... would be a welcome faculty. Before setting out to the 'Common Room' café in Framlingham, I dutifully looked at the map. Pretty straightforward, head to Coddenham, then continue on the B...... (at that point my attention wandered) ... should take about 50 minutes or so - piece of cake. As I thundered past Otley College, I knew something wasn't right. I was 20 minutes late for breakfast, but I can thoroughly recommend the spot; the salmon and scrambled eggs were perfect.

At 8:00 in the morning - I was delayed getting away by a sticking rear brake - despite bright sunshine, the roads were wet and slippery in the shade - a combination of a receding frost and mud from the ongoing sugar-beet season here in East Anglia. Add the seasonal salt not yet washed away by Spring rains and the Hillman was due a good hosing down on my return. She ran well. The new core plug (a Volvo B20 plug fits the MS and, presumably the 6/80 block, perfectly) showed no signs of leaking; the temps and pressures were within limits and, having charged the battery, she started on the button, hot and cold.

I took patterns from the Ford box and the MS bell-housing to play with and sort out where the centres are going to end up - approximately. The Series II engine is under the bench and a bit difficult to get at just now, but it won't be long before I haul out both it and one of the Morris gearboxes, to measure up.

This is misleading as, true to form, I managed to get the Ford pattern (the rear plate) upside down in relation to the MS plate.

This is how it should be - note the added portion to make it flush with the lower part of the MS plate. It appears that I'll have to add studs to the MS end of the spacer as there'll be no room to insert bolts between the two plates - the overall length of the spacer is around 32mm.

Fortunately, with the plates the right way around, there's enough clearance for the heads of the Ford attachment bolts to continue in service.

A flying visit to Learned Counsel's workshop revealed much progress on the Mazda-engined Locost. Testing is set for some time in March. Most of the Mazda engine management unit's sensors have been removed and a new dedicated ECU and wiring loom worked up. 5 hours on the rolling road has produced encouraging results....

... but the racing Jowett is on the back-burner for now.

I applied the first coat of filler to the foam model, mostly to fill in the gashes left by my over-enthusiastic application of the vibrating saw thingy. The back of the car is less pod-like than appears in this picture. The distortion is down to the phone camera. Nevertheless, I shall have to keep an eye on it and make sure the slightly Noddy-ish profile is flattened out. A good trick that I often use in painting, is to look at the canvas, or in this case the model, through a mirror. All the misshapen bits that your brain subconsciously smooths out for you are revealed in the reflection, pointing you then, in the right direction.