1973 MGB GT- A little rust 30/08

[Nathan]

Sounds like you repeated my mistake too :-).
Both front and rears I simply changed the oil, on my Midget I went down the route and bought the uprated versions only to be told that's the only difference. They certainly stop the wallowing feel on corners, but wont make it a corner stormer.

The Race springs are quite stiff, but not as to make it uncomfortable, it helps give it that planted feeling. The only thing that took me some getting used to was the rake, at first it felt like I was sliding into the foot-well :-). My rear is not lowered at all, and it was on the new wheels so maybe it exaggerated the feeling.

The rear is amazingly simple to convert to modern shocks. The original mounting point can be used to fix the shock and a slight adjustment to the bottom spring plate for the lower end.
Yeah I looked online at the Kits, and thought I can make one up at a fraction of the cost.

[ChasR]

Agreed with Nathan. I had race springs on my 'B and without bumpers. Despite this it was fine. The other set of race springs I had were sold to Matt (RetroWarwick) who found it to be a similar experience, despite him upgrading his ARB to a fast road item (7/8" IIRC). I did however drive around as Nathan did for a while (with a surprisingly stiff rear end (stock bushes, Spax dampers, and new springs (albeit on a car sat idle for 4 years)). Upon going to Superflex bushes on the rear and lowered rear springs, it was a lovely thing to drive around (and probably why the car sold if I am honest).

The rear can be converted to Spax items in around 2 hours tops IMO with a set of new shackles and nuts to hand .

[flyingphil]

Hi Adam
Good looking wheels!
Re the rear arch crack - it seems to be a very straight line, is there a part replacement panel join there?

[adam73bgt]

Dec 20, 2013 15:32:14 GMT Nathan said:

Sounds like you repeated my mistake too :-).
Both front and rears I simply changed the oil, on my Midget I went down the route and bought the uprated versions only to be told that's the only difference. They certainly stop the wallowing feel on corners, but wont make it a corner stormer.

The Race springs are quite stiff, but not as to make it uncomfortable, it helps give it that planted feeling. The only thing that took me some getting used to was the rake, at first it felt like I was sliding into the foot-well :-). My rear is not lowered at all, and it was on the new wheels so maybe it exaggerated the feeling.

The rear is amazingly simple to convert to modern shocks. The original mounting point can be used to fix the shock and a slight adjustment to the bottom spring plate for the lower end.
Yeah I looked online at the Kits, and thought I can make one up at a fraction of the cost.

Ah right, if you remember which oil you used that would be great I'm guessing you have to take the dampers off anyway to drain the old oil out?

The rear isn't lowered on mine as far as I know, but its quite low due to tired springs I think

Dec 20, 2013 23:31:07 GMT ChasR said:

Agreed with Nathan. I had race springs on my 'B and without bumpers. Despite this it was fine. The other set of race springs I had were sold to Matt (RetroWarwick) who found it to be a similar experience, despite him upgrading his ARB to a fast road item (7/8" IIRC). I did however drive around as Nathan did for a while (with a surprisingly stiff rear end (stock bushes, Spax dampers, and new springs (albeit on a car sat idle for 4 years)). Upon going to Superflex bushes on the rear and lowered rear springs, it was a lovely thing to drive around (and probably why the car sold if I am honest).

The rear can be converted to Spax items in around 2 hours tops IMO with a set of new shackles and nuts to hand .

Hmm looks like I shall definitely have to invest in some race springs then, I was looking at improving the ARB to a 3/4" item, but I'll probably hold off until I've changed springs, damper oil and bushes to see if I really need it.

I'm thinking I'm defintely going to go with the Spax/Gaz rear shock conversion as it does look very simple to do, will be looking to polybush as much as I can as well as the rubber bushes all look a bit old.. Do you need any presses or anything to fit any of the polybushes?

Dec 21, 2013 7:52:54 GMT flyingphil said:

Hi Adam
Good looking wheels!
Re the rear arch crack - it seems to be a very straight line, is there a part replacement panel join there?

Thanks! I'm quite pleased with them apart from the occasional tyre rubbing, I've only had a quick look around the crack but I'm pretty sure theres a repair in there, I only actually tried to roll that drivers side arch which also happens to be the older of the two rear arches (the passenger one was done shortly before I bought the car) so I suppose it was going to be the arch more likely to have filler and crack!

[ChasR]

The Suspeflex ones fit a treat but they are very tight fitting. Some remote G Clamp pliers will do the job (I made do with a set of oil filter pliers (look a little like pipe pliers). No special process is needed. Just some care taken .

[jpsmit]

In terms of the dampers, for my midget, I went to a motorcycle shop and bought fork oil - the heaviest weight available

[adam73bgt]

Dec 22, 2013 5:15:08 GMT jpsmit said:

In terms of the dampers, for my midget, I went to a motorcycle shop and bought fork oil - the heaviest weight available

Ah awesome, another thing to go on the shopping list

[adam73bgt]

Well only a little update again. Started fitting the spotlights that I bought a while ago to replace my old one which got destroyed :/ You can just see them poking out from behind the grille here



They should be safe from parking bumps in there, need to add a few washers to space them downwards a bit as a fair bit of light will be hitting the top of the grille at the moment.

Then as its christmas I thought I'd treat the car by giving it a nice clean













It comes up fairly well considering how bad some of the paint is, if I get a few dry days in a row I'll give it a proper machine polish as I only had enough time to do the bonnet which looks pretty good considering its the worst panel on the car

The car then rewarded me for this endeavour by not starting.. I think its a recurrence of the dodgy battery earth problem which I'll investigate when I get a chance. Does anyone else seem to have this issue with earths? they seem to be fine for a half a year or so then give up :/

Its a love hate relationship

But i've also bought other presents for it, a few relays are on the way to fit up to the headlights as part of my updating the electrics and also a pair of gas struts to attempt to make working under the bonnet less of a decapitation hazard

Anyway thats all for the time being, merry xmas all

[adam73bgt]

Oh another thing that I should probably investigate is that the brake pedal is initially soft but after the first pump is hard (oo err) the braking is good regardless however, it may be that the system may need a bit of bleeding but as the brakes are single circuit I'll be keeping a close eye on it!

[niwid]

It does look properly lovely after a good clean mate. It's developing a very subtle, but unique 'look' with all the mods you've done.

[adam73bgt]

Dec 28, 2013 10:02:24 GMT niwid said:

It does look properly lovely after a good clean mate. It's developing a very subtle, but unique 'look' with all the mods you've done.

Thanks very much! The camera is a good liar in this case though, the bonnet looks nice and glossy in the photos but suffers from lots of little blisters in reality, but I shall be adressing those in good time, hopefully with a nice roller paint job..

Yeah its got a bit of a 'look' I'm still not 100% sure on the look I'm going for really, but it looks pleasing to my eye which is all I can really hope for (that and it working 95% of the time)

[task]

That's a neat way to mount the spots, keeps it looking clean and protects them! Do you find it makes much a difference to light output?

Hadn't realised you were quite so close, once I've finished my BGT it would be good to meet up (or even before if you wanted to)

[adam73bgt]

Dec 28, 2013 13:14:25 GMT task said:

That's a neat way to mount the spots, keeps it looking clean and protects them! Do you find it makes much a difference to light output?

Hadn't realised you were quite so close, once I've finished my BGT it would be good to meet up (or even before if you wanted to)

I nicked the idea off Rich's MGB on here I've not actually got them wired up yet so I'm not sure, though considering the old spot light was an old 35W thing whereas these are two 130W bulbs, the light output should be pretty decent

Yes definitely, I'm all for meeting other MGB's seeing how others are progressing helps me keep going on mine aha!

[adam73bgt]

Another little update on this, managed to get it running again.

The problem was electrical again, turns out that the positive battery lead had rubbed through some electrical tape wrapped around the terminal and it had shorted out on the bodywork :/

I've wrapped more tape around it but for a long term solution I need to either get a battery clamp (have been running without one, very naughty!) or get one of the rather overpriced plastic buckets that exist for filling the battery holes on MGB's this would also keep the elements away from the battery and would give me a little storage bin for the other side where the second battery used to be.

Bonnet struts, spotlight wiring, headlight relay wiring and polishing are the next things to do so hopefully a mildly more interesting update to come soon

[adam73bgt]

Had some various bits and bobs appear in the post today :)Nothing ground breaking, but stuff that needs doing



So theres a nice new gearstick gaiter to replace the knackered old one, some wiper seals and chrome bits to hopefully stop rain getting in quite so easily, some axle rebound straps to replace the nearly destroyed ones on the car and a pair of tappet chest cover gaskets as the engine is pretty liberally coated in oil on that side and I've been noticing a bit of a slick under the car.. Though oddly when checking the gearbox and engine oil levels, they don't seem to be losing any at all

Quick pic of the old and new gaiters, new one is a little bit bigger so needs a bit of adjusting to make it fit



The wiper chrome bits didn't fit the slight curvature of the MG's scuttle panel, and I couldn't get the nut back on one of the wheelboxes as I need to push it through the scuttle while I try and thread the nut on, great fun to do out in the rain and wind..
The seals were the main thing though so hopefully get that all sorted tomorrow

Axle straps and Tappet chest gaskets will have to wait until I'm back at uni probably as I need to make sure that the car will get me there haha

Another job I sort of got done today is something I've been meaning to do for a while. I don't really like the look of the overriders on the bumpers and they're already gone from the front, the rear ones have lasted longer while I worked out how to solve the issue of the numberplate lights which are attached to the overriders.

First off I thought I'd have a go at removing one of the numberplate lights as the bulb had gone. I tried a bit with the spanner and screwdriver but soon gave up on this and got the drill out



My not particularly subtle method of removing the overriders involves tearing off the rubber insert and drilling and chiselling away at the overrider it is fairly effective though..





I'm going to be aiming to drill two holes in the bumper underneath the numberplate to relocate the lights to, I think there was one year of MGB which got the lights in the bumper at one point so gives me something to aim for.

But for the moment I've left one of the overriders in place as I need a light to be legal for the time being so this is how its looking



Slow going as ever but should have it all sorted soon, New year, new things to go on the car and all that jazz

happy new year build thread readers!

[93fxdl]

Might not fit with the look you want, but have you considered number plate light bolts, available chrome or black or you could paint to suit
Ttfn and happy New year, Glenn

[adam73bgt]

Jan 1, 2014 1:12:33 GMT 93fxdl said:

Might not fit with the look you want, but have you considered number plate light bolts, available chrome or black or you could paint to suit
Ttfn and happy New year, Glenn

It's funny you should mention them as they were my first plan for the numberplate lights quite a while back now, I'd have to get rid of the numberplate backing plate in order to hide the wiring away properly, but thats my back up plan at the moment. I don't mind drilling holes in the bumper as its pitted and rusty and a bit bent from where I towed a mates car last year haha

[adam73bgt]

Just found this picture which quite nicely shows what I'll be aiming for, without overriders of course

[georgeb]

Jan 1, 2014 1:20:56 GMT adam73bgt said:

Just found this picture which quite nicely shows what I'll be aiming for, without overriders of course

Of course, the look you should be aiming for is the V8 badge!

[adam73bgt]

Jan 1, 2014 7:07:33 GMT georgeb said:

Jan 1, 2014 1:20:56 GMT adam73bgt said:

Just found this picture which quite nicely shows what I'll be aiming for, without overriders of course

Of course, the look you should be aiming for is the V8 badge!

With the amount of various engine swaps going through my mind all the time theres a small chance a V8 might find its way in there one day...