So, what does the seller say about the "Wheel of Chagrin"?
I have not contacted the seller since taking delivery of the car. What would be the point besides having a very unpleasant conversation about what a crappy job he did, how devoid of attention to detail he is, what low standards he has, and how much he didn't disclose?
The car was shipped across water. By the time I went to the port to pick it up, my funds had long been in the seller's bank account where they had made, I am sure, a one-way trip.
Honestly, the car was such a disappointment that as I drove it home from the port, trying to control the idle that was stuck at about 5,000 RPM, I was thinking of donating it to some cause or using it as a prize (ha ha!) of some kind. It was a rolling collection of projects, none of which were wanted or expected.
I let it sit for a few months in a storage garage several miles from home before going back to reassess the potential, and decided to try to work through the needs little by little as it did its sworn duty of draining my bank account while doing nothing to improve its new owner's opinion of humankind.
For one example, all of the gauges in the car were wrong and/or inoperative or at least not properly operating. I scrounged a nice-looking speedo and tach from my own collection of spares, bought a fully refurbed combination gauge from Bugeye Guy, and bought a fuel gauge at an as-new price from a local Brit car repair shop, and discovered that the speedo and tach did not operate properly after all. I took them and the fuel gauge to a local instrument restoration business where I paid $1,551 for the refurb and calibration of the three gauges. I have not yet reinstalled them, but I'm now into just the gauges for well over $2,000, and the coolant temp gauge indicates very high when I doubt that's accurate. So the money isn't yet all spent on something you would think (I would think) should be a gimme on a fully restored car.
I've been into British cars over 50 years so I am very, very well aware of the foibles of those old gauges, and I'm willing to accept that they indicate only a relative reading and the needles bounce and swing a bit even when new - I get it, I get it - but sticking needles (goes up to 4,000 RPM and stays there) and a speedo needle that bounces from 0 to 60 MPH while cruising, are outside the range of expected imperfection, even for Smiths.
It will be "a real car" - as Keith Martin calls a car with everything finally working at least half-way reasonably - when I'm done, but the cost and mental anguish take a toll on the Affection Quotient for the car, and driving it is more likely to be a case of dread of what expensive thing is going to go wrong next as opposed to just being able to enjoy it.