Road Trip from Port to Chicago

[Outbound]

So my new-to-me Superlight R will be here in late August. Arriving at the Baltimore port along with another Caterham that my buddy bought with me. My first plan was to have both cars shipped to my place in Chicago, and go from there.

 

Then found out that relatively easy to get a Special Temp Registration Plate, and can easily pick up the car from the Port after it clears customs. So why not turn this into a bit of an adventure?

 

Our tentative plan is to fly into Baltimore with a duffel bag of whatever stuff we need, a few changes of clothes, and plan to spend 2-3 days meandering our way back to Chicago via the backroads. We are both used to transiting for hours and hours in fully caged rally cars, and I used to daily drive and do road trips in my Lotus Elise a decade ago. So not too worried about "it'll suck" since the suck is part of the adventure.

 

My question to the forum though. What would you pack for a trip picking up a Caterham sight unseen?

 

I have confidence in the reliability as its coming from Sevens & Classics in the UK, getting a full inspection, good tread depth on the tires, all fluids changed and checked, etc.

 

My tentative list is:

• Flat tire kit (can steal this from my GR86)
• Variety of wrenches/screwdrivers/hammers in case need to adjust or tighten something, maybe?
  • Speaking of, what sizes would I need to adjust the steering column?
• Sunscreen
• Hearing protection, though we may get those Husqvarna Bluetooth headsets for hearing protection/communication
• Enough changes of clothes in case it rains

 

Is there any other suggestions? Or specific wrench sizes I should pack for items that might need attention along the way?

 

[Vovchandr]

18v battery air pump

LED road "flares" emergency lights 

Spare bicycle throttle cable kit

Phone mount 

USB battery bank to charge phone 

AAA membership or Hagerty drivers club for flat bed towing 

 

I carry a ton of tools and hardware everywhere I go. Mine was never as mechanically sound as yours but these are old cars so things happen. Rubber dries, things leak etc. I've had many break downs along the way. Make good stories. 

 

 

[CBuff]

I picked my car up in buffalo last month. And drove it 560 miles home.  Not as ambitious as you. It was incident free but packed:

- mini tool kit with ratchet, Allen keys , screw drivers etc

- fix a flat can

- 12v inflator

- emergency light / hazard light 

- flash light/headlamp

- AirPods / earplugs

- 12v adapter for usb/or battery pack

- go pro 

- heavy duty zip ties

- bungees or fasteners for gear 

- tow rope (to pull out of dangerous situation ). I had a chase car

- towel to lay on, deal with rain or place bonnet on if removed, wipe windshield

- Hagerty insurance and drivers club

- a couple of large garbage bags )randomly always carry these and they come in handle. 
 

-I didn’t bring but maybe some baling wire, tape, hose clamps ??? Maybe jumper cables or jumper battery pack (could also be your power bank)

 

Cloths

- hat 

- driving shoes

- wet weather gear

 

 

 

[CBuff]

This is the tool kit I got. Small and pack able. 
 

https://a.co/d/hK3rtYK
 

 

you may want some electrical wire and crimpers for some side of the road electrical fixes. 

[JohnCh]

Good list above.  I also carry self-fusing silicon tape for hose leaks, and a very small multimeter, some wire, crimps and crimpers.  Oh, and duct tape.  When all else fails, duct tape.  

[Outbound]

Cars getting loaded on the boat. Only a few more weeks. Mine in orange, and my buddy is getting the blue one.

 

Edited August 15 by Outbound

[slowdude]

Bring a razor blade and a small bottle of rubbing alcohol. Ports sometimes affix big stickers to windscreens to tell dock workers where the car needs to go.

[Outbound]

Well, it's done. And it was as much as an adventure as we hoped.

 

Got the notice that the cars were ready, and booked a one-way flight to Baltimore, meeting up with my buddy Zach. We spent the afternoon getting some crab cakes from Duda's, and watching an Orioles game. Shockingly baseball games are more enjoyable when you can just sit back and chat verses having to wrangle kids. Used the lime scooters to jet around the harbor.

 

Next morning got to the Port at 8am to meet our escort who would take us into the port, get through all the paperwork, move us between a few buildings, and ultimately find our cars in the lot. Though honestly was quite hard to miss!

 

 

Surprisingly both cars fired up, and we got situated, figured out what controls did what, and then followed our escort out of the port. Mine (in orange) was sputtering and not idling too well, but figured we'd get it sorted.

Left the port and headed to the closest gas station, as my guage was showing beyond E. Pulling into the station it was sputtering and barely idling. Great. This is going to be a good start if the car can barely idle.... Filled up with gas and put in 9.5 gallons. We both concluded that this must have a 10-gallon tank since it was showing so close to empty. I later looked up the tank size, its 36L which translates to 9.51 gallons..... Thankfully this gas station was only 1.5 miles away!

 

But then the car wouldn't start. Okay, easy push start and we decided to head to Autozone to get some supplies and check the battery. Found a harbor freight next to it, bought a cheap tool set and tweaked some things like the pedals and checking various coolant lines, electrical, and fastener checks where we could. The battery looked nearly brand new, and tested okay, just low voltage. So we figured maybe had some vampire current from sitting on the boat, and just not enough to start it a few times without giving the alternator time to charge it up. No biggie, we'll hit the road, and we'll pop start if need to.

 

 

We slogged through baltimore traffic, as we wanted to avoid the interstate while getting used to these things. Took an hour to get through and out of the city, in pretty hot weather, starting to regret this idea of driving all the way to chicago if it sucks this much, but no matter. A few short blasts through some nice suburban homes gets us excited that this will be great.

 

We finally made it out into the backroads of Maryland and into PA where started getting glimpses of how fun this is. Sweeping country roads, empty traffic, and the intake trumpeting from the front. We kept moving west and made a sobering stop at the United 93 National Memorial. Got some food at a local restaurant nearby and decided to push to south of Pittsburgh to stop for the night.

 

The last 30 minutes of our drive was on an amazing back road filled with tight corners, except.... it was dark, and my headlights were both pointing to the left. Made for wonderful left hand turns, and slow, sketchy right-hand turns. Ha. But made it to the hotel and got a solid nights sleep.

 

 

The next day we set off, intent to head to Toledo where we'd split off and head our separate ways (onto Detroit and Chicago). Somewhere in Ohio I did a pull from a highway stop light up to 70-80mph and felt the car drop a cylinder. Oh boy.... here we go. Could hardly hold at 60mph and made it to the first exit, and pulled off on a small road. Pulled off the hood expecting the worst. Only to thankfully find that a spark plug boot wire had popped off the distributor cap. Weird, but an easy fix. Double checked all the other boot connections and then fired up.

 

Only to find that now Zach's car wasn't starting. No click of the solenoid, so checked all that wiring, seemed okay. Okay let's roll the car back and push start you this time. Then for some reason when he cranked it fired up, no problem. Odd. Oh well.

 

 

We made our way a little more south, avoiding a large storm system brewing near the lake. Only got spit on a bit while blasting down the farm field highways of Ohio.

 

Finally made it to Toledo, got some lunch, got preached to by a man at a Mcdonalds gas station, one guy almost blocked us in while trying to leave, saying "I saw this from across the street, I've never seen a Caterham in my life, let alone TWO of them! Can I get a pic?". The usual gas station conversations ensue and then Zach and I split our ways. His car wouldn't start again, but this time we found the solenoid signal wire had completed back off, so plugged that back in firmly, and fired right up.

 

At this point, I just wanted to get home. So I hit the interstate and mostly cruised at 70mph while having to jump out of the car at every toll booth (forgot my EZ Pass of course). Would pull up to the booth with my belts unbuckled, quickly pull off the steering wheel, jump out, grab a ticket or pay the toll, jump back in, pull forward and then off to the side to take my time getting belted up, take a drink of water, and get settled.

 

Hit Chicago right at 5pm on a Friday night, slogged through traffic on Lakeshore Drive.

 

One highlight was that I was in bumper to bumper traffic right next to Solider Field, and I hear some planes coming. I look up and two F-18's flying in formation fly a few hundred feet over my head, practicing for their Sunday afternoon football flyover. Something special when in a car like the Caterham. Couldn't get the grin off my face.

 

Finally made it home to my condo. With my 6 year old daughter losing her mind. Tippy tap toes so excited to jump in, couldn't even wait for me to pull into the garage before she was trying to climb inside. Mission accomplished.

 

All in all, heck of an adventure, glad I had a great friend to do it with, and love how simple these cars are that can go 800 miles with easily solvable niggles without fully disabling the cars.

 

Would I do it again? Probably not. But so so glad I did.

[slowdude]

18 minutes ago, Outbound said:

Well, it's done. And it was as much as an adventure as we hoped.

 

Got the notice that the cars were ready, and booked a one-way flight to Baltimore, meeting up with my buddy Zach. We spent the afternoon getting some crab cakes from Duda's, and watching an Orioles game. Shockingly baseball games are more enjoyable when you can just sit back and chat verses having to wrangle kids. Used the lime scooters to jet around the harbor.

 

Next morning got to the Port at 8am to meet our escort who would take us into the port, get through all the paperwork, move us between a few buildings, and ultimately find our cars in the lot. Though honestly was quite hard to miss!

 

 

Surprisingly both cars fired up, and we got situated, figured out what controls did what, and then followed our escort out of the port. Mine (in orange) was sputtering and not idling too well, but figured we'd get it sorted.

Left the port and headed to the closest gas station, as my guage was showing beyond E. Pulling into the station it was sputtering and barely idling. Great. This is going to be a good start if the car can barely idle.... Filled up with gas and put in 9.5 gallons. We both concluded that this must have a 10-gallon tank since it was showing so close to empty. I later looked up the tank size, its 36L which translates to 9.51 gallons..... Thankfully this gas station was only 1.5 miles away!

 

But then the car wouldn't start. Okay, easy push start and we decided to head to Autozone to get some supplies and check the battery. Found a harbor freight next to it, bought a cheap tool set and tweaked some things like the pedals and checking various coolant lines, electrical, and fastener checks where we could. The battery looked nearly brand new, and tested okay, just low voltage. So we figured maybe had some vampire current from sitting on the boat, and just not enough to start it a few times without giving the alternator time to charge it up. No biggie, we'll hit the road, and we'll pop start if need to.

 

 

We slogged through baltimore traffic, as we wanted to avoid the interstate while getting used to these things. Took an hour to get through and out of the city, in pretty hot weather, starting to regret this idea of driving all the way to chicago if it sucks this much, but no matter. A few short blasts through some nice suburban homes gets us excited that this will be great.

 

We finally made it out into the backroads of Maryland and into PA where started getting glimpses of how fun this is. Sweeping country roads, empty traffic, and the intake trumpeting from the front. We kept moving west and made a sobering stop at the United 93 National Memorial. Got some food at a local restaurant nearby and decided to push to south of Pittsburgh to stop for the night.

 

The last 30 minutes of our drive was on an amazing back road filled with tight corners, except.... it was dark, and my headlights were both pointing to the left. Made for wonderful left hand turns, and slow, sketchy right-hand turns. Ha. But made it to the hotel and got a solid nights sleep.

 

 

The next day we set off, intent to head to Toledo where we'd split off and head our separate ways (onto Detroit and Chicago). Somewhere in Ohio I did a pull from a highway stop light up to 70-80mph and felt the car drop a cylinder. Oh boy.... here we go. Could hardly hold at 60mph and made it to the first exit, and pulled off on a small road. Pulled off the hood expecting the worst. Only to thankfully find that a spark plug boot wire had popped off the distributor cap. Weird, but an easy fix. Double checked all the other boot connections and then fired up.

 

Only to find that now Zach's car wasn't starting. No click of the solenoid, so checked all that wiring, seemed okay. Okay let's roll the car back and push start you this time. Then for some reason when he cranked it fired up, no problem. Odd. Oh well.

 

 

We made our way a little more south, avoiding a large storm system brewing near the lake. Only got spit on a bit while blasting down the farm field highways of Ohio.

 

Finally made it to Toledo, got some lunch, got preached to by a man at a Mcdonalds gas station, one guy almost blocked us in while trying to leave, saying "I saw this from across the street, I've never seen a Caterham in my life, let alone TWO of them! Can I get a pic?". The usual gas station conversations ensue and then Zach and I split our ways. His car wouldn't start again, but this time we found the solenoid signal wire had completed back off, so plugged that back in firmly, and fired right up.

 

At this point, I just wanted to get home. So I hit the interstate and mostly cruised at 70mph while having to jump out of the car at every toll booth (forgot my EZ Pass of course). Would pull up to the booth with my belts unbuckled, quickly pull off the steering wheel, jump out, grab a ticket or pay the toll, jump back in, pull forward and then off to the side to take my time getting belted up, take a drink of water, and get settled.

 

Hit Chicago right at 5pm on a Friday night, slogged through traffic on Lakeshore Drive.

 

One highlight was that I was in bumper to bumper traffic right next to Solider Field, and I hear some planes coming. I look up and two F-18's flying in formation fly a few hundred feet over my head, practicing for their Sunday afternoon football flyover. Something special when in a car like the Caterham. Couldn't get the grin off my face.

 

Finally made it home to my condo. With my 6 year old daughter losing her mind. Tippy tap toes so excited to jump in, couldn't even wait for me to pull into the garage before she was trying to climb inside. Mission accomplished.

 

All in all, heck of an adventure, glad I had a great friend to do it with, and love how simple these cars are that can go 800 miles with easily solvable niggles without fully disabling the cars.

 

Would I do it again? Probably not. But so so glad I did.

Sounds like an awesome adventure!

 

Save yourself $300 instead of buying and wiring a full LED cluster and buy these LED bulbs. I still haven't figured out how to get my rhd headlights aligned well so I just turned them slightly. The LEDs help a ton, to the point where you can actually drive it. Plug and play, 5 minute upgrade. 

 

https://www.classiccarleds.co.uk/products/latest-led-headlights-h4-philips-z-es-hi-lo-beam-conversion-9-32v

 

Also look into picking up a soft bits tunnel bag. Helps to store your wallet etc so you're not constantly fumbling around etc.

 

Welcome!

[Outbound]

Just now, slowdude said:

Sounds like an awesome adventure!

 

Save yourself $300 instead of buying and wiring a full LED cluster and buy these LED bulbs. I still haven't figured out how to get my rhd headlights aligned well so I just turned them slightly. The LEDs help a ton, to the point where you can actually drive it. Plug and play, 5 minute upgrade. 

 

https://www.classiccarleds.co.uk/products/latest-led-headlights-h4-philips-z-es-hi-lo-beam-conversion-9-32v

 

Also look into picking up a soft bits tunnel bag. Helps to store your wallet etc so you're not constantly fumbling around etc.

 

Welcome!

I actually am a lighting engineer. I designed the SL2 headlight bulbs that Diode Dynamics makes almost 10 years ago.  Those headlight bulbs aren't the worst, but nothing beats a properly designed headlight with an LED source from the start. I ended up finding the OEM Caterham LED units (sold under United Pacific from Summit Racing for the LHD models) and got those before the car even arrived. Also have the new LED Rear light kit.

 

Given my company (www.outboundlighting.com) designs LED lights, it's an important part to me.

 

Fits in the tightest spots in my warehouse too! Haha.

 

[slowdude]

1 minute ago, Outbound said:

I actually am a lighting engineer. I designed the SL2 headlight bulbs that Diode Dynamics makes almost 10 years ago.  Those headlight bulbs aren't the worst, but nothing beats a properly designed headlight with an LED source from the start. I ended up finding the OEM Caterham LED units (sold under United Pacific from Summit Racing for the LHD models) and got those before the car even arrived. Also have the new LED Rear light kit.

 

Given my company (www.outboundlighting.com) designs LED lights, it's an important part to me.

 

Fits in the tightest spots in my warehouse too! Haha.

 

Even better! I'm a cheapskate and skeptical to big changes so the bulbs were the easiest for me. Have held up so far but I'd imagine when they finally bite the dust I'll be ordering from you. 😎

[JohnCh]

What a great adventure and writeup!  Did Zach make it home without further issues?

[Outbound]

41 minutes ago, JohnCh said:

What a great adventure and writeup!  Did Zach make it home without further issues?

It was indeed a fun adventure, the kind we don’t get to do so much anymore since we both have growing families of our own, and our own thriving  businesses now. Was great to unplug and just focus on the adventure of driving for a few days.
 

He did make it home with zero issues once we found the signal wire itself was having flaky contact.

 

I did some work on the car today, redid the vacuum lines with new 4mm ID tubing and tees, now the car idles a lot smoother and can leave a light without having to rev a bunch, or buck at low RPMs. There was clearly some small leaks in there. 

[Marek]

22 hours ago, Outbound said:

I actually am a lighting engineer. I designed the SL2 headlight bulbs that Diode Dynamics makes almost 10 years ago.  Those headlight bulbs aren't the worst, but nothing beats a properly designed headlight with an LED source from the start. I ended up finding the OEM Caterham LED units (sold under United Pacific from Summit Racing for the LHD models) and got those before the car even arrived. Also have the new LED Rear light kit.

 

Given my company (www.outboundlighting.com) designs LED lights, it's an important part to me.

 

Fits in the tightest spots in my warehouse too! Haha.

 

 

 

Great trip report.  Thanks for that!

 

I'll take your comments as an endorsement of the Union Pacifics as good quality with sufficient light.  What is your opinion on 7" vs 5.75" lights?  My Seven came with the smaller lights and they fit the car well (and a 7" would require new housings, mountings, and a different look).  Is the 5.75" a significant sacrifice?

[Outbound]

45 minutes ago, Marek said:

 

Great trip report.  Thanks for that!

 

I'll take your comments as an endorsement of the Union Pacifics as good quality with sufficient light.  What is your opinion on 7" vs 5.75" lights?  My Seven came with the smaller lights and they fit the car well (and a 7" would require new housings, mountings, and a different look).  Is the 5.75" a significant sacrifice?

 

They are rebranded lights manufactured by Sirius (http://www.ns-sirius.com/products.php?page=9&plevel=2&pmid1=1&pmid2=4&pmid3=&keyword=)  but when I fired them up on my power supply they looked like they have a plenty solid beam pattern.

 

I have a friend who is the optical engineer for Morimoto lighting, and he's shown me all the optical data on these 5.75" headlights he designed and it looks amazing.

https://www.morimotohid.com/housing-morimoto-sealed6-led-5-7-5?quantity=1

However, I wanted the OEM look. If I am not thrilled with these oem ones, I might spring for the Moriomoto. Or I'll get them anyways and do a back to back. Ultimately I don't plan on driving the car too much at night (it'll be put away for the winter) so ultimate lighting performance wasn't high on my list. A clean OEM look was the ideal one, and there are a lotttttt of bad looking 5.75" options out there.

 

As far as 5.75" vs 7". If sticking with halogen bulbs, then yea the larger the lamp the better. However with LED it doesn't really matter much. Ultimately could even have a tiny 2-3" headlight with a proper projector and it'd outperform a 7" halogen. Just would look very odd on these cars. 5.75" I think modernizes the look and makes it look lower and wider, so that's why I went down that path.

[Slonie]

Thanks for the intel on LEDs for our cars. The Morimotos look pretty decent, and the Union Pacific are definitely a lot more affordable than the Caterham-branded version.

 

And also, worlds are colliding here as I have an Outbound light that gets used every week (and so do two of my night ride friends, after seeing mine).

[Croc]

On 9/10/2024 at 8:27 PM, Outbound said:

I have a friend who is the optical engineer for Morimoto lighting, and he's shown me all the optical data on these 5.75" headlights he designed and it looks amazing.

https://www.morimotohid.com/housing-morimoto-sealed6-led-5-7-5?quantity=1

 

 

Totally non-seven related but I just ordered a set of those 5.75" for my Range Rover CSK rebuild where it has the rare dual 4 headlight (7" and 5.75") grille.  Morimoto was an excellent find!

 

 

[I B Sevener]

Wonderful write up Outbound. Now, keep doing the drives but take your little ones with you so that they are properly raised regarding Sevens.