Reply to "2017 Spa Classic in Pantera"

So drove on, gas in the tank, schnitzel in the stomach. Time looked good, I would get to where I wanted at 4pm, could maybe watch icehockey world cup.

Not to be. It's starting to be a tradition for me to have major issue on the first day. Not every year but day one of my first LMC trip in this Pantera is a day neither my wife nor me will ever forget. She got very quiet as the issues happened, that's rare. And last year in the Longchamp, major fail that required hours of work. And those years, like now, it's not as if it's the first trip in the car, Longchamp is almost daily driver, and Pantera has been on 4 trips already this year with nothing to fix at all. But apparently these German highways test us to the limit. As I would experience.

Stopped for gas again, filled up, paid, back in car. Ignition on, push start button. Nothing. Not even ignition, gauges and warning ligts dead. Hhmm, reminded me of Longchamp last year. Oh s... . Thankfully I was in a not very busy gas station, and not many people interested in my problems. Time to fix the Pantera. I pulled it backwards away from gas pumps, but stayed under the roof, rain was threatening.

I had an idea of what the problem was. This winter the ignition switch failed on the starter circuit. Mike Drew very cleverly said: "Replace it" but in my wisdow I thought it's only the starter circuit, I'll replace that with a push button. And I did. I should have known not to leave a failing component in my car! Mike was right.

So took the steering column down, just like on the LC, and used a test light, yes ignition circuit faulty. So put in three wires, hanging down into the foot area of the driver, when connecting correctly, I could start and drive. Hurray, mobile again.