Denis Welch was kind enough to invite members of the Austin Healey Club to his workshops on the evening of Tuesday 8th April. The evening was organised by Mike Smith from Northern Centre, who invited members of Midlands Centre to join them. On the night, nearly 30 members turned up, including Neil Williams from Eastern Centre.
Both Denis and Jeremy were there, along with Denis's wife Tina to welcome everyone over cups of coffee. Also were members of staff, Martin and his colleagues in the parts department and in the workshop.
Following a few words of welcome from Denis, we split into two groups for a tour of the facilities. In the workshops were both road and competition cars belonging to customers. Also, Jeremy's E Type Jaguar which had just been prepared and was off to Mallory Park for a test session the following day. The facilities included the jigs for pressing and assembling all the BT7/BN7 chassis parts, the dyno room where every engine is set up and run in for the equivalent of 500 miles before delivery, the machine shop which includes an NC machine for close tolerance repetitive machining of parts; crack testing where all cranks, rods half shafts, stub axles etc. are crack tested before use; crank balancing; etc. Only three engines, including Jeremy's 3000 race engine were in the assembly area as most engines are already with their customers for the new competition season. Some of the specialist parts were discussed such as the steering worms which unlike the originals, are machined to give a constant back lash over the range of movement, and the aluminium cylinder heads where the combustion chambers are fully NC machined to give identical volumes.
Following the tour, members were able to drool over all the goodies in the new parts catalogue, with a few credit cards being tempted out of hibernation.
Our thanks go to Denis, Jeremy, Tina and all the staff for a very warm welcome and a very informative evening.
