Then my generation came a few years later and the Spitfires got hooked to all kinds of repurposed sled items. As we grew up, they were parked for a few years. Then my brother thought he would get them going. Adding a little gas and some new plugs had them off and going again. Then one started the day creeping on the clutch and ended the day ghost riding into the neighbor's fence half a mile away across a field....(story best told verbally) I determined, at 13, the crank seal failed and caused the runaway. My brother, being my brother, ordered parts and scattered the two sleds across a 4x8 sheet of plywood in the barn. A couple more years and I was itching for some snow fun. Armed with my deductive reasoning skills and my mental image of what it looked like before my brother started fixing it, I drove in to the pile right before a winter storm. A few days later, we had one running sled again! Then I spent the next several miles finding every nut I didn't properly torque.
BTW, I owe most of my mechanical abilities to following after my brother.... Several years of fun later, I bought better, faster sleds and this one got moved further back in the barn till it was put in the hay mow. Then it was job, house, wife kids.... I now have 3 kids that need to be steeped in the Spitfire goodness.
If I remember correctly, it had carb issues when I parked it last, I did find the carb in the glove box... In order to not repeat history, I will be replacing the crank seals. It will be just a get it going and make it look OK kind of project, because if my sons are anything like me it shouldn't be fixed up too nice yet.... And yes, that speedometer says 3,875 miles, and the speedo pin broke several miles back....
