My project MGB GT.

[ahockley]

Looks great - although I'm a little biased! I'm a tiny bit worried that you've gone and knicked mine from my garage - it's identical:

[Kentish]

SB - Nigel said:

SB - Nigel said:

but, but yours is going to be in daily use

Kentish said:

To a point; I won't take it out in the winter on salty roads and I'll minimise the amount of times the car sees rain - unless it rains whilst I'm out of course

each to there own . . .
not taking it out on saltly roads fair enough (but that's not a daily runner then) and oh, dear, not taking it out in the rain fits you exactly into the bright red, wire wheels MG stereotype :shakeheadsmiley:

Enjoy your car

Just remember to raise and rotate your wheels and to free off your clutch and brakes every spring (subject to weather) - just joking, calm down all

Different horses, different courses, as long as you enjoy yourself and harm no one else go for it

Oh no, I'm not the sort to keep it locked away in the garage all of the time - it's not exactly rare and expensive!

A car is to use and enjoy but I would like to get some under body protection on before the winter.

I should imagine the B is quite good in snow with those narrow tyres

I'm not likely to use it on icy roads though, I know all the bits are available but I'd rather keep it damage free and use my other car in winter, it's better equipped for it with 4WD and a galvanised body.

You can't drive 2 cars at the same time though so I'm being sensible about how to best preserve the B whilst getting the most out of it and my other car too.

They are both fun to drive but in different ways, so a lot depends on my mood and the weather. For that very reason the B is likely to get more use (eventually) in poorer weather because it is a hard top car.

I may sell the hard top off my audi, or not fit it that often as the 2 cars do overlap in functionality a bit, although the MGB has more room in it (believe it or not)

It'll depend, it was sunny this weekend and I took the MGB out in favour of the Audi with the roof down. I just felt like it, I wanted the feel of a 60's sprts car and a burbly exhaust note - despite it leaking brake fluid and a disconcerting clunk everytime I take up drive or lift off the throttle and the fact that it's a pig to start at the moment, I still picked up the keys to the B and had a smile on my face as the scenery rolled past.

Did you get your copy of Octane this month?
Loads on the MGB in it and one of the staff cars is a B (rolling resto).

[Kentish]

ahockley said:

Looks great - although I'm a little biased! I'm a tiny bit worried that you've gone and knicked mine from my garage - it's identical:

That looks lovely, I hope to get mine as mint as yours oneday!

Mine was a little neglected by the past owner so I just want to give it some TLC to get it back up to a really nice standard. It's not at all bad but does need a little fettling.

A few weekends work will see all mechanical issues resolved and then I just need to do a few cosmetic bits.

[ahockley]

Pictures can be deceiving.. it's far from perfect - in desperate need of an engine rebuild at the moment. Improving and slowly fixing bits and pieces is exactly what I love about owning an old car. Oh, and the noise it makes...

[Kentish]

ahockley said:

Pictures can be deceiving.. it's far from perfect - in desperate need of an engine rebuild at the moment. Improving and slowly fixing bits and pieces is exactly what I love about owning an old car. Oh, and the noise it makes...

I'm constantly amazed at how reasonable parts are for the B.

An exchange recon engine from one of the specialists is only in the region of £800.

Not bad!

I have a bit of a clunk underneath on acceleration and on lifting off which I believe is either propshaft or rear axle or possibly a bit of both.

A new rear diff is a very reasonable £200.

The propshaft was silly cheap too.

I'm currently thinking about going through much of the mechanicals and replacing as much as I can where it is worn, pretty much make it a complete restoration if I can.

[ahockley]

I had that problem.. mine was worn splines on the wires and the hubs, not propshaft or halfshafts. An expensive problem sadly as it required 4 new wires and four hubs.. You could hear a clunk from each corner as you accelerated / deccelerated. Easy to test - Jack up a wheel , brakes on and see if it has a bit of play - mine moved about 1cm at the tire.. quite worn!!

[Kentish]

ahockley said:

I had that problem.. mine was worn splines on the wires and the hubs, not propshaft or halfshafts. An expensive problem sadly as it required 4 new wires and four hubs.. You could hear a clunk from each corner as you accelerated / deccelerated. Easy to test - Jack up a wheel , brakes on and see if it has a bit of play - mine moved about 1cm at the tire.. quite worn!!

Was that rotational play and not side to side (like a worn hub bearing)?

I'll have to check that out.

I'm sure some of the noise is also the exhaust hitting the rear telescopic damper (it's not on the original lever arm dampers), plus it runs really close in other places.

But I think you could be right about the wheels too as there's more than one type of clunk going on and it's always when you put your foot down and lift off.

I had a check of the prices and I think I saw that the replacement wire wheels are around £215 each plus the price of the hubs of course - I think it would be over £1k to replace them

Are the hubs easy to replace?

I wonder whether it would be worth me going for a nice set of 15" minilites instead if my hubs and wire wheel splines are worn?

Edited by Kentish on Tuesday 21st April 22:46

[ahockley]

Kentish said:

ahockley said:

I had that problem.. mine was worn splines on the wires and the hubs, not propshaft or halfshafts. An expensive problem sadly as it required 4 new wires and four hubs.. You could hear a clunk from each corner as you accelerated / deccelerated. Easy to test - Jack up a wheel , brakes on and see if it has a bit of play - mine moved about 1cm at the tire.. quite worn!!

Was that rotational play and not side to side (like a worn hub bearing)?

I'll have to check that out.

I'm sure some of the noise is also the exhaust hitting the rear telescopic damper (it's not on the original lever arm dampers), plus it runs really close in other places.

But I think you could be right about the wheels too as there's more than one type of clunk going on and it's always when you put your foot down and lift off.

I had a check of the prices and I think I saw that the replacement wire wheels are around £215 each plus the price of the hubs of course - I think it would be over £1k to replace them

Are the hubs easy to replace?

I wonder whether it would be worth me going for a nice set of 15" minilites instead if my hubs and wire wheel splines are worn?

Edited by Kentish on Tuesday 21st April 22:46

Yep, rotational play. I paid about 90 quid each for four new wires (painted not chrome, and standard size 14"?) and about 50 quid (No pound signs on my arabic keyboard!) for each hub.

I had them fitted by someone as I don't have a hub puller and thought best to give it to someone who's done it before! All in was about 700 I think two years ago. I looked into minilites too, but converting the hubs to stud based ones is just as costly. Otherwise you can buy centrelocked splined minilites, but I found these were even more expensive than wires!

All in all was a little frustrating - however it solved the problem entirely.

[Kentish]

Thanks, I'm going to check them out for play tonight.

I'm not sure whether I have converted splined hubs fitted or whether mine would have had the wires as standard, it's a 1969 car like yours.

How can I tell, do the splined hub conversions bolt to the original bolted type hubs or do they replace them?

[ahockley]

Not sure and my memory isn't helping..

I thought wires were standard - therefore splined hubs. When I looked into fitting bolt type (ie minilites / rostyles) you can buy a conversion hub, although from I think it required changing half shafts too.. not sure why!

Have a look in a Moss / Brown and Gammons brochure - they'll have all the potential bits and bobs as it must be a common mod.

[Kentish]

OK thanks.

I was having a look at Moss, MGOC, MGParts, mgandmidgetparts sites last night and I could only see bolt hub to splined hub conversion kits, I guess most people will want to go from bolt on later type to earlier splines with wire wheels.

I believe the rear axle was different between splined and bolt on wheel types, hence the need to convert the hubs and I suppose if you are going the other way (to bolt on wheels) it could mean replacing the half shalfs to match. I imagine the front is purely a case of changing the hub assembly.

Uhhm, I'm not sure which way to go with this now??

First step is to check them out later and see whether this is the issue I have but from what you have said, it sounds like I may have the same issue.

[ahockley]

That sounds right.

As you say, make sure this is your problem before worrying too much:

This has a little more info on checking - you can feel the wear quite easily. As mine were quite worn they were impossible to balance well, so I had a lot of vibration through the steering at high speed. Do you have this symptom?

I wanted to keep wire wheels, and I found that was a cheap as anything.

[Kentish]

Thanks for that, I'll check on the shape of the splines too.

I guess for longevity the regular bolt on type of hubs are better but as you, I prefer the wire wheels.

The only issue is that the hub and wheel are highly unlikely to have the same grade and maybe not even the same type of metal so one will always wear the other.

[Kentish]

Yep, it's the hubs!

I jacked the car and only checked the one wheel but it had a similar amount of free play as you mentioned yours had.

I'll check them out properly in due course to see whether they are all like it.

Shame as this will hit the budget a bit and prevent me from replacing the carpets and re-upholstering all the seats for a while.

Oh well, Rome wasn't built in a day!

[Kentish]

Alastair,

What colour is your car?

It looks the same as mine; the previous owner told me cardinal red, someone else told me damask red (which I though was a very dark red but I could be wrong).

cheers,
Kevin

[SB - Nigel]

Kentish said:

. . . someone else told me damask red (which I though was a very dark red but I could be wrong).

No you are right Damask is a dark red, briefly lighter when highly polished - see my Midget (insurance) profile photo

Damask red is a colour that suits a B more (see my B profile photo) but is a bit too dowdy for a Midget

Yours is not Damask but it's difficult to tell which red with photos (not that I'd know anyway)

[ahockley]

Kentish said:

Alastair,

What colour is your car?

It looks the same as mine; the previous owner told me cardinal red, someone else told me damask red (which I though was a very dark red but I could be wrong).

cheers,
Kevin

Well, it's a shame that this appears to be your problem too. My car is Tartan Red - I'm sure looking at the pics that yours is the same. I've never heard of Cardinal and, as Nigel says, Damask is darker.

Keeps us updated with your progress!

[SB - Nigel]

Both below are Damask and are polished and photo'd in the sun so appear lighter than usual - different cameras and processing so they appear different colours

Tarty red was a popular respsray/resto colour especially with wire wheels (usually chromed) but there are a couple of other BL bright reds the MGB Original book will tell you all you need to know or I'm sure there'll be a Rover or MG web site or forum with the info and perhaps photos (but same problem with colour as below)

[Kentish]

Hi guys;

Colours are really difficult to see on a forum, my car looks quite orange in the photos here and my profile but it's not at all orange and much more of a red.

Your B and midget both look terrific!

The midget looks in the photo quite similar to the colour of my car but I'm sure mine is probably the same colour as Alistairs car.

Yes, I'll keep you posted on progress; I have a big birthday next week and I think some of the family are buying me some interior parts for the B

[SB - Nigel]

Kentish said:

Hi guys;
Colours are really difficult to see on a forum

yes and in photos

Kentish said:

Your B and midget both look terrific!

thank you but the camera lies
the B was in good condition (Rover V8 conversion) but my Midget altho' in generally very good condition cosmetically isn't so good, that was my insurance photo and it looks better now on its Anthracite (grey) minilite copies wheels

Kentish said:

The midget looks in the photo quite similar to the colour of my car but I'm sure mine is probably the same colour as Alistairs car.

yes the photo makes the colour look lighter, when the car is unwashed and out of the sun Damask looks a darker, old man's red

Kentish said:

Yes, I'll keep you posted on progress; I have a big birthday next week and I think some of the family are buying me some interior parts for the B

yes please let us know - don't fit any new carpets or such until you been thro' a lot of rain in case you have leaks and be very carefull when changing the steering wheel, ask first

Anyone told you about the "donkey's dick" causing wet legs (driver's left and passenger's right) ? - this being full of muck or split is the cause

Edited by SB - Nigel on Thursday 23 April 13:01