of the fluids. That includes check the automatic transmission fluid, the differential oil, the power steering oil, and the coolant. You’ll notice the hydraulic fluid reservoir is not on the checklist – we do something different there.

On the subject of fluids – we always pay attention to leaks. Some owners want every single leaks fixed. With a British car, that’s occasionally an impossible dream, and it’s always a very expensive attitude to have. We talk to our clients and evaluate their comfort with small drips. Then we look under the car and try to distinguish between leaks that may hurt the car versus leaks that are merely annoying. For example, if a radiator hose blows the car could suffer extensive engine damage in a hurry. A small leak from the rear differential may require nothing more than a few ounces of top-up every season. One needs to be fixed; the other is optional.

After filling all the other fluids and warming up the car it’s time for the springtime brake bleeding. Regular bleeding of the hydraulics will reduce your car’s tendency to dart left or right on heavy braking. It will improve responsiveness of the pedal, and it often cures brake drag. These systems get air into them from both the atmosphere and from nitrogen escaping from the four accumulator spheres.




Editorial note . . . I’ve skipped the next paragraphs of the original Rolls Royce article because they are unique to Rolls Royce and Bentley. The advice in the paragraph above is relevant for any car. We bleed or flush brake systems every day at this time of year . . . .

The story continues . . . .

While the trunk is open, we check the battery. Thanks to modern technology we’ve now got battery testers that can tell us a battery’s internal condition with a fair degree of accuracy. We recommend replacement if a battery drops below 75% capacity. In addition, we look at the date code on the battery – if its more than four years old we suggest replacement because any battery that age is living on borrowed time. And it’s cheaper to replace it now in the shop than six months later when the car has to be dragged out of a downtown parking garage after it fails to start.

We check and set the tire pressures. Some owners are very sensitive to this, and ask for lower pressures (28-30PSI) for a softer ride. Other owners are more sporting. They elect to stiffen the sidewalls with a bit more air. In any case, we are guided by the ratings and recommendations for the tires fitted – they vary quite a lot from model to model.

If we are servicing the car before winter storage we usually put the tires to the maximum pressure shown on the sidewall to reduce flat spotting. If it’s spring, we lower them back down. We always put the spare to the maximum pressure as spare tires are often neglected and it may not get checked again for a long while.

We always check the operation of the air conditioner and heating system. Some older cars will need the air conditioner topped off every few years. If the leak is more severe than that, it’s probably worth repairing. In New England we sometimes pull the grille to remove insects and debris from the condenser fins. The need for that service will depend upon where you live.

We’ve already checked the brake pressure lamps, but now we check the rest of the fascia warning lamps, and all exterior lamps. We also check the wiper blades, the washers, and all the accessory equipment. We check the seat belts and buckles.

If the car is new enough to have self diagnostics, we check for stored faults. Stored codes can point the way to problems that are not yet visible, so it’s important to check them. Any codes found should be addressed and cleared so they don’t send future service personnel on wild goose chases after things you fixed the year before.

Depending where you live, it may be necessary to clean out body drains and intake screens. If leaves and debris clog the drains you can end up with expensive water damage inside the car.



Finally, we take the vehicle on a road test and note any strange behavior. We pay attention to knocks when the car rolls over bumps, pulling or drifting when driving straight ahead, pulling on braking, and how the engine runs. We make sure the transmission feels normal and gear changes are smooth.

We recommend waxing the car at least twice a year. At the same time, we’d treat the leather with Hide Food to keep it soft. Detailing, however, is the subject of a whole ‘nother article so I won’t cover that here.

If you follow the maintenance guidelines above, you should be rewarded with a comfortable, reliable, and enjoyable motorcar whose lifespan is essentially indefinite. If you look at this work and think it’s expensive – you’re right! But the alternative – repairing breakdowns caused by neglect costs even more.

I’ve had people read this and exclaim, these cars sure do need a lot of care! Actually, that’s not true. The care they need is the same as any car. What you see here is a difference in attitude. These service schedules are meant to preserve the car in good mechanical order indefinitely. The maintenance schedule for a new Ford, in contrast, assumes the car will be on a slow slide to the scrap yard as soon as it leaves the showroom. If you applied this Rolls Royce service philosophy to a Chevrolet or a Lincoln you’d probably be rewarded with similar durability.

Detail: Getting our cars ready for spring