production houses and radio stations
consulting with him for years to get the
exact note of specific vehicles, he has
now built up a comprehensive sound
library of car engines.
The passion was, for a soul as
inquisitive as this one, inevitable.
Without the distraction of sight, his
quest for stimulation led to alternate
discoveries and, beginning with
household appliances, from a very early
age he came to understand (and love) the
sound of machinery. It became apparent
at that time that he had perfect pitch and
he began playing the piano at four, the
first link in his equation of engines to
musical instruments.
This facility now dominates his
appreciation of – and expertise with –
cars as surely as sight guides the rest
of us. And a lack of the latter in no way
limits his enthusiasm. Oh no. The man
is, by any definition, a car nut. And if
his choices are individual, they simply
reflect his unique parameters in making
them: he owns and loves an MG RV8,
for instance, bought in 2007. It fitted
his criteria, blending the abstract of
MG history with the aural treat of the
Rover V8 engine for which he had four
exhaust systems built, flow tested and
tuned until it produced the note he was
looking for.
And found. And allowed me to savour
when he brought the car out to the
village to swap rides between his car
and mine. And, damn it, that’s the first
time ever that my side-piped E-Type
has come second in a sound-off. Okay,
the Jaguar’s still prettier but Alistair’s
parameter is hard to argue. After all, you
spend a lot more time hearing your car
than looking at it.
Which doesn’t mean that his stable is
completely devoid of aesthetic merit. In
2008, after comprehensive searching on
the ’net, he bought a 1991 Walkinshaw
XJS, one of only 240 built. Sadly, this
fabulous V12-powered creation remains
in the UK due to import restrictions but,
as I am learning, little gets between our
guy and a giggle and if he has to go over
there to drive it...
Because drive ’em he does. Not on
public roads (hem, hem) but on private
property and, with someone else
steering, on anything resembling a
racetrack whenever the opportunity
arrives. Failing that, he’s entirely
happy to let selected friends pilot one
of his cars while he savours it from
the passenger side, as he did recently
when he came out to show ’n’ share the
Lotus Excel that, in 2009, he shipped
to Australia to undertake the twin
challenges of getting it to, (a) comply
with our legalities and, (b) provide a
level of predictability quite unimagined
by its manufacturer.
And it is on those visits, graced
beyond mere roadwork by good food,
company and conversation, that
Alistair’s alternate existence is revealed
as indeed different. But not deficient.
Within moments of entering our home
for the first time he complimented us
on the generous height of its ceilings
and, in moving beneath them, needed
no warning of floor-changes from
carpet to tile to timber because, I can
only presume, a sonar sense of sorts
predicted every wall-opening, and
experience alerted him to the associated
possibility of flooring change. This acute
development of his other senses makes
Alistair’s relationship to cars so unique.
Now able to diagnose mechanical
condition purely by touch, sound and
scent, his capability in the field began
at an early age. As a child he was taught
by a science teacher friend of the family
how an engine functioned and, in the
garage at merely five or six years of
age, was instructed by this still fondly-
remembered soul how to pull an engine
apart and, even more critically, put it
back together.
At the age of 11, he was taken to a
friend’s workshop and taught how to
rebuild and work on a small diesel
tractor. And the learning has not stopped
since. Seeking input from friends and
professionals whenever possible, over
the years Alistair has assembled an
enormous cognisance of make and
model variants. And using speech
software on his computer allows him,
through visiting car sites and reading
magazines (there’s another one?), to sate
an ongoing thirst for the latest news and
information.
But this quest goes well beyond the
abstract. A large and handy fellow,
Alistair is a more comfortable than
most – okay, me – with the oily end
of proceedings and quite happy to
exercise his learning. Which means
that stripping and reassembling whole
drivetrains holds no terror for the man- and just to give you some idea of the
accomplishment involved, imagine
attempting that on your own car in pitch
darkness.
There are limitations, of course, and
Alistair is not so stubborn as to ignore
them. He has, for instance, always
needed sighted assistance when working
on electrics or any other components
or processes that involve colour or
coding. But that collaboration is more
Alistair can identify
a matchbox car in
seconds; his Lotus
Excel is currently
in the workshop,
although Alistair
personally handles
all his MG RV8’s
maintenanced motorofficial f motor_mag^107