Tag Archives: mantis

Being precious

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This afternoon I dropped the Mantis off at Invisifilm’s new premises in Cheadle. Tomorrow Steve will fit the Armorfend paint protection film. It’s an 18 year old CAD drawing & very basic compared to modern kits, however a new drawing & bespoke kit is another £500. Yikes!

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The paint is still relatively unscathed after a few weeks of (admittedly cautious) driving. Hopefully the Armorfend will keep it that way for a good few years (there is a 10 year warranty on it). A couple of trips to Le Mans should be a good test! 😂

Priorities

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The Mantis is taking a back seat as family matters take priority ATM. Currently outstanding are the two press studs on body where the rivets have pulled out, and the voltage stabiliser. I don’t have the tools to do the riveting so that is a garage job (although getting some kind of reinforcement to rivet into on the stud to the left of the Nearside headrest will be challenging!). Having posted on the Marcos Forum about the voltage stabiliser I have bought a solid state one off eBay & that again will need wiring in by someone with more time than me.

Other things to be done of course include an LS engine conversion, a respray & a new interior…

Hitting the Redline

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A somewhat postponed trip down to Redline Sports Cars today. Left Manchester an hour behind schedule & in the rain (as forecast, to be fair) but as I expect to be without the car for a good three weeks the hood was down… didn’t get too wet! The sun was starting to show by Birmingham & by the time I was half way down the M5 it it was lovely. It’s always a pleasure driving into Wiltshire.

I made it to Redline with only one ‘practice’ circuit of the site required, before I parked my male ego & looked at the site map. Good to see Jeremy & later Joe. Had a quick look over the car & talked through the job list before leaving it with them. The two major items are the new hood (I have lived with Selotape over the growing split in the vinyl rear screen for three years so I can’t be accused of rushing this one!), & chassis checkup/Waxoyl. I now know from the Marcos Forum that there are 13 bungs in the chassis (to be removed when Waxoyling properly) – just the sort of essential information that will get me invited to wild, crazy swinging parties I reckon… Anyway there also the minor jobs including;

  • Replacement electric aerial
  • Suspension check (ride seems harder than last year, after a few potholes!)
  • Water ingress through windscreen jets
  • … the windscreen jets!
  • Oily fumes coming in through windscreen vents
  • Waterproofing door cards (water seeped around door speakers a few weeks ago, but does not seem to have damaged speakers themselves)
  • Air director thingy (i.e. windscreen/footwell/split)
  • LED bulbs to gauges (I need to check these out more, as SMD bulbs appear to be the way to go, rather than unidirectional ultra bright LEDs). Do I go for blue or white ones though?!
  • Secure offside dashboard (been on & off so many times I don’t think there’s anything left for the screw to bite into).

Jeremy has suggested the chap making the new hood will tweak the flaps at the front to make them a bit more effective, which sounds very promising. Not as good as the later hood frame & cover with all the metal plates & acres of rubber & velcro (that will disappoint some people on Google), but that was £££ when I spoke to MHS. And let’s face it the hood is not up much anyway, rain or shine. I also got to see a half-built Invicta that Joe is finishing off. It’s a fab Mercedes blue, & looks very imposing (2m wide!). Hope I see it again when it’s finished.

The car is still doing about 13mpg (Waaaaah!) & the conversation drifted onto ECUs, & Joe has left me to ponder a Unichip (as chosen by the factory) or I have been recommended Omex. Neither of which are cheap but in the medium term would pay for themselves if they take the mpg into the high teems or low twenties. Now… where’s that lottery ticket?

I love my commute!

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Bah! Still no takers for the CARFEST North show & I can’t attend myself. I get the impression our glorious leader at CMI is (understandably) a bit miffed at the underwhelming response. You wouldn’t think Marcos owners were the most obvious shy types!

On the bright side it looks like at least one Marcos is going to be exhibiting at the Passion for Power show in Manchester’s Event City. Well done to Mr Barlow says I! Flying the Marcos flag in the North.

School runs & commute in the Mantis today. Glorious. Glorious. Glorious. Fine weather & all running well on the car. I have succumbed to contacting the car detailer to see what can be done with the Mantis prior to Jem’s birthday bash & of course, with a view to staying shiny through both Tatton Park shows & the odd annual rally! Time to get that kidney on eBay…

The Clubbing scene

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Bizarrely I have recently ended up on the committee of the MOC (Marcos Owners Club), thanks to the urging of one of the other members, Larry Kilick (he of Mantis slaying fame, but also someone who has created a stunning car out of a bright yellow GT, with various engine improvements & a veerrrry cool steering yoke). I say bizarrely because CMI (Club Marcos International) has always been my favourite Marcos club, due to the much more active membership, and the excellent way it is run by Isobel, who is a prime candidate for sainthood if ever I met one… However the CMI ticks along very nicely thankyou, so it is the MOC which needs a bit of invigorating, and that, I think, is the general idea behind the new blood on the committee. Long term I think there is a legitimate arguement for amalgamating the two clubs, as there aren’t exactly thousands of members in each and we would have a lot more clout if we acted as a single organisation. On the other hand most owners I know are in both clubs anyway! A major obstacle of course is the various shenanigans which led to two separate clubs in the first place – I wasn’t around at the time (barely out of nappies!) but it would be nice to think that however badly people behaved all those years ago, eventually things could be reconciled & we could all go back to trying to support the marque as best we can. This easy for me to say of course as I am not the one who has slogged my guts out for years to keep the clubs going. Re-reading this it sounds a bit sanctimonious  but hopefully you know what I mean.

Rallying cry

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Had the Marcos annual rallies last weekend. Alas on the Saturday I never made it to the MOC (Marcos Owners Club) day at Curborough sprint track due to a domestic hiccup, but I would only have embarassed all the other Mantis drivers anyway! The top two drives were Mantis, with the LMs close behind, then the rest of the Marcos hoi polloi. I also missed the big evening meal which sounded like good craic. Instead I set off early Sunday morning with wench en suite, and met up with lots of people at the hotel so we could get to the main rally site at Donnington in convoy. We looked great on the motorway, but then got a bit chopped up as we approached the circuit. Over sixty Marcos and lots of sun made for a pleasant day, but the racing was boring (I don’t think I appreciate racing much, do you?). On the way back we tagged along with another local Marcos owner in his nice Mantara, and had a delightful squirt along the Cheshire roads. The only downer was that I noticed the engine temperature was reading higher than normal, even doing about ninety, but it never went over 120 degrees & the fan was going so we carried on. Today on the way to work the same thing happened, but this time I stopped to have a look & got squirted in the face from a hole in the radiator, which is a bit of a bummer. Nursed the car back home & will baby it to the garage this weekend to have the radiator removed & sent off to a specialist. It was suspiciously easy to confirm that the radiator itself is from a Ford Scorpio V6, but of course there had to be a Marcos twist(!). It has special brackets welded on, so it looks like my best bet is to get the core replaced & keep the tanks top & bottom (assuming they are OK). Could possibly get a more efficient one made up (Serck?), but then need to get brackets done etc etc – all valuable driving time! Meanwhile I hope it rains steadily for a week so I don’t miss my car!

These boots are made for drivin’

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It’s a funny old world! The Bridgestones have worn a fair bit, & I was thinking how nice it would be to replace them before Le Mans, but I can’t really afford it . I tried them because they were the tyre fitted to all the Mantis, including the GTs, by the factory, however they have not ‘wowed’ me. Mind you, Marcos fitted the SO2s & I was only able to source the SO3s, which do not seem to have been received as well (& by people a lot more knowledgeable than me!) So… Saturday saw the end-of-season bash with my Hockey side, which this year we spent at Heywood Races, where bizarrely I won a grand by betting on some chap because he was wearing our team colours (red/black)! Coo! Anyway, Saturday night saw some winnings back into the kitty (all drunk now!), but I have just got back from Blackpool where the rest of my ill gotten gains were blown on a new set of tyres! (Blown? Tyres? Geddi… oh never mind). I have decided to try some Goodyear F1 ZRs, which I got fitted by Performance Wheel Supplies, up in Blackpool. A bit if a trek, but most tyre people are buggers with your wheels, however this outfit seem to have a very good reputation with the TIPEC folks. I got a reasonable price I think & they were careful with my wheels, but for £650 I was a bit disappointed they didn’t throw in metal valve stems!

Somebody stop me!

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Things are pretty hectic on the car front at the moment. I am losing the company car next week (a BMW Compact I got off the used car list) & have lamentably come to the conclusion that ‘Man cannot live on Marcos alone’. Or at least, get to & from work/hockey in it. I have been agonising over a second car for the more moist moments in life (remember the Mantis luuuurves to aquaplane! And leaks too!), and having rejected ‘interesting’ cars like the Alfa 147 (reliability/service issues) may end up buying the beamer off the lease company. Alas this has coincided with a heft garage bill for the Marcos, so it’ll be Marmite & rice for supper until Christmas for me! I am pretty happy with the Mantis right now though, so the fat bill was worth it. Most of the work done has been to replace stuff that’s worn out, not broken. This is OK, ‘cos it was me that’s worn it out, driving round ‘n having fun!!!  I now have my upgraded front brakes to 315mm AP Racing discs, and replacement back brakes, trialling the EBC Greenstuff pads all round. Upgraded polyeurethane front and back suspension bushes. 100W main beam lights, and Philips VisionPlus dipped lights. Even a boot light! (something that will be most appreciated 0300 hours at Le Mans this year!)

I hope the Mantis is pretty well ready for Le Mans now. Having got so many other Marcos to come along, I have no intention for me to be the one to break down! (At least, not first). Mind you, as we have all round Marcos guru Dave Chivers coming along, help should not be too far/too many beers away. Next on the list of ‘fiddling’ is to reposition the front numberplate so that it does not impede the airflow so much. I will try & post some ‘before & after’ pictures, as I know that’s what my adoring public want. Probably…

Silence IS golden!

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Well it’s been almost five months since I last wrote anything, so I must’ve crashed the car or the engine blew up or something, right? Wrong! I’ve had five months of glorious, trouble free Marcos motoring and it’s been fab, both for me and for anyone with shares in Shell, BP or Esso! I apologise to anyone who may have been checking this page for updates, and I really do appreciate your patience! I’ve got loads of photos to try & put up & some events to remenisce about, but no ‘guess what broke’ stories, sorry!

The other thing that has been taking up my time is the Marcos forum I set up last May! With over fifty members and thirty thousand visits so far I am delighted with it’s success and hope it’s proving useful to the various owners who use it.

I will update this page fully when I have my photos ready, and even complete my article on Le Mans 2002, particularly as we now have Le Mans 2003 all booked up!