Recent new Member Ian Clapham sent in details of his 1953 Triumph Mayfair.
Introducing ‘Mikey’ as he is affectionately known is a 1953 Triumph Mayflower recently rescued from a dilapidated shed in Abergele, North Wales.
My example is quite a late model & is a Deluxe which means he has a Smiths Heater!
He was parked up around 1980 just a year after the previous owners used him as their wedding car, and there is still confetti under the rear carpet.
The condition is fair, structurally sound but has needed all new brake hoses, wheel cylinders & the handbrake cables freeing off. I have renewed the ignition parts & rebuilt the carburettor. On first start up it was running on 2 cylinders so I did a compression test & found 2 cylinders showing zero, so I noticed 2 stuck valves through the plug holes, a bit of lubrication, brass drift & a hammer they soon freed off. I adjusted the timing slightly a couple of degrees advance & surprisingly runs very well.
The rear headlining had fallen down so a little persuasion & a couple of self-tappers sorted that out. One of the trafficators was stuck but once removed & cleaned, it was back working no bother. The temperature gauge is stuck halfway so I will need to send that off to Alan at The Gauge Shop who does a fantastic job, the Oil pressure sits lovely around 50psi.
There are some rally plaques on the grille, he won the concourse class at the 1973 & 74 Standard Register Rally. It's nice to know some 50 years ago he was being appreciated in the club & rally scene rather than just a car to get from A to B.
All the fluids were changed & lots of the electrical connections cleaned up to aid reliability. The bodywork is fairly poor or ‘full of patina’ some folk call it, so I’m going to keep the patina as ‘Its only Original Once’.
I’m doing all the work myself & look forward to taking it to local shows & the supermarket at the weekend. Going forward it will just be maintenance rather than restoration.
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