Preparing to drive a Dino - any tips please?

Skip 2nd gear, as others have stated until the car is fully warmed up. These little motors are torquey enough and the gear ratios close enough that going 1st to 3rd is no problem. Once fully warm you should be able to use all the gears. I don't rush my shifts, go through the gears deliberately. When fully warm, enjoy all the revs, man they love to live above 3,500 and happy to over 6,000.

Cold starting procedure:
Turn key until fuel pumps run, wait 30-60 seconds.
Pump the throttle to the floor 5 times
Hold the throttle 1/3 open
Turn the key to start
Give it enough gas to prevent stalling
Drive!

Hot starting procedure
Turn key until fuel pumps run for a few seconds
Hold the throttle fully open
Turn key to start

Enjoy it!!

Let us know your thoughts after your drive.

Pic for inspiration

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Thank you for this advice! Additional question, when do you use the choke?


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Prior threads have recommended against it - mine is in place but the set-screw isn't tightened at the carburetor. Dino's aren't often started in cold weather.

 

The choke is a Rube Goldberg machine. If it’s not well maintained, it can stick open and flood your cylinder walls with fuel, diluting the oil and making the car run poorly. A few pumps of the accelerator pedal should be fine for starting unless it’s really cold out.

 

how do you find it now?

 

When you get in, close the door with the little finger hole made for that purpose.

Don’t pull on the door pocket.

Don’t touch the quarter window latch.

In fact, don’t even look at it.

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Most vintage cars like to be warmed up before driving, especially the gearboxes are bulky until warmed up. After the temp needle moves off the peg, you can drive gently until it reaches operating temp. Also, especially the gearbox, shift slowly, and shifting to 2nd, double clutching is a help.

 

such great advice, I couldn’t help but laugh because it is so true

 

Presumably, the car the OP will be driving belongs to someone else.

Whenever I drive someone else's car, I ask them to take me for a ride, and "show me what the car can do"; that way, one gets an understanding of how far the owner is inclined to push their car; as well as a notion of "what the car is used to taking". Once one has a sense of these two things, I think it is good policy to never exceed them...

And yeah, don't "fiddle" with anything that you don't absolutely have to. Things break on old cars, and probabilities of breakage go up when one is unfamiliar with how they work...