1971 MGB GT Zetec

[roddymac]

I had previously put my Europa build on this forum, so I thought why not put the current build on here too. In July of 2020 I decided that I needed another headache (mid life crisis?), so a 1971 MGB GT was purchased. I had one when I was 18, and had looked periodically for one since selling the first GT in 2001. Other cars came and went in between (Elan +2, Frogeye Sprites, scratch built Lotus 7, scratch build Lotus 11), but the desire to build a restomod B GT never went away. So, this is what I started with:





As I'm on the wet coast of Canada, and the car being a 1971, it has (had) a padded dash, which I've never been fond of. An earlier metal dash was sourced, along with some early seats (stolen from dear old dads car as he ordered a new set of seats), and a slightly later grille (more on that later):







The plan before getting the car, was to build something to use a Zetec mated to an RX8 gearbox. I had ordered an adapter plate from Jon Hughes at the start of 2020, and had sourced a gearbox and motor but had nothing to put them in. Buying the GT gave me a car to use them in.

I drove the car through the fall and winter, then in March of this year things started to happen. First the Elan had the body put back on to make space in the garage:



Then things really started to happen:







In order to fit the Zetec, the front crossmember required some weight loss, a large portion was removed:



And the motor was slotted in:



It sort of fit, but did require more trimming of the crossmember, and some minor trimming of the LH pedal box to give a bit more clearance for the starter:



Motor mounts were tacked in:



And the motor was finally set in it's final location (but not bolted in for good):



The exhaust manifold shown was just tacked together to get an idea of how to route it, in the end it didn't quite end up looking like it's shown.

More to come....

[Alpina99]

Brilliant,
Absolutely looking forward to the "more to come" bit,
Nigel

[grifterkid]

This looks very (very, VERY!!) good to me...

Cannot wait to see more progress.

[roddymac]

Following the motor fitting, my attention turned to the bodywork. The car was supposedly a California car, so was mostly rust free. But there was some hidden rust and some poorly repaired areas that required some attention. Both dog legs were showing either bubbling or were perforated. Bboth sides where stripped and the inner panels repaired (outer panels were then ordered):







Following that, the undercoating was removed from the front arches:





and given a coating of etch primer:





Next up was fitting the dash, the upper dash/scuttle panel differs between the early and late North American cars, so an early one was cut up and fitted to the body (following removal of the windscreen, and existing dash):







The steering column required the removal of the cowl supports, but I'll have to come up with something to mount a new one.

All of this work took place over a two week period and at the end of the two weeks the engine bay and arches looked like this:







A little while later, the front suspension was stripped from the car and given a fresh lick of paint, and reinstalled:



I really should have cleaned and painted the kingpins, but at the time I just wanted to get the car back on its wheels. Speaking of wheels, the alloys that were on it were sold to a friend (along with the old motor and gearbox). Instead of alloys, I'm going to be using some Nissan steelies that look similar to the MGA Twin Cam wheels:



The rear hubs are cut down wire wheel hubs so that I can use the knock offs, I'm still trying to sort out the fronts though. And, no the knock offs don't hold the wheel on, they're just there for show.

Once it was rolling again, the Zetec was slotted back in and dressed up:



At the end of April the car was loaded up and sent away for paint:



While it was away, the seats were re-upholstered:





They're not perfect, but I'm sure once they're sat in a few times I wont notice the wrinkles as much.

In July the car was back from paint:





Which allowed some reassembly:





And most of the interior was installed:











That brings most of the work up to date, I haven't done much to it in the last month due to being was too busy with other things (work etc), but hopefully I'll have it back on the road in the spring. I'll keep this thread updated as things progress.

[adam73bgt]

Lovely work, always love seeing a red interior contrast with Grampian Grey? Paintwork

[Zagato]

Nov 20, 2021 8:57:31 GMT adam73bgt said:

Lovely work, always love seeing a red interior contrast with Grampian Grey? Paintwork

Absolutely, it looks stunning in that combination, also loving the wheels.
In fact you are building my dream BGT!

[roddymac]

Thanks for the compliments. Just before I bought the car I saw some photos of a grampian grey GT and decided that was the colour I wanted with the red interior. I'm very pleased with my choice, even dear old dad thinks it looks great. Hopefully I'll get to do some work on it tomorrow, though I've been voluntold to put some new front hubs on dad's MGB.

[roddymac]

I really should update this thread. The car is now mostly done, the local car show was last month which was the deadline to have it "done". Leading up to the show I had rebuilt my spare motor as the one in the car had excessive crank endfloat, this mean obviously pulling the motor for the umpteenth time.







I managed to get it running and actually drove it up the street, but either the input shaft on the gearbox or the input shaft bearing is shot, so the motor had to come out again to swap gearboxes. Luckily that was done in about 4 hours, and the car was back running and driving, though it still needs some tuning.





I also managed to get the glass back in, which was an absolute headache.





Following that, some minor details were attended to, and the car was ready for the show:



I made some adapters to allow the use of early window winders:





This is before heading to the show:



Unfortunately, SWMBO can't drive a manual, so I had to take the Lotus to the show first, then get a ride back home to get the MGB. Luckily the show was only 10 minutes away so in the end it wasn't that bad.







And here's a few of "Quality Assurance" giving the car a once over:






Hopefully in the next few weeks I'll get some time to get it running properly, and re-fit the windscreen and rear window trim. Then I can drag the Elan back out of the back of the garage and get started on the bodywork.