Six hardy IET/PJP souls met up very early on Friday 5th July at the Rowing Lake in Peterborough and got to know each other on the drive down to Malvern, Worcestershire.

 

We arrived exactly on time to join with an IET/PJP member who had travelled independently. We were met and welcomed by our guide John who talked through a video of the history of the Motor Company, the development of the site from pre WW1 to the present, and ran through the itinerary for the visit. We commenced the tour and were shown around the woodworking sheds (the older types of Morgan contain significant amounts of Lincolnshire Ash), the sheet metal sheds (very noisy), the paint/spray bays, the leather and trim shops, the final assembly shed and the pre-delivery facility. It was particularly gratifying to see many young engineers hand building the cars and displaying first class skills in the fabrication and assembly of these beautiful motorcars. We were given plenty of time to see the full range of four and three wheeler Morgan cars in various states of assembly and in the finished article, particularly interesting were a number of one off vehicles in special livery and which we were lucky to meet the designer who talked through his ideas.

 

The tour concluded in the heritage centre and of course the shop which afforded the opportunity to buy a memento or two. We warmly thanked John for the informative and thoroughly enjoyable tour.

 

We lunched in a very pleasant local hostelry, after sampling some local delicacies and suitably refreshed we drove a short distance to the 3-Cs laboratory located in a large business park. We were met by Dr Eamonn Maher who explained the principles of Super-Conductivity and the work 3-Cs were doing with lightweight super conducting cylinders. We were treated to a number of eye opening demonstrations of the benefits of low temperature super-conductivity and the layering on thin super-conducting application into metal cylinders was amazing  – it was clear that the potential power gain applications were immense and hope that the research that 3-Cs are currently engaged in comes to successful economic fruition. We thanked Eamonn and his team in the usual manner and started the return journey through typically heavy Friday afternoon traffic

 

A special thank you must go to John Soares (Courteous Travel) who drove us all safely to Worcester and back and to Mick Ross who lead the group and ensured we all got the most out of the day and managed the formalities

 

I think I can safely say that all enjoyed the visits very much and that it would be a day we would not forget in a hurry.

 

Gav Hukin