Juliet's Kenya Days blog

Letter from Graham to Simon & Pat 12 May 1975 –

Yesterday I put the cylinder head back on the van engine and the engine now runs on four cylinders. A valve had got very badly burnt. I think it was faulty for a long time but here the engine tends to boil easily so it was made much worse. I think the van’s radiator is clogged up and the chemicals which are supposed to clear it are not working because the water does not get through the tubes properly. We have made several journeys into the Rift Valley along dirt roads. It’s really quite exciting because the roads are difficult and there are wild animals around and if one got stuck it would be a very long walk to a garage. On our last trip we came to a stretch of mud about 20 metres long and I went into it just fast enough to reach the other side. We always see deer of various kinds on these trips and Maasai with their cattle and goats. Usually we see giraffes and sometimes baboons. The scenery is lovely.

Letter from Graham to David 26 June 1975 –

Last month I discovered an exhaust valve was burnt out so I took the head off and had the valve seat renewed and several other seats re-cut. The engineers also skimmed the head – all for the price of my ‘Tommy’ record (nearly £6). As a contrast I paid four times as much for a shock absorber this week. It pays to shop around because the BMC main dealers charge much more for parts than smaller shops.

Letter from Judy to Jane July 1975 –

Our minibus has proved very useful and we’ve had many good outings in it. For a long time it boiled every time we took it out which was very trying but then we flushed the radiator out in the bath and dislodged all the stones and mud inside it, so that cured that problem. Labour is cheap but parts are dear – we have got to buy 3 new shock absorbers £25 each and also new tyres £20 each soon. However we will be able to sell the minibus easily and for a good price too. The price of second hand vehicles is very high, mainly because every car has to be imported I suppose.

Letter from Graham to Rod 20 July 1975 –

Today I spent a few hours getting the minibus hand brake to work properly.

Letter from Judy to Nanny & Grandad 3 Nov 1975 –

We had to buy a new radiator for the minibus which set us back £50.

Letter from Graham to David 3 Dec 1975 –

Another job I did today was sticking some plastic foam on the bottom of the van door to stop dust coming in when we travel on dirt roads. Dust was a horrible nuisance previously though we learnt to put up with it. Yesterday I replaced the bronze bearings in my starter motor and it goes much better now. We will be spending Christmas at Meru National Park in glorious heat. Last time we had three calamities; first we had delays getting there because the engine was giving up. What seemed like petrol starvation turned out to be badly pitted contact-breaker points. I had smoothed them down once too often so that the hard steel had got worn right through. Our second calamity was a damaged, leaky radiator. This seemed to be caused by a stone getting between the fan and the back of the radiator. The four small holes took many hours to mend by soldering. The corroded copper did not take the solder properly and as the garage men were trying to get access to the little holes they opened up other holes. It would have been terribly expensive if I had been charged for the actual man hours consumed. I have a new radiator now and the engine stays beautifully cool. The old radiator was partly blocked by hard water deposits and did not work properly. The third bit of bad luck was getting stuck in soft sand. I went a bit crazy with frustration and ended up by having to stop and rest to cure the migraine I’d got. I seemed to gain some benefit from each calamity – experience is a valuable gain if I can prevent similar troubles happening again. Points get eroded faster here because of dust getting in the distributor. Dust also makes other bits dry up or even seize up – brake rod joints are quite a problem. Doors need oiling more often too – I have certainly learnt to take maintenance more seriously; I even changed the washers in the clutch master cylinder before it actually failed. It’s nice to be able to work on the van without getting frozen though I have been stopped by wet weather a few times.

Letter from Judy to Sue & Gravel 27 Apr 1976 –

We have finally decided to hang on to our minibus and not get a 4 wheel drive vehicle – the general consensus of opinion seems to be that you get stuck just as often with a 4 wheel drive (because you attempt more ambitious things) and when you get stuck you tend to be in remoter places and stuck much worse !

Letter from Graham to David 9 Sept 1976 –

Yesterday I got a lot of air in the brake system because the reservoir got too low. I shall check it more often in future !

Letter from Judy to Nanny & Grandad 16 Sept 1976 –

We have been having a fairly quiet time aided by having the van out of action for 10 days or so with brake and suspension trouble – I think the van will just about last out our time here and with luck we’ll be able to sell it at a vast profit just before it falls to bits ! Vehicle prices are so inflated now as imports are so rigidly restricted – a new ‘Beetle’ costs 56,000/- and we’ve been told we should not consider selling the van for less than 24,000/-. Tanzania has stopped importing vehicles completely so whenever anyone goes in from Kenya the Border Police take notes of engine and chassis numbers as well as all the usual details to prevent new engines being taken in in old bodies. It is all rather boring as it means a delay of 1-2 hours at the border every time. Our friend who was going to borrow our minibus for a trip into Tanzania decided against it in the end, for which decision we were later thankful as the day she was supposed to have left Nairobi was the day the brakes decided to give up.