MG Sports Cars

And more....

Abbadee...abbadee..abbadee.....That's all folks!

Interesting ramp setup. ;)

Great work guys, the old shell stripped and ready to send away. Just don't forget to recover Ricks struts and that aluminum hood before it goes. Looks like I will have to carry over a few days of vacation this year, so I'll have a little more time next year and may be able to get over for a Roadmaster weekend.

Bill Young Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Just don't forget to recover Ricks
> struts and that aluminum hood before it goes.
>

Hopefully, we'll salvage more than that....the hatch and possibly the roof for sure..

I haven't been keeping up like I should... but if the body shell is going to be scrapped, cut the bulges from below the tail light areas. Someone will be able to use them on a RB to CB conversion. That's how I got mine -- from a shell that a guy was about to send to the crusher.

More good news. Larry Shimp was going to donate some body panels but because we got this new GT he decided to make a substantial cash contribution instead, in addition to making some welcome suspension recommendations. I have his check in hand and plan to deposit it today. This puts him among the ever growing group of our top contributors and we are certainly grateful for his assistance, thank you very much Larry!

As soon as Steve and I get the chance to do it we will see if we now have enough to order the heads from TA. I would like to make it a complete order, including the studs and valve covers if we can manage that. Mike told me he was sponsored out but I'll also ask him if there's a chance he can give us a friendly price.

Jim



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2008 04:47PM by BlownMGB-V8.

OK, I just looked at the TA catalog again and did a rough tally. Estimating shipping costs we are approximately $150 away from being able to place our order, which will include the heads, the studs which are required to use the heads, and a set of valve covers with fill caps and such. My suggestion is the black krinkle finish, they look really good. If a couple of you guys could help us out here we'll get those on order. Or we can wait. Maybe after Thanksgiving we can ebay a few parts and get enough cash to cover it. Up to you guys.

Jim

Larry, on behalf of the Ways and Means committee, I thank you!

All is in readiness for another exceptional MGB-Roadmaster weekend. Well, maybe not "all", since the lab is a bit untidy, but we have heat, we have light, and we have most of the tools we might need, plus tunes and refreshments, so I think we'll be good. I've been trying to make some more floorspace and in the process getting distracted by tasks, great and small, all shouting my name in a cacaphony of chaos and it's a little distracting. I pulled out the old spare Olds engine to see if it made sense to swap it into my roadster while I ready the 340 driveline but it really makes more sense to sell it instead unless I'm really desperate to drive it. It probably would make more sense to find a running LBC of just about any description instead to put around in. So I have things to shove back into their corners and about a Gazillion half completed small tasks to consider between now and Thursday. I might not finish. In fact I'd say it's just about a dead certainty. But we can work around that. The extra GT has taken up some space and it'll be touch and go to get Steve's car inside overnight but I'm betting we can do it. (Where is that overhead lift when you need it?)

There's just no telling at this point what we will decide are priority items for the weekend so right now I'm not going to attempt to project what we might get done. The suspension work is important of course, and we have another opportunity to reconsider our approach to steering clearance, with both the new GT body and new heads to soon be ordered. (In fact, I think we could probably go ahead and order those and get the valve-covers later.) We may decide to set the drivetrain into place and estimate what the clearance will be with the new heads. Or not. But in any case there's plenty to do.

And now some news. Though it doesn't affect us here, it is of great interest to anyone considering a swap such as this. TA Performance has published the weight of their new aluminum BBB block! This is a bare weight, without cylinder liners and main caps but is good for comparison purposes. The weight is 110 pounds! That is 67 lbs less than the stock cast iron 1970 455 block that we are using, which weighs 177 with main caps. It is also only 50 lbs more than a bare 215 block without main caps. By the time the caps and liners are added we'll be back to about the weight of a 300 or 340 (or SBF) block. Which means that with this block and alloy heads and intake an MGB could be built with the BBB that would easily weigh less than stock, using other lightweight components such as in the suspension and brakes. Who will be the first to own one? I don't know, but once this one is out on the circuit it shouldn't be long before we see one.

Jim

We have a nice suspension system on our Historic Race Car a Modsports MGBV8,we tried to use the original layout with uprated units for many years but this proved a bit Neanderthal,especially as the Historic Racing rules stipulated we could not alter.
Lucky for us there is a new motorsport club that caters for the many V8 Modsports and Special Saloons cars like us in the UK ,Europe and USA.To try to revive all these Historic race cars they have simplified their rules to allow various configurations of suspension systems using modern technology.

HMSA Historic Modsports and Saloon Association, www.historicmodsportsandsaloons.com

So now we are using all Alloy adjustable units,fully rose jointed,new pick-up points and it works a treat with our lap times coming down considerably,especially compared to the Sunbeam Tigers and many Jaguars.
Next on the list is to have manufactured some light panels made out of Carbon Fibre,have a look at this HMSA its got lots of V8s registered.

That sounds interesting Peter, I don't suppose they'd let us run the MGB-Roadmaster in that would they?

So anyway, the crock pot is full of stew, and I expect Steve is on his way, should be here sometime tomorrow. I'm really looking forward to getting back on this project. We'll fire up the furnace and get right to it. As always, anyone who'd like to stop by is welcome and will get a warm meal and good company.

I have a link to some photos of that TA aluminum block:
[www.flickr.com]

Very beefy for a 110 lb chunk. Seems like they put the metal in all the right places. They claim it'll support 3000 hp. That might be a little much for an MGB, but it should never break, and with replaceable sleeves it should never wear out.

Jim

Hope you & Steve have a productive weekend!

Thank you Carl, and we did. Steve came in Thursday evening and we had a bowl of beef stew and then went and unloaded his car and trailer. Thanks very much by the way for your assistance in transporting my 340 Buick engine to and from Dale's shop in Danville, Virginia. I now have some very nice engine parts and will be putting up some photos on the 340 thread just as soon as I can get some good shots.

Anyway, I had turned up the heat earlier and we had a reasonably comfortable place to work. My recollection may be a little fuzzy on the details and the sequence of events but hopefully Steve will jump in to correct my errors. So we unpacked the parts, pulling Steve's car and his trailer inside where it was warm, after we had first moved the two GT's around to where we had enough room to do it. I tried to take a picture of that, at that point we had 3 GT's, a roadster and a half, and a trailer all inside, and the amazing thing was that we could still get around all of them. But the camera battery chose that moment to die, and the next morning we went back out without the batteries and had begun moving things before we thought of them again.

Anyway Steve soon had the rear axle and suspension out of the Blue GT while I was adding the upper coil-over mounts to the IRS crossmember and attaching it to the Jag pumpkin. We used hardened socket head countersunk capscrews and red locktite for the mount bolts and I'm happy with the attachment. I think it is a good bit stronger than the original. Then we put the axle under the green car, only inserting the forward spring eye bolts since all it has to do is roll. Next we removed the front suspension, took that up and put it under the front of the green car, just dropping a couple bolts through for positioning, and took the Roadmaster's front unit and mounted it in place under the blue car.





Steve did most of the work on that part. In fact, he took on the dirtiest part of the job and had it knocked out in record time. I tried to hold up my end as best I could. It turned out that the steering shaft was pretty close to the stock '69 large style U-joint so we decided to unbolt the steering rack and see how well it would fit.





As you can see the shaft is a little long but not enough to cause any problems. If we can fit the 455 with the alloy heads in without moving the cone then we'll just drill through for the pinch bolts and be good to go. But we won't know until we get the heads. I plan on ordering them tomorrow.

So by then the paint was dry on the rear suspension and we slid it over and jacked it up into place and bolted it in. We positioned it for maximum pinion angle initially. That will have to be measured, readjusted to 3 degrees and locked into place permanently but that's another day, and I'll have to make another post to load the other photos.

Jim

Over the weekend we polished off a big crockpot of homemade beef stew and also managed to devour a couple packages of cured ham that Steve thoughtfully brought along so we ate well. Friday and Saturday we had the lab up in the 50-60 degree range and were quite comfortable, working with our jackets off most of the time while the outside temperature hovered around 15-20 degrees, but we did learn that turning off the heat at night let the floor get cold and probably didn't help on fuel usage either. We were watching the weather closely due to the snow flurries but the skies cleared by nightfall last night, the roads were clear, and our biggest concern was the driveway which Steve maneuvered easily (I hope) this morning by swinging over into the yard to go down the hill. He should be getting home in a couple more hours.

So back to the car. Here's a shot of the Green GT this morning sitting outside. We will be removing some more parts from it as we go along, and it will always be a part of the Roadmaster MG. We are grateful for this car, without it the project would have never happened.



So with the IRS bolted into place and the car on the ground we got our first look at the new candidate.





At this point the fixed struts we had put in to hold up the rear of the car were too long and it sat a little funny so we shortened them a bit but I don't have a photo of that. The tires clear though and it rolls real nice. Steve and I were debating the possibility of getting a pair of wheels with more negative offset and fitting a tire that will go inside the stock wheelwell on a 17" rim. I don't know if such a wheel is made though. It would have to have the mounting flange flush with the tire bead to work. At this point we'd prefer to concentrate on making the car run. Then when it comes apart for paint we can worry about bodywork and other things, including wide tires.

Jim

Steve and I then had a look at the front of the car and decided to go ahead and install the motor mounts. That required removal of the old mounts so to make the work easier we removed the grill, bumper and the valence panel which we discarded as too damaged to reuse. The bumpers on this car are pretty decent, especially the rear one. It was at this point that we realized the car had been in a front end collision. The damage had been pretty well hidden by the grille and the slam panel but the slam panel itself was a bit mangled which should have tipped us off. So that came out, along with the brace and the horizontal shelf the brace sits on, and the box beneath the shelf. The left (facing the car) inner wing's extension forward of the radiator mounts will also need to go, including the left end of the shelf (whatever that panel is called) but the right side can be straightened. Luckily the green car can supply those parts. Also, the left front fender has a splice above the wheel arch. I haven't looked at the other one. Since I seem to recall that the green car has splices at the rear of the fenders, and the job on this one was average or better we can wait to address that until we're ready for paint.

We went ahead and chiseled away the radiator brackets and then using a transfer punch, located and drilled the frame holes for the motor mounts. We used a 5/8" holesaw this time to enlarge a 1/4" carefully drilled pilot hole and they came out way better this time than the first attempt on the other car, and the top braces dropped right into place on the support tubes. I'll be welding these in soon, probably at the next break in the weather. But we put the parts together and took pictures.





Jim

Jim, Steve,

I'm sure you are aware of this but just in case, it looks like there is a mismatch of the front fenders, the right is pre-69 and the left is 69 or later...the placement of the turn signals don't match.

-- Scott



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/2008 07:40AM by Scott68B.

Scott,
I'll admit that I had not noticed.

Jim and I had a good time and got enough work done for 1 weekend.
The Food and lodging were great and so was the company.
I had little trouble on the way home but the car and trailer are filthy. Snow was falling in Ky and VA on my way home, but traffic was light and the snow never built up.
I left Jim's at 5 and got home at 2, not a bad trip.
When Jim gets the new heads we can find out if the steering will work as we have it.
See you all at the V8 meet in NC.

Steve

Scott68B Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Jim, Steve,
>
> I'm sure you are aware of this but just in case,
> it looks like there is a mismatch of the front
> fenders, the right is pre-69 and the left is 69 or
> later...the placement of the turn signals don't
> match.
>
> -- Scott


I had noticed that when the car arrived last month...but promised myself that I would not bring it up. The Concours/Originality folks tend to get bent out of shape on these things.

:)

Jim's remark about previous front end damage is proven with this mismatch.

It's still a GREAT bodyshell in my opinion!

:)

Rick,

I wasn't trying to be negative at all with my comments and, obviously, I couldn't care less about originality but now is the time to address this if it matters to the decision makers. I think both sides should match but that's just me. If it were my car and it had two different fenders on it, that's all I would see every time I looked at it.

From the pictures I've seen, it does look like a fantastic find!

Regards

-- Scott