The MGA With An Attitude
MGA Guru Is GOING MOBILE
The British Invasion, Stowe, Vermont - (September 19-22, 2025)
Friday, September 19, 2025:
Then heading north through Vermont for an 5-pm appointment to check into The British Invasion car show in Stowe, Vermont, Turned off of VT-108 onto I-89 north, and promptly blew a head gasket while winding the engine up for the long uphill entrance ramp. Bummer, we don't have time for this right now. Cursory inspection revealed combustion gas blowing directly tout the back of the head gasket at the rear head bolt location. Hadn't seen failure at that location before. Oil pressure and water temperature okay, doesn't look to serious, so we opted to remove #4 spark plug to kill combustion and drop the pressure, and drive on running on three cylinders. Sounds like a Briggs and Stratton single cylinder with a bad muffler, but it runs pretty good on three cylinders. We cruised into the car show registration at the Stowe fairgrounds right on schedule at 5:30-pm.
First incident for the week end was a dent in the LR fender of a Triumph, lightly grazed by a big Jaguar sedan. We picked up the registration packet, grabbed a beer and sat to chat with a few folks.
When they headed into town for evening celebration (and maybe a live band), we headed 10 miles farther north to find a decent WiFi spot in Morrisville, Vermont. This one was open late, so I managed to finish the photos and notes for the prior few days.
Saturday, September 20, 2025:
Breakfast in Morrisville, VT, then 10-miles south back to Stowe, VT for the car show. We had registration number 202, filed a month ago, so maybe 300 or so British cars present today (not counting a couple hundred visitor cars parked in the next field). After getting parked in the right line, next business was to walk around nearly two hours taking pictures of the show cars, mostly in small groups. Starting with MGA, see if you can count them, I'm not counting.
Find some early production MG Triple-M cars, Midget, Magna, and Magnette,
Before a couple rows of MG T-type.
On to a few rows of MGB and MG BGT.
The red one has a nice carbureted V6 transplant.
Throw in a few MGC for good measure,
before getting to theMG "modern" Midgets.
This MG Midget was sporting an unusual bolt-on fast-back hatch hard top.
It did not seem to be easily removable, so I suppose it was intended to be semi-permanent.
One more picture inside of the MG Midget GT before moving on to the vintage Jaguar.
Lots of old Jag's before the newer ones.
The red shooting brake style car is a 1973 Reliant Scimitar. The big black and cream car is a 1951 Alvis TA-21. Of course the little two-tone green and white cars are Metropolitan.
Here is a Jensen Healey, a pair of Jensen Interceptor, two TVR 280i, a 1971 TVR Vixen 2500, and a 1980 TVR Taimar.
Below right is a 1940 Morris 10 Series M Saloon, sitting next to two Morris Minor, a woody wagon and a convertible.
Can't niss the three wheel Morgan Super Sport, 1931 maybe.
Two slightly larger Morgan, a 4-4 (little Morgan with 1600 engine), a Plus-4 with larger Triumph engine, and a 2009 Mini Cooper.
the silver car is a 1964 Alvis Grabber Super Coupe, followed by some Land Rover.
the big grey and black saloon car at far right is 1953 Triumph TDC Renown. Next to it is a 1977 Triumph Dolomite Sprint.
We have a lot of Lotus, starting with Elan, Elite, Europa,
And two Lotus Elise before getting into the vintage Mini.
I think the multi-color Mini was the star of the show for the week end, and don't miss the Mini Moke.
Mini truck, and a 1987 Austin Mini rebodied DHC (Drop Head Coupe?).
Then get5ing into some Triumph. The grey one is a TR5 with 2.5-Liter fuel injected six cylinder engine.
Lots of TR6.
Some TR7 and TR8.
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Couple of Triumph Spitfire before some GT6+.
TR4, TR4A,and a bunch of TR3 and TR3A.
And some Aston Martin at the end of that line.
All around the fairgrounds, and I hope I got pictures of all the show cars by quarter of twelve. Fifteen minutes to rest before getting to work at noon to change the blown head gasket. About an hour to remove the carburetors and intake manifold, and lift off the cylinder head. I already knew exactly what we were going to find, and why it was my own damn fault, so kick me now.
Not long ago we were installing a new vacuum signal pipe from rear carburetor to distributor, and there is a large P-clip to hold the pipe on the rear head stud. Since the factory did not see fit to install a longer stud in that location, there is not enough thread to add a second nut. So the rear head stud nut has to be removed to R&R the big P-clip. And wouldn't you know, I forgot to re-torque that rear head nut after installing the new vacuum pipe. In fact I just removed that rear head nut with my fingers, without touching it with a wrench. So naturally the head gasket blew out the back right next to that stud.Bummer. Dammit. Kick me. But once you figure out what the problem is, it always turns out to be something simple. At least we can be confident that the new head gasket will be a proper fix and should hold up okay, assuming it gets properly torqued down of course.
As soon as the engine ran and idled well, we shut it down while the awards were being presented, just relax and recover. Then we ambled over to the Stoweflake Hotel for an evening banquet, for which we and a lot of other people were an hour early. Empty hallway, closed doors, and the bar was not yet open, so just sit and relax/recover some more. The bar was opening about quarter to seven, so grab a drink and crash the door to the banquet room, still not entirely ready. 7:30-pm before ceremonies began, 7:45-pm before we could attack the buffet table. Somewhat disorganized, someone speaking while we were eating, desert table available as soon as we could get there. Not much more ceremony, as the car show awards were presented at the car show. Sorry, no pictures from the banquet, which was little more than a dinner meeting.
Sunday, September 21, 2025:
Good morning for the second full day of the car show.
With some time to spare while the show cars were rolling back in for the color show, it was a good opportunity to check out a very nicely restored MGA 1500 Coupe for sale in the Car Coral. -- The story is, the car was nicely restored, finishing about 2001 with only minor detailing incomplete. It was then parked until 2018 when the current owner bought it. He did some cleaning and buffing to finish it nicely (may have paid a pro shop for some of the detailing work). It has only been driven a few thousand miles in the past 7 years, and has been well cared for, so it still shows nicely today. -- In case someone wants to do the expedient thing, and buy one that has already been restored, this is your chance.
 If interested, contact Paul Wegman in Old Forge, New York -- Ph: 585-967-4605 -- email: bkblt@aol.com
There were some commercial vendors, some food service, and a few swap meet vendors to visit. This time the show cars were parked generally with other cars of similar colors, so there was voting and awards for Best Red Car, Best White Car, etc. There were also awards for Best Period Correct vintage clothes and car decorations.
On to the color show, beginning with, Two-Tone cars.
Green.
White.
Black, but this sort of morphs into shades of dark grey.
And Rainbow. Well,I recon there is only one car that is three colors or more, the flashy little vintage Mini. But I think this is a catch-all class collecting other odd colors that don't fit into the more basic colors.
Red.
No clue about the last two cars on the end.
And there was a Tail Gate Party going on with awards for Best Presentation, Best food, Best Theme, and I don't recall what else, but the fried chicken and pumpkin pie were good. I think there were four Tail Gate set-ups, and for sure they all got a ribbon for something of a noble cause, all jolly good fun.
Once the fun was done, photos taken, and awards distributed, the place was clearing out by mid afternoon. We headed a bit south to stop for late lunch and WiFi at Burlington VT where I could get a little work done downloading pictures and catching up email. Processing the photos and notes was a lot of work. Maybe I should take fewer pictures, Hope you enjoy the show.
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