Where the Seven Scores - and closing the garage door.

[Tony Griffiths]

A lovely sexist cartoon at the end.

[Tony Press]

But in my experience often true ! 

[Bob Culver]

An uncle bought a 1928 Dodge 4 and ran it into the 1950s. He always stopped it in the garage using the handbrake. His next car a 1937 Studebaker had an under dash handbrake...

I have recounted before but when I first used my Seven I used to stop with the rear wheels in a shallow gutter depression while I opened garage doors. The car had a copper exhaust so in the manner of youth, for the benefit of passers by,  I used to gun it a car length then stamp on the brake. Shoes were then relatively very expensive and I had a home use pair with a ¾ inch hole in the sole. I kept an open 4 gal tin of old engine oil in the garage. The tin exploded up the wall and the headlamps hit the bench and tilted skyward. Getting the dents out of the lamp rims was an exercise like the Repair Shop.
ps. The lady in the cartoon appears to own a Jowett Javelin. My aunt whose husband owned the Dodge, used to tell of a trip with a wealthy friend to an adjacent town, Speed limit here was 50 mph. The friend had a new Javelin and my aunt was astonished that it was driven at 60 mph! As with our Seven, 40-45 mph was cruising speed of the Dodge. Times have changed.

[Mike Costigan]

No Bob, the Javelin would have fitted in that garage; I think it's an Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire.

[Tony Griffiths]

No Bob, the Javelin would have fitted in that garage; I think it's an Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire.

Trouble is, if you make the garage A7-sized, it looks rather silly.

[Nick Salmon]

Years ago I was taken to see an old house that had been lived in by ancient family members. The garage door had a patch in it about a foot off the ground and it was explained that this covered the hole that grandpa had cut in the 1930s so that the over-long car would fit in the garage - the exhaust pipe protruded through the hole.

[Charles P]

Years ago I was taken to see an old house that had been lived in by ancient family members. The garage door had a patch in it about a foot off the ground and it was explained that this covered the hole that grandpa had cut in the 1930s so that the over-long car would fit in the garage - the exhaust pipe protruded through the hole.

I remember visiting the Daily Mirror print works in Watford in the early 90's. They had a hole cut in the wall to allow a machine driveshaft to be withdrawn through the wall, to facilitate bearing maintenance.

[Mike Costigan]

Reminds me of a tale my late father told: a friend with a Morgan 3-wheeler performed his regular valve regrinding service in the driveway, and to check his workmanship he decided on what would now be described as a Top Gear-style acceleration test towards the garage doors. What a shame he had forgotten that he had also serviced the brakes... and forgotten to re-attach the cables!

[Ian Dunford]

I had a friend who restored his Nippy chassis in the garage at the top of a severe slope.
As he reversed out he began to gently apply the brakes.
It was at this point he remembered/discovered that he had not secured the seat to the chassis.
The rest of the tale to too painful to tell.

[Bob Culver]

In the 1970s an owner of one of the best Jowett Javelins had a rural home on a hilltop with an abrupt drop. Somehow the car ran away over the edge and landed on its roof. Despite the solid construction it was flattend to the waistline. The widened wheels were recovered and live on!