Longest TR trip?

[NutmegCT]

What's the longest trip you've taken in your TR? (days, total miles, etc.)

Any "coast to coast" drivers here?

What did you take along (beside a credit card!) - and what car problems did you have?

Just testing the waters ...

Thanks.
Tom

 

[Marvin Gruber]

Check out the website " Dangerous Crosswinds", these guys are doing an 8000 mile cross country road trip on a 1960 TR3. The second time.

Marv

 

[Andrew Mace]

When I bought my '62 Herald in June 2002, it had been drive a whopping 700 miles in the 13 years previous. Three weeks later, I did a 2550-mild round trip from NY to MN and back. I had problems with a bad tire valve in Ohio on the way out, and the voltage regulator acted up, prompting me to buy a spare battery at an Indiana Walmart. The rest of the trip to and from Minnesota was uneventful and trouble-free!

 

[Anthony_S]

Good question....I am leaving for my longest trip yet in my TR3 tomorrow. I am going about 2 hrs away. I know it doesn't seem that far but it is the longest trip I have taken it. I am pretty excited, just hope the weather holds out....I am for sure packing my rain coat.

 

[TR4nut]

I put on about 2700 miles on my TR4 over 11 days with the Mitty trip this year. Had a great time too!

 

[tomshobby]

In '65 I had my TR4 while at Ft Knox. A tour to see the waterfalls in the UP. Took our TR6 on a 4 day tour through Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and back to Wisconsin. Last summer's 4,000 mile tour through 15 states. Preparing to leave the last week in July for about a 6,000 mile trip to Provost, AB then to Vancouver, BC, Washington, Oregon, and through the northern states on our way back home.

With my '64 TR4, '67 GT6, and our '76 TR6 I have covered over 150,000 miles.

 

[justin_mercier]

I am hoping to travel the 450 miles to Niagara Falls this september with my car, but I'm not even running or assembled yet. I want to get on the road in about 4 weeks from now so that I can make some test drives to local shows and work the bugs out with time to resolve them before Niagara. My previous longest trips have been out to albany with the TR7 and up to the white mountains with the TR6, so around 150 miles each direction.

 

[Don Elliott]

In 2000, I left Montreal in my 1958 TR3A (bought brand new in May, 1958) and joined up with another TR3A owner in Windsor Ontaio then drove across the USA to VTR in Portland Oregon. The total trip took 3 weeks and I drove 7300 miles all told. In Yellowstone National Park, my generator stopped charging and for two days after we swapped batteries (Gary was re-charging mine in his TR) while I ran with his battery, we arrived in Portland. That was when Randall saw me clutching my generator as I was putting in a spare I bought from Bob Reinhold from Laguna Hills, Calif. for $50.00.

The day later, I had trouble with my overdrive so the then president of the Portland VTR Group let me put up my tent near a babbling brook on his farm where he lived while I removed my gearbox and overdrive in one of his barns, we ordered the parts we needed from Moss in Calif. and after they arrived, he re-assembled it for me. But I re-installed it at his place where I stayed for about 6 days. Then I drove my TR3A back to Montreal.

A year later, I drove the TR3A to VTR in Breckenridge Colorado (5250 miles all told) and the only problem I had was at VTR when I asked a friend Bob Palmer from Ohio to help me bleed the brakes because at 12,000 foot altitude, bubbles had emerged in my silicone brake fluid and I had to pump the brake pedal to build up pressure. That job took abot 30 minutes and the total trip took two weeks. On that trip I was alone with my TR3A and had no CB or cell phone with me.

They can be very reliable if you prepare them before you leave home. That's why I have named mine "TRusty".

 

[TRclassic3]

About 1500 miles round trip in the TR3 to Jekyll Island GA to attend VTR a couple years ago. Great trip. Only brief cause for concern when motoring through the wilds of SC (we did all secondary roads). The motor starting cutting out. I pulled over, popped the hood, poked around and finding nothing started the car. Ran like a champ the rest of the trip. I surmised it may have been a spec of rubbish that momentarily buggered a jet.

Getting ready now to leave for NC. It will be a thousand miles or so.

 

[sd80mac7204]

I have done several trips with my spit that were all 4 hour one way trips. Home, PA to Huron, OH to see family. Home, PA to Silver Spring, MD to see an old girlfriend of mine. Home, PA to Wooster, OH for TRA. I have also had it all over western PA. Other than the constant oil leak, the only problems I have ever had were a bad tank of high ethanol gas on the Wooster trip and loosing all of my gearbox electricals after a spin in severe weather conditions on RT22 near Altoona PA coming back from Silver Spring.

 

[Don Elliott]

Last summer, the TR Register in England loaned me TS2, the 2nd TR2 ever constructed. It was built in June 1954, I drove it across England and through Wales for 23 days for a total of 2088 miles in all. The only hitch I had with this historical classic TR2 was the pinion gear on the starter lost the retaining pin and the pinion fell off so I had a local TR garage (6 miles away) put in a new starter which was paid for by the TR Register.

I drove several runs up the Hillclimb at Harewood in Yorkshire and attended the TR Register International Weekend in Harrogate with between 450 to 500 TRs attending.

 

[Moseso]

I know this hardly makes me the record-holder, but, in the early '70s, I used to drive my TR3 from San Francisco to Portland, OR and back -- maybe a half-dozen times. That's about 1800 miles, round-trip.

 

[TR3driver]

I've not driven all that far at one time in the TR, longest was probably VTR 2001 in Breckenridge, CO. Roughly 2500 miles total, including sidetrips. But I drove alone (with my daughter in the car), much of it on secondary highways (out past the Grand Canyon, through Durango, CO where we rode the steam train to Silverton & back, etc.)
Let's see, that was the trip where I blew a headlight fuse, coming down the mountain into Durango. I was also having trouble with valve seat recession, which didn't stop the trip but did keep me from trying to compete in the autocross. I remember driving up to I-70 to pick up a coil wire, but as I recall it was mostly an excuse to go driving through the mountains.

I've done several other trips around 2000-2500 miles. All had some minor troubles, never enough to require a tow truck. Couple years ago, I drove the TR3 to Tucson to join Geo and others for the "Arizona Roadrunner". Probably drove 2500 miles with most of it by myself through the desert. The block drain started leaking, so I stopped and wrapped a hose clamp around it. The front end was vibrating kind of badly at freeway speeds, so I came home early (still haven't fully resolved the vibration problem).

Longest in the Stag would be VTR 2005 in Rockford, IL; about 6000 miles total (went to visit family in IN afterwards). Again drove alone (solo going, daughter rode back with me). While packing to leave, I inadvertantly left the ignition on, which allowed the leaking float valve to fill a cylinder and hydrolock the motor. I was running behind (took longer to put the dash back together than I had allowed), and was very tired (hence the gaffe) so I just let it sit overnight and went on.

During a big rainstorm near Denver, I plowed into a bunch of standing water, which came up over the hood and broke the driver's side wiper arm. (Early Stags had a plastic pivot piece that was kind of fragile.) So I tie-wrapped the arm (leaving it working but without the pantograph function). The front tires wore out, so I stopped somewhere in Iowa for a new pair of tires. Then on the way home, one of the head gaskets started leaking and the alternator came loose. Wasn't too far from home by then (and it was around 4 AM), so I topped up the radiator with melted ice from the cooler and limped on home.

I do carry a cellphone & AAA card; but they're not much good when I don't have cell coverage ... :laugh:

 

[hondo402000]

for me 65 miles around the outer loop in Charlotte last week, sad but true,, still try to dial in my webers but oooo so close, still running in the 12 AF range at 2500-2800 rpm, if I could get it in the 13-13.5 range I would take the AF meter off and be done, then maybe a trip to Charleston SC.

hondo

 

[DanB]

In the TR4A, about 2000 miles in 1981, WV to Florida and back, throwing oil out the tailpipe all the way due to faulty pcv. I had just got the car on the road a few weeks before, learning as I went. The things we do when we're young!!!

In the TR7 I have made many trips in the 700+ mile range.

Dan B

 

[TexasKnucklehead]

The longest trip I've taken in my present TR6 was a little over 3,000 miles. I left Houston on a Friday, alone, and drove to my folks place in Pa for the weekend and was back home by the next Tuesday. The trip was uneventful and mind clearing (my Mother was happy to see me on Mothers day). It is not uncommon for me and my wife to drive to Austin for a weekend -or even an afternoon in the TR6 (it's 200 miles each way). I have only been towed home once because I was unable to diagnose a shorted distributer rotor. My TR6 has been dependable.

I plan to drive my TR3 from coast to coast... assuming I ever get it put back together.

 

[HerronScott]

Our longest trips were several summer trips to visit my wife's parents in Spartanburg, SC with my TR4A back in the late 1980's - 700 miles round trip.

Scott

 

[bnw]

Went from Portland, OR to Champaign. Il in 1970 in the middle of winter in this car.

https://picasaweb.google.com/treight/DropBox?authkey=Gv1sRgCOfTra-ukKWqTQ#5754040801771076530

I installed an additional heater from a 1950 Ford Pick up (very similar to our heaters) on the passenger side and it was clearly 10 degrees warmer on the passenger side! I blew a front wheel bearing in Wyoming that took two days to fix because of lack of available parts in rural WY. By the time we left Champaign, IL, I was running on three cylinders due to a burnt exhaust valve on #3. Drove all the way back on three cylinders (2600 miles)! The only problem other than loss of power was fuel economy. It dropped from 22 MPG to 13 on the return trip. When we got home, I ordered the piston/ liner kit from JC Whitney for about $70 and rebuilt the block in my backyard.

 

[bgbassplyr]

The 59 TR3, which I obtained in '62, was my only daily driver for three years. I drove it like I had stolen it....Charlotte to Atlanta every weekend for a year...Charlotte to Sebring...up and down the mountains...every where I took a notion to go....and the only problem I ever was a broken fan belt.

Now I know that this was when the car was fairly new, but it was always dependable, and as I said, ran it hard and put it up wet more than a few times.

 

[3798j]

In my 1961 TR3 the trip was from Harrisburg, Pa. to Ft. Lauderdale Fla.(1150 miles) in 24 hours the summer of 1967. I95 had not been completed,although there was a bit of it around Washington D.C. and then again in Florida. We took our time returning a week later. Four 17/18 year olds - two in a '67 MGB, two in my TR. We still get together and the talk invariably touches on memories of the trip - it was awesome. Took some hand tools, a distributor cap and a spare fan belt. Didn't touch any of it.