We set off on Friday afternoon - I picked the kids up from school - with a trailer packed full of camping kit:
Made good time down through Wales then along the M54 towards M6. Saw signs for M6 problems in the usual place - M6/M5 junction so headed for the toll road. Just before the toll road we found a good pub for grub so stopped off to fill our tanks. When we set off again, hit the M6 and the info boards were all blank, so assumed the traffic had cleared and headed down the M6. Wrong. Lost about an hour and, with it being a warm evening, the car started to get a bit hot and bothered, but never actually went over the 3/4 mark on the temp gauge. The triple core rad, oil cooler (with its own fans that cut in at the same time as the radiator fan) and the "water wetter" seems to have kept everything under control.
Now we'd got a new tent for this trip - it's an 9 berth Khyam, and very good too. Didn' t realise how big it is though, and after 1.5 hours with help from the kids (they're 4 and 6!) we were all set up and sorted. At 11:30 pm we all turned in (don't tell Mum they were up that late!).
The venue was Hatton Country Park - chosen for the Sunday show 'n' shine part of the weekend. That meant a shortish trip back Northwards for what is (for me) the best part of the weekend - solo laps of Curborough Sprint Track near Lichfield on the Saturday morning. It's a great set-up for those of us who want to let it all hang out without being dangerous - you join the queue of cars, do 4 laps of the circuit on your own, then join the queue again. The circuit is short and has a good number of 2nd and 3rd gear corners - perfect for getting a Sunbeam Lotus sideways. There's lots of run-off space between the track and the barriers too.
As ever, the atmosphere is very relaxed and no-one is under pressure to perform. 1.3 Avengers through Sunbeam Lotuses and an Avenger Tiger with a Vauxhall Calibra Turbo motor all take part and do what they want to do - take it steady, go flat out, go for the best line or do a bit of show-boating. Whatever. Took a few passengers out on the track and, as usual, on of them was the "Red Baron" - Patrick who drives his Sunbeam Ti over from France every year. He's always good company and its great to see that he drives over, thrashes around the track, then drives back in a car that's now over 25 years old. Nice one. After 12 laps of the track, my daughter started to complain about itching on her legs - she'd been running about in the long grass so we went off in search of Piriton and the 'beam survived another track day without incident. It's brilliant to drive on the track - even with the super soft Yokos on and the LSD it'll still kick sideways on 5 of the 6 corners on the track, in the dry. It does kinda limit the life of the tyres though.
We headed back to Hatton about 6pm in convoy - great to see about 30 'beams and Avengers on the road together. They're not exactly glamorous cars, but it must've made an interesting sight, particularly in the part of the country once famous for Rootes cars (for those not in the know, the Sunbeam has its historic "roots" in the Rootes family of cars through its common underpinings with the Chrysler Avenger, once a Hillman Avenger, Hillman being a part of the once great Rootes Group of UK car manufacturers. The Avenger was initially built in the Ryton factory near Coventry before being moved up to Glasgow. Some of the convoy cars diverted around by the Ryton factory which was making Peugeot cars until the early 2000s. Try and keep up! The Rootes Group had been bought by Chrysler in the early seventies leading to Chrysler UK which was bought by Peugeot-Citreon at the end of the seventies when they re-badged all the ex-Chrysler UK cars as Talbots. Talbots continued to be built at Ryton near Coventry until the mid-eighties when production was changed to Peugeot badged cars. Anyway, the diverted cars ended up driving past a piece of derelict land as the factory was pulled down a while ago, going the way of the majority of the British volume car industry.
Got the kids off to sleep in the tent then socialised with some of the other campers for a while. It seems these occasions always call for some kind of alcohol to be consumed - take it steady when there's kids to look after though. This is probably the least organised bit of the weekend - there were a bunch of folks in the marquee, a bunch around their tents then a few more in the bar. It would be better to sort out some kind of focal point on the Saturday evening to bring us all together. Easy enough to say, but I guess I'm one of those who could actually do something about it....
Sunday is show 'n' shine. Even then though, the atmosphere is really easy going. It's a bit of fun rather than a serious competition. The judging is done by every member so it's pretty even handed and you couldn't claim that the judges were biased, had an axe to grind or any form of bias as there's usually about 100 or so of them! There are lots of classes to for Sunbeams, Sunbeam Lotuses, Avenger, Avenger Tiger 1, Avenger Tiger 2, modified/competition etc. My favourite award is for the best "workhorse" - i.e. a car that gets used and has to work hard for its living. This year it was won by a guy's Avenger that had towed his caravan over from Holland - he does a UK tour with his caravan every year and this year it fitted in with the ASOC National so he'd come along to see what happens. A great guy who is a children's entertainer and goes by the name of Loopy the Clown. See, its easy going and not too serious!
Managed to sell some parts - I wanted a Series 2 rear screen for my car (it currently has Series 2 front end, but a Series 1 rear screen) and found one on eBay a few months back, but it came with 2 more Sunbeam rear screens, 3 Avenger rear screens and 3 Avenger front screens. I sold off 3 of the surplus items then donated the rest to the club's spares stash, so if someone wants them in the future they'll add to the club funds. Made a bit more back than I'd paid out and now have the correct rear screen so that's a bit of a result - and there are 3 more club members who have stuff they were looking for.
So with the tent down and the day's activities over (the kids enjoyed Hatton Park - there's a good bit there for them to do so they didn't have to pretend to like looking a shiny almost classic cars all day), we headed back up the M6. It was busy but flowing and the car breezed it. Kids asleep before we got home - I don't know how they do it, the car's so noisy - so another National meet went well. No prizes for my Sunbeam this time, but with the time taken to look after the kids and the tent to look after (must take something smaller next time), the car went on the show stand with the fly splats from the journey and the thick black brake dust on the wheels from the track day, so its no suprise there really.
