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Cell core by the yard from Universal Carnegie Manufacturing

In early November we got to visit Cicioni Radiator Repair Works in Hazleton, PA which may be one of the largest radiator shops left in North America. A family owned business since 1957, they definitely know what a cell core radiator is, and servicing vintage British car radiators, heater cores and fuel tanks is no problem. We also got to visit Universal Carnegie Manufacturing in Carnegie, PA (also known as Carnegie Industrial Radiator). This place works on all kinds of radiators and heat exchangers, but our interest here is the fact that they have the materials and skills to rebuild cell core radiators, as originally used in MGA. Here you can send them your original radiator, and they will re-core it and send it back to you, one stop service. They have cell core by the yard and can cut it to any size to fit your need.

We stopped to visit Gary Slagle in New Paris, PA who has been disassembling cars for years and has tons of good used MGA parts available, and apparently some Triumph stuff as well.

Darrel's Garage" in York, PA

Darrell Lutz front and center

Then we dropped in to visit "Darrel's Garage", in York, PA, that bunch of friends tinkering with cars the alley on Tuesday nights. Darrell has a new toy, a Morris Minor 1000 (with a 1275 engine) that had just been retrieved and pushed into the garage the day before. The gang had convened to see if they could get it running, and we found it takes 15 people to fire up a Minor that was last registered 27 years earlier. The next day we returned to borrow the service rack to change a worn tie rod end and torn rack boot on our MGA (then finding the other boot cracked as well). We also changed out a broken door latch cable at the same time.

MG NA at Vintage Restorations LTD in Union Bridge, MD

We had a short stop to see Pete Groh of British Car Keys in Ellicott City, Maryland. He has loads of key blanks for vintage British cars. If you can provide the key code, he can cut the keys and mail them out to you. We also stopped at British Racing Green in Newark, Delaware where Jim Knight is servicing vintage British cars and supplying parts. I picked up a pair of steering rack boots which are much better quality than the current common collection of crap parts made overseas. We visited eMachineShop in Mahwah, NJ. This is the place that will machine up custom parts on special order from your drawings using state of the art NC machine tools, one piece at a time if necessary.

We were shop-hopping in New Jersey for a few days when we came up one day short on time and got surprised by a nasty snow storm (that was supposed to be only heavy rain). While slogging through a few inches of heavy wet stuff on the expressway out windscreen wiper drive broke leaving the car without wipers. After a noble struggle to get off the nearest exit without getting anyone killed, we were grounded near Philadelphia, PA for the rest of the day waiting out the storm. Next morning, we visited British Miles in Morrisville, PA, a boneyard that has parted-out more than a thousand British cars over the years. Surely, they would have anything we might need to fix the wiper drive. Turns out we managed to reassemble the original parts without having to R&R the wiper motor (very fortunate), and we picked up a new wing mirror to replace one the was broken day before during the snow storm fiasco.

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