[lynx42]

Spot on Mike. George Russell. I last saw him at Bendigo Swap Meet about 10/12 years ago or maybe more. Yes, he had a great collection of all sorts of parts and just happened to have the 216 pistons when I needed them in a hurry.

I had decided to do a run to Melbourne in the Chev the weekend before I was to leave for the trip to Darwin unfortunately the car used more than 15 litres of oil on the 300km. trip to Melbourne and as much on the way home. I could see the Darwin run was out of the question unless I fixed the engine. On the Monday morning I rang JP Piston and a few other places and ended up getting in contact with George Russell. He said that he had pistons and if I could get the bare block to him by 1.00pm on the Tuesday, he would re-bore the engine to suit his pistons that afternoon. The engine was quickly removed from the car and stripped down and I headed of to The Basin. George got to work straight away and I picked it up, finished, early on the Wednesday and had it back in the car by Wednesday evening. There was a problem with the rear main bearing which came loose on a test run on Thursday afternoon which I fixed that night and I left for Darwin on the Friday morning. I had a Jeep trailer on behind and about 15km. west of Sale the was a knocking sound which got louder and worst and then there was an almighty BANG and one of the tyres on the trailer blew to bits. I was never so happy to have a tyre blow-out in all my life. The "Back to the Track", trip is another story for another time.

regards Rick.