Fettling in Cartagena

 

What a beautiful, vibrant, historic city Cartagena is. It is full of life, excellent food, fantastic music and everyone is looking to entertain and make a buck.

 

On our first day Nigel took his Lagonda out of the old town and found a car cleaner who set too with a vengeance. His car was power washed on top and underneath to the very highest standard. He got more differential oil and more gear oil and by the end of the process was entirely satisfied as to how the car looked. It had been a long time since it had had a wash and looked all the better for it. He continued to fettle for the rest of the day. Chris likewise drove to the same area of town but in his case he got a full engine oil change and a jet wash all for about £40! Whether or not you could tell the old girl had been washed I will leave you to decide!

 

The following morning, first thing the three amigos set off to our nearby secure car park (armed parking attendant!) to have a look at Ham’s radiator. Given that we had two consecutive early morning over heating incidents the only option was to haul the radiator out, mend the leaks as well as possible and wash the radiator through to remove any obstructions. The cooling system on the Lagonda is not a particularly complex thing. A simple water pump driven by the engine circulates water through the block and pushes it into the radiator where the heat is expelled and so on around it goes. If the pump is working then almost certainly any problems exist in the radiator.

 

Between the three of us we managed to get the radiator out of the car and immediately identified two cracks in the solder on both sides near the base. These have almost certainly been caused by the rough tracks we have been on at times combined with the constant speed bumps and other general wear and tear on the road. Although in a perfect world you would want to re-solder the joints in these circumstances the answer is to use a ‘chemical metal’ type filler which sets as hard as metal but is in-fact a form of epoxy. The other possible cause of the early, very rapid rise in temperature could be that the ventilation slats in the front of the radiator weren’t opening properly so we cleaned up the mechanism and gave it a good oil hoping that this would ensure that particular mechanism was working correctly.

 

Before repairing the cracks Chris and Ham carried the radiator back to the AirBnB. The sight of two extremely sweaty tourists carrying a 1934 radiator through the streets of Cartagena was a sight to behold! They found a hose and, turning the radiator upside down, flushed it through from the bottom, thus ensuring that there were no possible rust or grit to block any of the finer pipes. They then carried the radiator back to the car park, leaving it to thoroughly dry out. We wanted to leave no stone unturned!

 

On Nigel’s insistence we filed back the paint and cleaned the existing solder right back to the metal before applying the epoxy and then left it to dry. Between the three of us reinstalling it was quick and painless and the car was left, without water in the radiator for the epoxy to set hard. Fingers were all crossed that the ‘bush fix’ had worked…and it had! When the radiator was filled there were no leaks and when it ran up to temperature the slats opened correctly. Only a decent run on the road will prove that the problem is solved and that will come on Monday when the cars are being delivered to the port.

 

Saturday afternoon Ham’s Lagonda was delivered to a car park about 10m up the road where an enthusiastic team set to give it a deep clean. 3 hours later the car was gleaming like new and returned to its secure parking for the night. We had fettled and cleaned for four days and the cars should be running well for all the hard work. Here’s hoping!

 

On Sunday Nigel shamed the rest of the team by his enthusiastic site seeing. He took a two hour taxi tour of the city, visited the old monastery, the ancient fort and then an hour tour around the harbour.

 

I cannot leave this page without mentioning the taco’s. We found a Mexican restaurant called Unica, 2 minutes from our AirBnB which serve the most fantastic shrimp, beef or marrow tacos. They are literally the perfect light lunch and however much we try to find somewhere better we have completely failed. There are excellent restaurants in Cartagena but so far only one which serves the best tacos!

 

On Monday we take the cars to the port where they will remain until the Hoeg Beijing arrives on Wednesday in the early hours. Fingers crossed!