HWY 91N - 1975 Manta A 19000 SR
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Owner:
Martin Dodgson
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I bought HWY91N
nearly four years ago from a chap who’d had
it since 1982. HWY is a 1975 Manta A 1900SR, and
had been slightly modified by the time I got it.
It was originally Signal Blue (bright turquoise)
with black plastic seats and static seat belts.
When I got it, it had been resprayed black (very
good quality job), had black velour seats with
lumbar adjustment and headrests (much more
comfortable than the standard seats), revolution
alloys, inertia reel seat belts, a glass sunroof,
and an electric fuel pump. Of these, the only
thing I changed was replacing the alloys with a
set of SR sports wheels. |
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| The car had
120,000 miles on when I got it, and it put it
into service as my everyday car. A change of job
meant I ended up doing about 55 miles a day in
it, and things started wearing out, in particular
the engine, which lacked torque and burned a lot
of oil. At 145,000 miles it was going through a
gallon a week and then would only run on three
cylinders. I had the engine completely rebuilt,
and an unleaded conversion done. I also had the
clutch replaced. Once the engine had run in, it
became very powerful and torquey, being able to
pull from much lower revs in top gear and
accelerate faster and quieter. This is still with
the original Solex carb. |
| As the thing was
running much healthier, I was driving it further
and faster, and other things started wearing out.
First, I had the rear axle replaced with a
secondhand one, when the original started making
loud noises, but the worst thing to go was the
front subframe, which sheared as I was driving
along. There was a big bang, and the steering
became very "graunchy" feeling.
Fortunately no other damage was done and I had a
complete front subframe assembly at home with
suspension, steering rack and wheels on, so I had
that fitted, once I had retreived the correct
engine mounts from the spare motor in my garden.
(early and late engine mounts are different, as
are the subframes.) |
| There have been
many other thing which have been replaced, such
as springs, brake discs, exhausts, etc, but I am
still using it nearly everyday (I also use 2 FD
Victors now, as well), and it has covered 170,000
miles, and is probably the best car I have ever
had. |
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