I keep breaking stuff!

[Lippyp]

I'm having a real bummer of a day. Went to my local cruise last night and on the way back noticed a harsh vibration when I pulled away (this was after a fairly enthusiastic take-off at a road junction. Had a look underneath this morning and guess what? The propshaft centre bearing had bust, the spot welds holding it to the mounting plate had failed on one side. It's only eight months old. Fortunately the garage that fitted it said "bring it over and we'll weld it back up" which they have done and also re-inforced the other side....crappy pattern parts.

At the same time when it was up on the ramp the mechanic pointed out to me that all four tires are cracking around the side wall from old age (tires were on there when I bought the truck two years ago so I don't know how old they are.) So I now need four new tires, and the brakes have started pulling slightly to the left on the way home from the garage so I need to have a look at them too. Just to round things off the heatwave we have had here for the last week (high 80's, thats hot for the UK!) week has broken and we're forecast heavy rain and thunderstorms.

Has anybody had any experience with Cooper Discoverer HT tires? Are they any good? It's looking like either these or Bridgestones (31x10.5R15's on there, currently no name all-terrains)

There was a real wild car at the cruise last night, a mk IV Ford Cortina (probably the most boring square shaped early 80's family car Ford made in the UK, beloved of travelling salesmen!) with a spaceframe front end, a mid mounted 406ci Ford V8 where the bulkhead used to be with a huge supercharger mounted in front of the engine low down behind the grille (a bit like the old pre-WWI Blower Bentleys) open headers and an aluminium interior, twin radiators, one either side of the blower mounted at an angle with electric fans, this thing is apparently seriously quick down the strip running 12.68 @ 112mph. The biggest engine available as standard was a 2.3l V6!

This is a standard Cortina for you to feast your eyes on!