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At the beginning of June we headed over to the Birmingham Reliant Owners Club rally in Nuneaton and Lucie was on display for the day though as only a few cars turned up, we stayed for a few hours and headed home again.
The weekend after a number of folks had been invited over to Reliant’s old engine and axle plant in Shenstone by Dave Salter a counselor for Shenstone. This is the only Reliant factory still standing now as the two main factories in Tamworth (Two Gates and Kettlebrook) were knocked down a few years ago. On the day a number of cars turned up for a photo shoot outside the factory (that hasn’t really changed that much since the days it was used by Reliant). I also got to meet Susan Nelson who was the PA for Jonathan Heynes when he was in charge of Reliant and as a result was put in touch with Jonathan Heynes who then proceeded to help us with Volume 2 of our Reliant book (Available later this year). As we have our son Harvey now, there is no way he can travel in the Reliant as it has no seat belts or means of securing a child seat, therefore we have to trailer the Reliant every where. However, after the display of cars at the old Shenstone factory, we also took part in a classic car show at St. John’s Church in Shenstone which was just a couple of miles down the road and so leaving the trailer at the factory, I drove the Reliant to the church grounds with Caroline and Harvey following in the Jaguar. My brother followed my van and reported that every now and then there was a flame flashing out of the exhaust, apart from the old hiccup the van seemed to run OK so now we suspect it may be either the timing that needs looking at or a burnt out valve. That said after the show, Lucie drove back fine to the Shenstone factory where she was loaded up and taken back home.
Elvis Payne.
June 2011
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