MG Sports Cars

Done. Tentatively set for 5/15,5/16 & 5/17.

Scott, Get the car on the road by then, and come with us to Carlisle Kitcar Import car show that weekend ! Always a good time.
Mike

Sounds like a lot of fun Mike. I'll let you know as things unfold with the build.

Thanks Artie!

Good progress was made last weekend. It is going together pretty well at this point. The coolant temp sensor is installed and the wiring changes for it are complete. Carl, I did check and it's grounded to the block real well. Also finally got the exhaust gaskets Jim Stabe suggested installed. The driver's side header was straight so that was real good. Here's a picture of the gasket.



Here's one of a gasket installed. Both sides are done at this point and hopefully leaks are a thing of the past now.



Another milestone is getting the steering is back together for the first time in over a year. Here's a picture of the steering shaft in the engine bay.



This next one is of the VSS reluctor and the sensor mount. I'll get pictures of it installed before too long. As I mentioned earlier, it took more work than expected but I'm please with the result.



So the plan is to get a very early start on Saturday morning to knock as many things off the list as possible. I'm going to concentrate on getting the engine bay much closer and then move to get the interior back in shape. The detailed list of tasks is still a little long but things are truly getting there now.

I love those exhaust gaskets, they will seal up anything. They squish down to 1/2 the uncompressed thickness.

More progress over these past couple of weekends. The to do list is still a bit long but not nearly as long as it was a month ago. :) I'll start out with a couple of pictures I promised over the last couple of posts I've made. The first one is of the VSS installed. The last one is of the shifter.



You can see it's an aftermarket shifter. The lever is reversible and I've put the "bend" forward so the knob is moved forward a couple of inches. The picture is after the change. I've got it in the car now but forgot to take a picture of it installed.

The engine bay is getting there. I think it looks much more complete now and I'm very pleased with it. This first picture shows the rear of the bay.



This one shows an overhead shot.



This one shows the front of the motor. It's starting to look like a complete engine.



Much more progress was made. The underside wiring is about half routed. Next up is the battery cut off switch and redoing the battery cables. I hope to finally fix my voltage drop problem once and for all.

That's it for now. It feels like things are moving much more quickly now at least. It's fun! :)

Scott, Looking good!

Very clean looking job Scott! Keep checking stuff off the list, and soon will be on the road. :)

Thanks Jim & Calvin!

I thought I'd give a brief update from last weekend and catch up on some images I promised in earlier posts. First, here is the fuel filter installed. I got a little too close I think but it should give you an idea of what was done.



This next one is the shifter installed in the car. The interior looks a bit messy in the photo but it's worse in person! :) It's a couple of hours away from being put back together and cleaned up.



So most of you recall I discovered a voltage drop issue while troubleshooting a no start problem. Replacing the defective ground cable helped a whole lot but I wanted to completely update the battery wiring while I was at it. This next picture shows pretty much what was done.



I used "Military" style battery terminals. It's grounded in two places now. One is on the tail housing of the transmission, the other to the body. Maybe a bit of overkill but I'm pleased with the result. I'm using 1/0 cables. I was kind of laughing to myself as I was assembling the parts. Back when I got my car in the fall of '79 one of the first things I did was replace the battery cables. The originals were crap. I screwed up and did something right and went with 1/0 cable back then. I seem to recall I got about 10' to do the job and I was thinking that I probably gave $10-$15 for it back then. I think I gave more than $20 for the 4' I bought at NAPA last month. It was one of those reminders that times have changed a bit. Anyway the ground side is new cable and the hot side is my 36 year old "updated" cable. All the cable ends are soldered on. Oh, I finally have a battery cutoff switch installed too.

The next step is fabricating the accessory drive stuff. It's actually underway now. I'll go into much more detail in my next post. The final picture shows the radiator roughly in its final resting place. I needed to confirm there was room for what I'm planning...there was plenty.



That's it for now. Hope everyone is having a good spring!

Edit: spelling, changed "it's" to "its"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/07/2015 07:45PM by Scott68B.

Scott I'm so excited for you to drive that baby. man the first time I drove mine it put a huge smile on my face, well that was about 12,000 miles ago and I still can't wipe it off good luck brother.

Scott
I like your shifter. Can you share the brand and where you found it at?

It's looking good, If I were that close I wouldn't sleep until it moved on it's own power

Thanks Bill, I'm looking forward to it too.

G.R., unfortunately I don't know the brand. I got it off of eBay 3 or 4 yrs. ago. I can tell you it isn't a name brand shifter.

In a perfect world I'd be out in the garage right now finishing it off but work and wife dictate that other things need done too. :(

Will either of you be attending the V8 meet in Indy? Hope so.

That shifter looks like a copy of the B&M Rippper I have. My mounting plate is Blue, but the bend in the stick and slotted mounting holes look similar.

Thought I'd do a very brief update. I've got a good start on the accessory drive stuff. This first picture shows the current state.



Does that look like 8+ hours of work? I started with the most complex side first and as you can see it isn't nearly done yet. I'm quite pleased with the results so far. This next very bad depiction shows what the belt routing will look like. Keep in mind it really isn't to scale, just wanted to show what the end result will look like.



As you can see, I'll be using a jackshaft to drive the alternator and water pump. The black lines show the rear most belt/pulley which will be driven by the crank pulley. The red lines show the forward most belt/pulley which will drive the alternator/water pump. Hope that's clear.

Next steps are completing the alternator side and then the jackshaft side. I also need to fabricate a plate behind the water pump on the passenger side to securely mount the lower pulley you see there. Hope another 8 hrs. gets me close.

That's all for now. More details will follow.

Here's another small update. Still making progress but haven't had a full day to work on the car the past couple of weeks unfortunately. The only picture to share at this point is this one.



This has been my view for the past few work sessions. All the pulleys are in place but there still is a bit of work to do. The alternator plus the two pulleys near it are pretty much lined up to the Corvette spec in relation to the water pump pulley. The pulleys on the right are placed where they will live but I need to create the spacers so they too will line up with their respective pulleys. You can see that there is plenty of work left. I find I'm spending a lot of time measuring things so it gets a little tedious at times but I'm really enjoying the challenge of building this. I got a factory belt tensioner, which I intended to use in the system but found I couldn't, to use as my starting point and am lining up all the forward pulleys to it. I ran the twine to make sure the belt routing is good. The next step is to permanently and rigidly mount the pulleys so I can determine belt lengths. I am probably looking at 2 work sessions to get it to that point. This has to be done right. That's all for now.

Time for another update. I'm keeping the "slow but steady" theme going on this build. Still working the accessory drive but, except for a few more tasks, it is just about there. This first picture shows both belts installed.



It's probably been the most challenging fabrication task in the build. Strange as it may sound that is one of the reasons I chose to go this route. It's not that its hard, just requires attention to detail. This is the first test run of the thing.



I ran it up to about 2000-2500 rpms and nothing flew off so that was good. Of course it's going to have to do much better than that. When I get the cooling system installed I'll give it a much better test at a much higher rpm. The motor sounds like it has marbles in the crankcase in the video. I'm using video mode in my camera and it seems to favor the higher frequencies and disfavor the lower. It actually sounds really nice and quiet especially since I've installed Jim Stabe's manifold gaskets. It has a smooth idle with a hint of something extra that my v6 never had. I'm looking forward to getting it out on the open road.

So the next steps are tweaking a couple of the smooth idler pulleys so the belt runs more toward the center of them and balancing the jack shaft assembly. After that is installing the radiator. I finally pressure tested it and was surprised to not find any leaks! When I get it to that point I can finally start the engine and get if fully warmed up. If I get the brakes bled it will theoretically be drivable. There will be some additional fabrication tasks associated with the radiator like constructing some ducting for air flow and plugging some holes in the radiator support. If I can get the radiator temporarily mounted I may just take it for a quick trip around the block. We will have to see.

Artie had to change his plans so he's now coming in on the 5th-7th of June. Looking forward to seeing him. Our hope is to have a running car on the road by the time he leaves.

This last picture is one I've been meaning to take for quite a while but just never got around to doing. I posted it on the other site but thought I'd put it in this thread for posterity.



For some reason I really like overhead shots, gives a different perspective on things. Hope it will help someone in the future.

Looking good Scott!!

Scott,

I hope you kept the patterns for the accessory brackets. There is going to be a market for them soon!

Quote:

...... with a hint of something extra that my v6 never had.

No doubt!

Thanks Mike!

Quote:

I hope you kept the patterns for the accessory brackets. There is going to be a market for them soon!

Carl, I'm taking things one step at a time starting with getting to the end of the driveway and then around the block! :) The real test will be beating on it during the autocross event in Indy. The questions in my mind are will things stay in place with no movement once adjustments are made and is everything strong enough? I've been trying to build the brackets with that in mind.

Oh, patterns, measurements, pictures, and help are always available to friends.

Looking forward to seeing you both in Indy!

Scott, Excellent!!