First off, let me note that this issue is going online partially complete, because it's long past time to put a new issue online. We'll be finishing and adding articles for another week or so.

I was awakened this morning by the season's first squadron of Canada geese honking by overhead on their way south to wherever it is they go. The days are distinctly shorter than they were two weeks ago. Summer is ending -- a very busy summer, in our case.

Summer began early for us. Lee "VolvoGirl" Holman stayed with us for a week in early May, which was a hoot. Lee is an enormously energetic and enthusiastic woman who also happens to be the perfect house guest and it was great having her here. In her case, they didn't just break the mold -- there never was one. She's hand crafted.

Next was the IPD Garage Sale, where Lee and I were supposed to give a tech session. It sort of didn't happen, at least not in the sense that we stood up on a platform in front of a crowd. Instead we just roamed around and fielded questions one-on-one as people approached us, so I guess that counts.

Hard on the heels of that (Lee actually left after we did), Marsha and I embarked on a two-week trip to the eastern U.S. We flew to a very hot and muggy Orlando, Florida, for a stay at Disney World, then drove a rented Hyundai to Georgia to visit my mother and one brother there. Next stop was the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina to drop in on Brooks Townes, then tagging along with his 1800ES to Watkins Glen in western New York for the big Volvo event there (see Three Days of Volvos). We ended by visiting my other brother and his wife on their 12 acres of heaven by the Delaware River in eastern New York, and we finally turned in the Hyundai in Newark, New Jersey, and flew back home from there.

The next event for us was Zupan's Historic Races in Portland. There was only one Volvo racing this year; a black 1800S owned by Joe Contreiras from British Columbia. Joe was having a lot of problems. Cameron donated a head gasket to the cause, and I spent much of Sunday overhauling the car's distributor and generally trying to get it to run decently. We did get it to go from a "no start" to an "actually finish the race" status, but its Weber carbs had disastrous jetting and we didn't have parts available to do anything about that. Joe did manage to beat a Saab Sonnet with it. I look forward to seeing Joe run again once the tuning bugs have been worked through.

A few weeks ago, we cruised up to Tsawwassen in British Columbia (opinions about how the city's name is pronounced vary, even amongst the locals) for the first-ever large Volvo Club of B.C. meet. I'll be writing this up for our next issue. For now I'll just say that Gregg Morris and crew put on the best organized meet anyone attending had ever been to. The location was perfect, the food was superlative, there were several Friday driving tours to choose from and they made me a concours judge.

Yes. Me. Concours judge. For those of you who've seen our cars and/or have heard my opinions of concours in general, the irony of this will be apparent. In fact, it was both fun and instructive. Cameron took first place in the modified 122S/123GT class and Bob Moreno swept the stock class going away with his restoration of Carolyn's Amazon, the project we've been covering for nearly two years now.

Speaking of Bob Moreno, our own 122S is now at The Works (see Amazon Resurrection). It's terrific to have this most faithful of cars heading back to a state of good health and beauty. It will not be a quick process. The current plan is for Bob to do all the bodywork, paint and interior; then we'll do whatever mechanical reworking is needed ourselves. We'll document all this, of course.

Nothing much has changed on our 1800S, my current daily driver. I've finally bought a set of old Cragar alloy wheels in the right size and should have those on the car in a week or two. These will permit lowering the car, so the next project is to rework the suspension with John Parker's progressive springs and urethane bushings -- also a new set of Bilstein shocks to replace the old ones, which, even though Bilstein, are fading with sheer age and mileage. We'll surely have an article on how this works out.

As for the MPPE project (Multi-Purpose Performance Engine), I'm still waiting for a large crate of parts to arrive from Sweden. There have been some supply hangups, the details of which I don't fully know. I expect some progress will be made over there between the end of summer racing and rallying season and the start of ice racing. More to follow as the details emerge.

There was one other event that has significance to some of you. We've stopped publishing VClassics in print. We're returning to having a new issue of this web-zine every two months and I'll work on improving it. I'd hoped to have this issue online September 1st, but I'm still wading through the subscriber refund process and other detritus left in the wake of the print edition's passing, which is time consuming. For those of you interested, see End of Print for the details.

And that was our summer. I hope you enjoy this issue and enjoy your Volvos while the good weather holds -- we'll see you all back here before winter sets in. (Australians and other Antipodeans may ignore the previous sentence at will.)

--Phil, editor@vclassics.com