SPANNER IN THE MEMORY HOLE

Recall that the shroud supports in the engine compartment on a 100 are traps for anything dropped into them.  There’s no outlet, and over the decades these tend to accumulate a certain number of hardware items and other things that get dropped while working on the car.

Well, as Kent and I were finishing up stripping the chassis of the RHD BN2 for the body and paint shop, we decided to check these infamous vaults, and with the aid of a pick-up tool Kent extracted a small and very corroded spanner.

I cleaned it on a wire wheel and was surprised to find so many markings.  Before cleaning it, it looked like an ultra-cheap, stamped tool, but in fact it is labeled with all kinds of information:

TERRY’S SPANNERS

MADE IN ENGLAND

TEMPERED STEEL

And the ends are marked with the sizes: 0 BA and 2 BA.

I had never heard of Terry’s Spanners – a contemporary competitor of Superslim and King Dick? – and we wondered when it was lost into the deep recesses of this car.

Since it was made in England it seems most likely that it has been in there since at least 1962 when the car was shipped to the USA.  Was it dropped on the assembly line in Longbridge?  Was it dropped during servicing while the car was owned in England 1956-1962?  Perhaps the first owner “deposited” it there.  By the way, it was on the distributor side of the engine, so it wasn’t likely lost while working on the carbs.

In any case, we’ll never know, but at least it satisfied my hope that we’d find some such artifact in the disassembly process.  I had been hoping to find a UK coin – a penny would do – but this is actually more interesting and will become part of the tool kit.

I must remember to report these findings to the Concours Committee.