In the 1970s or 80s you used to be planning to sell a car when it’d done 40,000 miles. Corrosion had started to appear, reliability was becoming suspect and the risk of some significant expenditure was looming. In many ways this part explains the demise of the once massive British car industry along with our parlous industrial relations and emerging global competition.

My Morgan, or ‘Samantha’ as I know her, is now creaking into its 16^th year. She’s exhibiting some of the above reliability maladies along with paintwork or trim problems. In fairness a lot of its original design was done in the 1950s and 60s; durability wasn’t on their minds. The suspension is jarring on the wrong road and such a rigid ride rattles every component. The joke goes that if you run over a coin in a Morgan you can tell whether it’s head or tails! I say the wrong road because 16 years ago the road surface was not pock marked with botched repairs or providing a slalom challenge of avoiding potholes. Neither were there the speed bumps that can reduce me to gibbering wreck where the low hung car has to scrape over one with distressing metallic noises.

However, the looks of the car remain sublime and an open country lane in sunshine with the hood down is one of the most fun activities you can have with your clothes on. The admiring looks are myriad and I’ve lost count of the middle aged or older blokes who’ve cornered me in York, supermarket car parks or European campsites to ask about the car. I recollect once in Sweden that I had to flee into my tent to escape the inane questions of “I believe the car has a wooden frame; is the chassis ash as well?” (No, in case you’re not certain.) One car lifetime highlight was taking my Favourite Youngest Daughter to her wedding and the car appearing in the wedding photos.

This event spawned another memorable event where as we’re all sat awaiting the entry of the bride and groom in the room, to be joined by the registrar for the marriage ceremony and I was heard to utter, by my other son-in-law, the immortal words of “bloody hell, there’s someone sat in my car!”. Through the window I could see the car and in it was sat a complete stranger. Storming out I confronted my new passenger who rather than being contrite asked if I could take his photo? After his eviction I returned to the small matter of my daughter’s betrothal with one of the venues staff standing guard over the car.

When I took car abroad in 2016 I was less concerned about its reliability but as I plan a tour through Holland, Belgium and Southern Germany before France in a day or two’s time I’m nervous. You worry what could go wrong a long way from home. It won’t be the radiator. That’s been replaced after the plastic header tank cracked. The new radiator is aluminium. New Morgans now have aluminium ones fitted and the depth of the radiator necessitated, in my opinion, the fitting of a mesh guard to stop possible stone damage. Fortunately the wonder crew at Copmanthorpe MOT garage are now the custodians of the car and can fit or sort anything.

In fact as regards dealers for the car there are 17 in the UK and the nearest to me is across the Humber Bridge close to Scunthorpe where any visit required it to be left overnight. As with all main dealers their prices became eye watering and you’ll find most Morgan owners have a beloved local garage they lean on. Some owners are engineers who actually perform many of the jobs on the car. I fall into the category of ‘polisher’ but with some accumulated knowledge from years of ownership.

A year or two ago I had a terrible smell of petrol in the cabin. The problem was a frayed hose that was routed next to a part of the engine that vibrated. Fortunately my sleuths at Copmanthorpe MOT identified the problem and after I ordered the new hose they fitted it and tied it down in such a way to stop movement. Fortunately the Ford Duratec engine and Mazda gearbox are mass produced and reliable; they worry me less. However, with an average mileage of 3,000 per year (I cycle further on my bikes every year!) you can forget to replace stuff such as spark plugs or change the oil in the gearbox or differential. On the latter then you’d not think about this type of maintenance but who keeps a car for 16 years? The body work polishes up nicely but in may places it’s tatty and a respray seems unavoidable on certain panels. Quotes suggest that I’ll be well into four figures and I’ve delayed this years, unsurprisingly.

Other tribulation came when I cracked the windscreen. This meant replacing the frame around the screen as well as the glass. Needless to say due to the fairly bespoke nature of the car the first frame assembly that came didn’t fit. This was inconvenient as I was going on holiday during the ordering process and I had to leave the car at Auto Windcreens for a couple of weeks hoping for the best. In the end they did a fine job. This incident brought home the necessity to have specialist insurance. I have such a policy and it’s very competitive. If the car ever needs repairing through an accident I feel an appropriate body shop will be selected.

The latest concern is that the fuel gauge never indicates when it’s full and tends to wander around when driving! The wonder crew (Leon and Mark) at Copmanthorpe MOT have ruled out other maladies to conclude it’s a dodgy sender unit. (A float sits on the fuel and translate into a level on a gauge.) You may well be thinking maybe the car should be a ‘return to sender’!

Anyway the Hull to Rotterdam ferry beckons. Wish me (and Samantha) luck!