| It's clear that John Sheally II is a Morgan nut; in fact, he may well be the leading Morgan proponent in America. He owns five Morgans (including a 1933 Beetleback 3-wheeler he bought the day he was leaving California to fly home), he races Morgans, is writing his third book on the marque, sponsors the John H. Sheally II Award for Best Morgan of the Year at the annual conclave, and simply is totally immersed in Morgan romance, history and technical data. But unlike many people who carry on automotive love affairs, Sheally believes his cars are meant to be driven and enjoyed-no up-on-a-pedestal lover is John. And that's one of the major reasons why he set out on his madcap cross-country jaunt: I did it to show that 3-wheelers are not fragile little things; they're sturdy cars that can be used. Most of the Morgan people at the Fullerton meet didn't really expect us to make it all the way across the U.S." Sheally adds that he knew it could be done, and his riding mechanic, Tim Hund, while not a Morgan man, was reasonably confident they would succeed.
Such confidence may have seemed entirely misplaced on the first day of the 3328-mile journey, as Sheally hit a 100-lb sack of cement in the dark of night on the interstate near Charlotte, North Carolina. |
across the desert, like with a sailboat, while the blowing sand was scouring most of the paint off the car."
Eight days from the start, near-disaster struck as they were leaving Tucson, Arizona following a fuel stop. An oil ' line ruptured, having been badly chafed by the leaping and landing in Georgia, and Sheally and Hund found themselves facing 2-3 ft flames from the engine. Sheally recalls that his first inclination was to scoop up dirt from alongside the highway to quell the blaze, only to discover that sunbaked Arizona soil doesn't scoop, whereupon he started beating at the fire with various articles of clothing. Hund remembers that the fire was burning directly beneath the gravity-feed fuel tank, and when it began to whistle like a teapot, he had visions of the promised land.
Unfortunately, among all the people who stopped to gawk, no one had a fire extinguisher, but just prior to what Hund is sure was the moment when the whole thing would blow and Morgan 3-wheeler pieces would shower the desert, a trucker showed up with an extinguisher and the fire was smothered as the local firefighters were arriving on the scene. The singed trike was
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doesn't make sudden darting maneuvers in a 3-wheeler, so Sheally and Hund
held on tightly while the trike was airborne for about 30 yards, making
a 2-wheel landing but staying upright. There was little apparent damage,
but the effects of the flight were enough to stress the Morgan's parts and
systems. The most immediate problem was that the engine had jumped its timing,
which led to overheating, glowing exhaust pipes that burned both men's jackets,
a broken valve, scored piston and damaged valve guide. This was all put
right the next day in Atlanta at the Harley-Davidson dealership by a man
named Ray Lyttle, one of those mechanics you always hope you'll meet on
just such an occasion. The valve was replaced by one from a Harley 74, the
guide was trimmed, and the piston was practically remade through the heliArc
welding talents of a local shop teacher. A variety of niggling mechanical problems plagued the crosscountry effort as Sheally and Hund pushed on through the southern states, fighting a soaking rain (no top, of course, on the 3-wheeler) from Atlanta to Birmingham, Alabama; the generator threw a pulley between Birmingham and Shreveport, Louisiana ' an 18-hour day fraught with minor repairs and adjustments. The crossing of Texas was uneventful until they were west of Dallas, headed for Abilene, where they encountered 30-40 mph crosswinds. The ever-smiling Sheally, who seems to thrive on misadventure, recounts, I was tacking and jibing |
pushed two miles up the road to a service station, and a passerby invited Sheally and Hund to use his shop for repairs. "All the way across the country, the camaraderie and help from people were simply terrific," Sheally says. "The television station in Virginia had filmed our departure and sent tapes to various other stations along our route, and it was amazing how many people we met who told us they had seen us on the news." The two Virginians spent the next day rewiring and repairing the Morgan, and then set off for Phoenix, where they took a day off to relax and recuperate. The last leg of the trip took them across the desert to Palm Springs, fighting crosswinds up to 70 mph this time, and as the end of the adventure was almost in sight, the demon of things mechanical got in one parting shot as the engine threw a valve spacer and bent a pushrod. Once more into the breach, lads, and all that. So Hund and Sheally pulled the pushrod and straightened it by beating it with a rock against the freeway guardrail, but they had no replacement spacer. Would the whole adventure come to an ignominious conclusion on the Riverside Freeway just a few miles from their destination? Not a chance! Sheally eyeballed the size of the pushrod end and guessed that the 7/16 socket in their repair kit would fill the gap, which it did. With a flashlight taped on the front of the car (the headlights had not worked since the Tucson fire), Sheally and Hund motored on to their destination. And Sheally, in his boyishly enthusiastic way, sums it all up: "My only regret is that we don't have time to drive it back home to Virginia." |
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