MGB & GT Forum
1974 MGB roadster..First go at restoration.
 hamm, nrw, Germany
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Just bought this 1974 roadster..got it home ok!..but now want to start step by step with a solid restoration using as many original parts as possible ..Anyone here with the best way of going about this giving a list of priorities ..what should be done first,second etc!..The body work is ok but I would like to improve it ,engine also ok but could be improved..in end effect this car needs the full works!..Thanks for your help!
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20160717_202922.jpg 47.5 KB
 Dayton, OH, USA
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1968 MG MGB GT "Bart - Yellow And Naughty"
1977 MG MGB "Red Betty" 2006 Suzuki Grand Vitara "Suzi Q" 2012 Jeep Liberty "Tommy The Tank" |
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hamm, nrw, Germany
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Thanks Dan!
Just saw an email which mentioned the range rover!..wondered what that was all about at first!..sorry for posting that pic accidentally!..Thanks for your reply..ill try to put some pics of the roadster here..this car has just had its roadworthyness certificate or TÜV here in Germany...i drove it home ..about 100 miles..ran ok..but not sure about the oil pressure and a few other things so plan to really check it out to make sure I dont do any damage (Hopefully I havent done that already!)I want to do a really proper professional job with this vehicle so will have to seek out some real professionals MG people. I would say this car is in average condition..but look at the pics for yourself.Hope the pics help a bit to think of a good strategy.Im sure it will cost quite a bit..but will be prrepared if its in good enough condition to justify further expense
Just saw an email which mentioned the range rover!..wondered what that was all about at first!..sorry for posting that pic accidentally!..Thanks for your reply..ill try to put some pics of the roadster here..this car has just had its roadworthyness certificate or TÜV here in Germany...i drove it home ..about 100 miles..ran ok..but not sure about the oil pressure and a few other things so plan to really check it out to make sure I dont do any damage (Hopefully I havent done that already!)I want to do a really proper professional job with this vehicle so will have to seek out some real professionals MG people. I would say this car is in average condition..but look at the pics for yourself.Hope the pics help a bit to think of a good strategy.Im sure it will cost quite a bit..but will be prrepared if its in good enough condition to justify further expense
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pelham, shelby county, USA
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 Tidewater, Tidewater VA, USA
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It's an unusually clean-looking little 74 B.
As somebody else mentioned, the absolute first thing you want to do is make sure your brakes are in good condition. If you feel any dampness on your feet when you're driving you have a bad master cylinder. The slave cylinder is located on lower part of the car near the right front wheel. It's in my opinion that its easier and not much more expensive to replace a cylinder rather than trying to rebuild them as often the cylinders themselves are damaged on the interior surfaces. Also, check your brake hoses for sponginess. If you detect any, replace them immediately before driving as you're liable for an accident and the leaking fluid can actually catch fire as I know from personal experience.
When I got my various classic cars comma I replaced all rubber hoses. You just don't know how long some of those hoses have been there and the checking and cracking that they get is sometimes so small you can't see it. This is particularly true of vacuum lines but just as true and every other rubber part.
Next I check the steering for tightness; it usually has no problems there but you don't want any surprises.
Something most people overlook is having the alignment checked if you're going to be using it as a driver.
Be sure to check your transmission oil - most people run it with the factory recommended 20w50 engine oil. You might want to drain your existing oil and start over from scratch as you have no idea what the previous owner did.
Check for drips the oil pan and differential and other locations. Many of these can be fixed. Despite the MG's reputation for oil leakage, a lot of connections simply need to be tightened. If you have bad drips it's fairly easy to find many of them and to replace many gaskets. Then there are the occasional situations where you just can't trace it down and when you finally do, the place is inaccessible or impossible... Those you either have to try to live with or do major work on your car.
I always like to clean my engine compartment up as it makes me feel better about the car, the car always miraculously runs better, and it's easier to spot new problems.
I feel the same way about washing and quick-waxing the body, cleaning the top, and detailing the interior... It significantly ups my pride and my motivation to make sure I do everything I can for the car.
The differential oil almost never gets checked butt fortunately very seldom really loses much oil.
If yours has the recycling canister in the trunk that connects to the fuel pump for gasoline and vapors, make sure that the hoses are not leaking as they probably are so old that they're leaking vapirs and you'll get a gassy smell.
If the car has been setting up for a while and won't run, you might want to either remove or replace the gas tank as it's bound to be full of varnish. If it runs fine but sputters a bit from time to time it's a sign you've probably got condensation in the tank. There are various products that you can buy at any auto parts store that will take the water out of your gasoline. One is called Heet but they all work the same and equally well.
You may have to clean your carb bowls as well particularly if it's been sitting up for a while as they will also be full of varnish.
A very good investment is a good shop manual. These can be bought on eBay and other websites. The original shop manual as presently sold is actually a combination of the owner's manual which was a small 5-1/2" x 8" booklet and the shop manual. Both are very poorly indexed but once you get used to it you can earmark your pages with small strips of masking tape folded over each important page to you and sticking out about one quarter of an inch.
Also, I highly recommend you to order a paper catalog from Moss Motors. I have one in my garage with my up other paper materials and shop manual. The advantage of the catalog is that it has schematics for virtually everything in the car that the shop manual doesn't. I don't do all of my shopping at Moss Motors it's just that they have the best paper catalog and I can figure out how to do almost anything by studying it. I had a box of vinyl clear page protectors so I cooked the catalog apart and put each page in one of them so that they don't get greasy when I'm looking things up. The catalog comes in particularly handy when you've totally disassembled and assembly and can't remember exactly what you did and where every part goes back to... Which can happen when it's been awhile by the time you get ready to reassemble.
Regarding sources of parts, I like dealing with Northwest Imports in Portland as the guy who answers the phone owns MGB's, drives them, and restores them. He's extremely knowledgeable, has your past buying records in front of him on the computer screen when he's talking to you, and will often tell you what your problem probably is and which part would work best for you. His prices tend to be lower than other suppliers. Despite his huge inventory however, there are some parts he just doesn't carry and for those I either go to Moss Motors or one of Moss Motors' distributors such as Little British Car Co. - lbcarco.com (who is very helpful, very fast, and usually about 10 to 15% less expensive than Moss).
Also you can buy an 11" by 17" color coded electrical schematic that is laminated. These are available from several locations on eBay and are well worth the price. I keep mine in the trunk at all times. Unfortunately, on many cars the previous owners have replaced some wires and added some circuits changing wire colors. MG used the same color coding system for decades and thus your wires theoretically should match whatever color is on the schematic.
If you have strange electrical problems, most can be solved by simply pulling the bullet connectors apart, cleaning the male end with a piece of wet and dry sandpaper, and rolling a small strip of wet and dry sandpaper into a tube with the grit facing outwards and pushing it into the female part of the connector to clean it. It is amazing how many of the so-called "Lucas Wizard of Darkness" problems this can handle.
If the suspension is bad, you may eventually need to change out the bushings and even the springs. That was my most recent project - replacing every single rubber bushing and pad with Prothane ones and replacing the existing heightened springs with lowered ones bringing the car down to the level of the early MGB's. This is major work and took several weeks. I recommend the Prothane bushings and pads over rubber ones. If you ever do this I do recommend that you have them inserted into your parts by a shop with an industrial hydraulic press as it's pretty much impossible for you to do it yourself even with a small shop hydraulic press. I ruined one of my bushings after a couple of hours worth of work and then took them all in with the parts - to my surprise this only cost $40.
Some cracked or checked rubber body seals can be healed a bit by using either Vaseline or a product that you can find at a car parts store.
A badly cracked dash top can be very distracting and can take away from the attractiveness of an otherwise good car. You can buy dash caps from various parts stores such as Moss Motors, Victoria British, and Northwest Import.
One thing I've done that has been helpful to me is to take a newly purchased car into my local British car shop and have them spend about an hour going through the car's various systems and producing me a short report of anything I'm liable to need during the coming 6 to 18 months. My British car garage charges $80 per hour as a shop rate and this is an amount very, very well spent.
I'm sure I've missed dozens of things but these are the ones that hit the top of my mind when I read your question.
CARS: Restored highly-modified 78 MGB, 70 MGB, three 50 Fords, and 68 Mustang; just starting a 73 MGB. COLLECTOR: Antique carpentry tools, auto & woodworking tools, automobilia, license plates, birdhouses; books; pictures (barns, cars, planes); miniature carved animals, small lamps; Indian items; 1890s-1960s cameras, 1930s-50s radios, 50’s & 60’s memorabilia, more. SCALE MODELS: Cars, pickups, trucks, buildings, airplanes, ships, trains. CRAFTSMAN: Creative fabricator, woodworking. DO-IT-YOURSELFER: Current major home remodel; doubled size of another; added rooms to several houses; built home; 4 large irrigation systems, 3 huge landscaping projects. ENERGY: Built off-grid solar & wind system for small farm; currently have on-grid photovoltaic system (100% of electrical needs); built energy-efficient pool system; installed solar pool heating system. READING: Historical fiction, mysteries. WRITING: Essays, blogs, social networking. LEARNING: Alternative energy, anthropology, archeology, autos, behavioral typology, climatology, comparative religion, economics, history, human migrations, geology, linguistics, politics, psychology, sociology, systemics, values analysis, world-view thinking. KNOWLEDGE: Respect facts, logic, thinking; research, devalue opinions. GROWTH: Value self-monitoring, setting limits, self-discipline, accountability, philosophical thinking.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2016-09-12 02:40 PM by barrybarnes.
As somebody else mentioned, the absolute first thing you want to do is make sure your brakes are in good condition. If you feel any dampness on your feet when you're driving you have a bad master cylinder. The slave cylinder is located on lower part of the car near the right front wheel. It's in my opinion that its easier and not much more expensive to replace a cylinder rather than trying to rebuild them as often the cylinders themselves are damaged on the interior surfaces. Also, check your brake hoses for sponginess. If you detect any, replace them immediately before driving as you're liable for an accident and the leaking fluid can actually catch fire as I know from personal experience.
When I got my various classic cars comma I replaced all rubber hoses. You just don't know how long some of those hoses have been there and the checking and cracking that they get is sometimes so small you can't see it. This is particularly true of vacuum lines but just as true and every other rubber part.
Next I check the steering for tightness; it usually has no problems there but you don't want any surprises.
Something most people overlook is having the alignment checked if you're going to be using it as a driver.
Be sure to check your transmission oil - most people run it with the factory recommended 20w50 engine oil. You might want to drain your existing oil and start over from scratch as you have no idea what the previous owner did.
Check for drips the oil pan and differential and other locations. Many of these can be fixed. Despite the MG's reputation for oil leakage, a lot of connections simply need to be tightened. If you have bad drips it's fairly easy to find many of them and to replace many gaskets. Then there are the occasional situations where you just can't trace it down and when you finally do, the place is inaccessible or impossible... Those you either have to try to live with or do major work on your car.
I always like to clean my engine compartment up as it makes me feel better about the car, the car always miraculously runs better, and it's easier to spot new problems.
I feel the same way about washing and quick-waxing the body, cleaning the top, and detailing the interior... It significantly ups my pride and my motivation to make sure I do everything I can for the car.
The differential oil almost never gets checked butt fortunately very seldom really loses much oil.
If yours has the recycling canister in the trunk that connects to the fuel pump for gasoline and vapors, make sure that the hoses are not leaking as they probably are so old that they're leaking vapirs and you'll get a gassy smell.
If the car has been setting up for a while and won't run, you might want to either remove or replace the gas tank as it's bound to be full of varnish. If it runs fine but sputters a bit from time to time it's a sign you've probably got condensation in the tank. There are various products that you can buy at any auto parts store that will take the water out of your gasoline. One is called Heet but they all work the same and equally well.
You may have to clean your carb bowls as well particularly if it's been sitting up for a while as they will also be full of varnish.
A very good investment is a good shop manual. These can be bought on eBay and other websites. The original shop manual as presently sold is actually a combination of the owner's manual which was a small 5-1/2" x 8" booklet and the shop manual. Both are very poorly indexed but once you get used to it you can earmark your pages with small strips of masking tape folded over each important page to you and sticking out about one quarter of an inch.
Also, I highly recommend you to order a paper catalog from Moss Motors. I have one in my garage with my up other paper materials and shop manual. The advantage of the catalog is that it has schematics for virtually everything in the car that the shop manual doesn't. I don't do all of my shopping at Moss Motors it's just that they have the best paper catalog and I can figure out how to do almost anything by studying it. I had a box of vinyl clear page protectors so I cooked the catalog apart and put each page in one of them so that they don't get greasy when I'm looking things up. The catalog comes in particularly handy when you've totally disassembled and assembly and can't remember exactly what you did and where every part goes back to... Which can happen when it's been awhile by the time you get ready to reassemble.
Regarding sources of parts, I like dealing with Northwest Imports in Portland as the guy who answers the phone owns MGB's, drives them, and restores them. He's extremely knowledgeable, has your past buying records in front of him on the computer screen when he's talking to you, and will often tell you what your problem probably is and which part would work best for you. His prices tend to be lower than other suppliers. Despite his huge inventory however, there are some parts he just doesn't carry and for those I either go to Moss Motors or one of Moss Motors' distributors such as Little British Car Co. - lbcarco.com (who is very helpful, very fast, and usually about 10 to 15% less expensive than Moss).
Also you can buy an 11" by 17" color coded electrical schematic that is laminated. These are available from several locations on eBay and are well worth the price. I keep mine in the trunk at all times. Unfortunately, on many cars the previous owners have replaced some wires and added some circuits changing wire colors. MG used the same color coding system for decades and thus your wires theoretically should match whatever color is on the schematic.
If you have strange electrical problems, most can be solved by simply pulling the bullet connectors apart, cleaning the male end with a piece of wet and dry sandpaper, and rolling a small strip of wet and dry sandpaper into a tube with the grit facing outwards and pushing it into the female part of the connector to clean it. It is amazing how many of the so-called "Lucas Wizard of Darkness" problems this can handle.
If the suspension is bad, you may eventually need to change out the bushings and even the springs. That was my most recent project - replacing every single rubber bushing and pad with Prothane ones and replacing the existing heightened springs with lowered ones bringing the car down to the level of the early MGB's. This is major work and took several weeks. I recommend the Prothane bushings and pads over rubber ones. If you ever do this I do recommend that you have them inserted into your parts by a shop with an industrial hydraulic press as it's pretty much impossible for you to do it yourself even with a small shop hydraulic press. I ruined one of my bushings after a couple of hours worth of work and then took them all in with the parts - to my surprise this only cost $40.
Some cracked or checked rubber body seals can be healed a bit by using either Vaseline or a product that you can find at a car parts store.
A badly cracked dash top can be very distracting and can take away from the attractiveness of an otherwise good car. You can buy dash caps from various parts stores such as Moss Motors, Victoria British, and Northwest Import.
One thing I've done that has been helpful to me is to take a newly purchased car into my local British car shop and have them spend about an hour going through the car's various systems and producing me a short report of anything I'm liable to need during the coming 6 to 18 months. My British car garage charges $80 per hour as a shop rate and this is an amount very, very well spent.
I'm sure I've missed dozens of things but these are the ones that hit the top of my mind when I read your question.
CARS: Restored highly-modified 78 MGB, 70 MGB, three 50 Fords, and 68 Mustang; just starting a 73 MGB. COLLECTOR: Antique carpentry tools, auto & woodworking tools, automobilia, license plates, birdhouses; books; pictures (barns, cars, planes); miniature carved animals, small lamps; Indian items; 1890s-1960s cameras, 1930s-50s radios, 50’s & 60’s memorabilia, more. SCALE MODELS: Cars, pickups, trucks, buildings, airplanes, ships, trains. CRAFTSMAN: Creative fabricator, woodworking. DO-IT-YOURSELFER: Current major home remodel; doubled size of another; added rooms to several houses; built home; 4 large irrigation systems, 3 huge landscaping projects. ENERGY: Built off-grid solar & wind system for small farm; currently have on-grid photovoltaic system (100% of electrical needs); built energy-efficient pool system; installed solar pool heating system. READING: Historical fiction, mysteries. WRITING: Essays, blogs, social networking. LEARNING: Alternative energy, anthropology, archeology, autos, behavioral typology, climatology, comparative religion, economics, history, human migrations, geology, linguistics, politics, psychology, sociology, systemics, values analysis, world-view thinking. KNOWLEDGE: Respect facts, logic, thinking; research, devalue opinions. GROWTH: Value self-monitoring, setting limits, self-discipline, accountability, philosophical thinking.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2016-09-12 02:40 PM by barrybarnes.
Attachments:
Rebuild Finished (3).JPG 41.8 KB
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Dayton, OH, USA
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1968 MG MGB GT "Bart - Yellow And Naughty"
1977 MG MGB "Red Betty" 2006 Suzuki Grand Vitara "Suzi Q" 2012 Jeep Liberty "Tommy The Tank" |
|
hamm, nrw, Germany
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hamm, nrw, Germany
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