hursst
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Posts posted by hursst
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The spaghetti in the interior continues to grow (Photos 1-3). This is like putting together a big complicated puzzle. First, I found a few minor problems:
- The ground wire for the horn was omitted from the repro wiring harness. It should branch off a 3-connector section to go to the horn, but there is just nothing, just the two-connector section. I cut the ground wire from my original harness and attached it to the horn. I'll then buy a three-section connector or just a larger connector and attach all three wires, so it should look seamless. I'm getting more and more disappointed by Moss' work on this wiring harness. Their quality control is lacking.
- I'm missing one of the wire pinching screws for the ignition. It was missing when I disassembled the car. I noticed the previous owner had jury-rigged a spade connector that was broken, so not sure what happened there. I should be able to get one from the junk MGs at the junkyard we visit, so for now, I can't attach the far side ignition wires.
- The far end of the original wiring harness that goes to the map light is just a bunch of home-made spliced nonsense that doesn't match the wiring diagram. Luckily, the Moss harness has it right, so I was able to connect everything on the far end.
I put in my Moss order for some bullet connectors, bullet connector connectors, and new bulbs for everything. I'm pretty sour on Moss now, but they do have easy on-line ordering. It's easier and less time consuming than having to call the leading competitor instead.
I was able to re-use all the original Bakelite pull levers on the dash. However, half of them broke off at disassembly due to them being rusted on, but I was able to epoxy all of them back together. One challenge I have is that all the white lettering for the knobs has worn off, so I'll have to see if I can get a super-fine brush and a magnifying glass to see if I can paint them well enough to look reasonable. Luckily, the originals have indentations where the letters are, so it's just a matter of filling them with white paint. I imagine it will be quite challenging, but I may be the only guy with original knobs.
My decision to install every electrical item to the harness before I install the gauge cluster is one of the best decisions I have made. With all the wire stripping, crimping, missing parts, and difficulty finding all the matches, there's no way I could do this crammed under the dash. It will be much easier with everything hooked up, it's just a matter of feeding it in the appropriate holes. At this point, I'm probably about 2/3 of the way thru with the interior wiring harness. I'll be slowed down by the missing parts and research I have to do with some of my notes and labels. The wiring diagrams are REALLY helping.
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Jeff,
The chassis and wheels look great! Amazing how basic the chassis looks, though. I think you may end up finishing yet another car before I complete my MGA! Really looking forward to seeing the continuing work on the Metz; that's going to be an amazing car and a very interesting restoration with the older stuff.
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Today, continued to work on restoring various wiring/cabling brackets.
Got the heat shrink installed on the horn (Photo 1). Turned out very nice; tucked right under the horn cover, so you'd never know it didn't come with bullet connectors as a repro. Installed horn, but not hooked up, as I need the connectors.
Continued working on the wiring harness. Got the turn signal switch hooked up and completed the driver's side portion of the interior harness (which isn't much). Continued on to the passenger side of the wiring. This is quite complicated. I have to translate the repro wiring harness connections from the original, which I labelled. Of course, 6 years have passed, so that's a real life-saver, as I'd have no idea where anything goes otherwise. Of course, there has been some tape that has fallen off or the writing is indecipherable, but that's where the electrical schematic comes in handy. I was able to install the separate smaller harness that came with the kit by hooking up the one lead wire (Photo 3). It now matches up to the original harness, so I can continue to figure out what goes where. I also discovered that there are a few wires that have the wrong connector type. I tried to hook up the heater wiring, but I found that one of the repro wires did not come with a bullet connector, as it should. I'll have to put an order in for bullet connectors. I also learned that the old harness has tons of light bulbs, and they are SUPER fragile, as I've broken two of them just moving the old harness around. I'll have to order a lot of bulbs, too. The last thing I learned is that all MGAs came with a fog light switch on the dash, regardless of whether or not it actually came with fog lights (Photo 2). I never figured out all the switches when I disassembled it, so it was a surprise to me. All the wiring is there, too, both on the original wiring harness and the repro, so I could easily add fog lights if I wanted to. I'm going to clean the switch up before I attach it to the wiring harness. Seems to function okay, not that it matters!
Happy New Year! The year 2024 simply sounds surreal to me...
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Thank you for all the advice. The float was checked by the specialist and he said it was set a little too high. He did not mention it leaking. I've had this carb rebuilt multiple times from the ground up, with just about every part replaced with the factory spec part from Rochester by this same specialist, including replacements of the floats with modern equivalents. The specialist mentioned the float was set a little high and my choke mechanism was binding pretty badly at startup. I suspect maybe the choke wasn't closing all the way when I was driving it as the primary culprit. The choke binding is completely gone now.
The problems appear to be solved at this point, I've replaced or rebuilt just about everything possible. I will be doing a 70 or so mile drive on Thursday to really test it out and see how the plugs look afterward. I'll also check the voltage out so make sure it's up to spec. I checked the new coil previously, and it appeared to be reasonable with its output.
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Just had the carb fully rebuilt by a Quadrajet specialist.
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Thanks Milt. It's running fairly well now, but I still have to pull some plugs after my next long drive and see how they look. I'll also do a voltage check to confirm.
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Jeff, you machine shop/engine builder guys are amazing! I can't imagine the skill, knowledge, and machinery it takes to get things all within thousandths of an inch and have them fit and run. I also assume that your build(s) are WAY better than the original factory builds and your engines should run much more reliably and for longer.
With engines this ancient, and with your tolerances, what motor oil will you run? Will you attach an oil filter, or will you just change the oil every xxx miles without a filter?
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More progress today.
-Installed the choke cabling (Photo 1)
-Installed the heater controls and cabling (Photo 2)
-Installed the heater air intake tubing (Photo 3)
-Installed the carburetor fresh air intake tube (Photo 3)
-Continued de-rusting and restoring multiple bracket fasteners for wiring and cables
-Hooked up front headlight wiring harness portion
Also bought some heat shrink tubing for the horn wiring. As shown on Photo 2, under the cowl is slowly turning into a big bowl of spaghetti. I think I will install the few other push/pull knobs from the gauge cluster to the wiring harness first, then feed them thru the gauge cluster with the wiring already attached. This should be slightly easier than going under the gauge cluster once it's installed.
At this point, I'm amazed at how little is left to put on the car. I have a lot more space in various closets and rooms! I'm going to clean up one bigger room I've been using for storage tomorrow. Of course, there is still a lot of work left, mainly wet sanding and polishing the remaining body panels.
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Back from Christmas break. I haven't been able to get as many hours as I wanted with the MG, as there have been so many other issues with other cars. I torture myself with constant old car repairs as it's still FAR cheaper than buying a new car for $40,000 or more. A lot can be repaired on an older car for $40,000, especially when your labor rate is $0/hour. Here are the two worst issues over the last two days: Had my belt tensioner spring mount crack and break off on my '01 Jeep Wrangler while I was driving. Barely made it home with a very slippery serpentine belt with almost no tension. Fairly easy to replace. Have a bad water leak in the rear hatch glass of my '97 Saab 900. Every time it rains, the trunk area is soaking wet. This is why when I bought it, every piece of metal inside the car was very rusty. Supposedly had it repaired by my Saab shop, but their repair lasted maybe 6 months before the leak came back. Had to find the leak, then I attacked it with flex seal tape in one section, then a thick, thick layer of rubberized undercoating on another section, which should either prevent the leak completely, or turn it into maybe a few drips once in a while. I'll have to see how it looks after the next rainstorm.
Ok, back to the MG. Progress has been excellent, but it's not much to look at with the nature of what's left. Over the last two days:
-Hooked up the strange windshield wiper cable to both wipers
-Installed the fuse box and associated wiring (Photo 2)
-Wired up the generator, coil, and most of the horn (Photo 3). All that's left in the front of the car are the headlight connections
-Installed the starter pull cable
-Connected the heater hoses
-Finished restoring the original driver's side interior kick panel (Photo 1)
-Working on restoring the many rusty clips that I've been finding on my original wiring harness
I will be leaving the original two fuses, as it worked when it was built, so it will work now. I'm also going for as much authenticity as possible, so adding more fuses is a no-go for me.
I'm going to install all the cables, wires, tubes, etc. that go thru the firewall to aide in the installation of everything when the gauge cluster goes in. Tomorrow, I should be able to install the choke cabling. There also appears to be another section of wiring harness that was not connected to the main wiring harness under the dash, so I'll have to figure that out before I install the gauge cluster.
The repro horn was a problem. My original horn was completely destroyed and the original wiring was cut or broken on the inside of the horn, so I never knew exactly how it was hooked up. The original wiring harness has bullet connectors (so does the repro wiring harness), but the repro horn had "U" connectors. I ended up splicing two pieces from the original wiring harness onto the repro horn (Photo 3 again). I'll add some heat-shrink to the splices and tuck them inside of the horn cover, so it will look like the original connectors. I'll use some bullet connector mating connections from my original wiring harness once I find some of them that I won't be using, as many of them are supplied on the repro harness.
My goal will still be to make Hershey 2024 with this car. I shouldn't have any problem finishing everything in the next 9+ months, but who knows? This looks like it will end up being an 8-year project. I originally thought I could have it done in 4-5 years. Wrong.
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Lew, no others that I know of. It does have minimal electrical components. A good fire extinguisher will be in the car at all times as well!
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Made some more progress over the last couple days. The work is going very slowly when a high amount of detail is involved. First, I was able to reuse the original "Lucas" plastic tag that I took off the original wiring harness and put on the repro wiring harness (Photo 1). All the photos of the disassembly I took are paying off now.
I completed all the carpeting (Photo 2). Turned out quite well, but was a little difficult with 16 separate pieces. I was actually able to reuse 3 of the original carpeting pieces, they just needed a vacuuming and quick cleaning.
I continued on the wiring harness. I was able to pick up some original Lucas fuses a number of years ago at the Carlisle import show, so I'll be using these to replace the trashed or missing originals (Photo 3). The ones that were on the car when I got it are on the right. I'm currently cleaning up the fuse panel and its pieces and should be able to install it all shortly. Only two fuses for the whole car!
Completed a little more work on hooking up connections on the wiring harness, such as the flasher, the headlight dipper switch, and I labelled wiring for the fuse box. I also installed the heater (Photo 4). I even installed an original key on the heater box screw at the far driver's side, as original. It was very difficult to install the two small defroster tube outlets under the dash with their practically microscopic screws. I had to rubber cement two of the upper screws to a screwdriver in order to be able to get the screw in position, as they were so small and so little room.
Next step is to get the fuse box and associated wiring installed and hook up more of the heater controls. After that, I think I'll install any outlying tubes/wires that need to go thru the cowl, as once I have the gauge cluster installed, it will be much more difficult to get under that area without much grief.
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Thanks Randiego, that's really good advice. I'll double check the points. At first glance, they looked pretty good, but I'll really inspect them.
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Got very busy this week, but finally got a few hours today to work. Finished the passenger side footwell carpeting (Photo 1). Same process as the driver's side one. I did have to use two repro "Lift The Dot" fasteners as two originals were missing. They were most likely attached to the part of the floorboard that rotted off and probably fell into the road somewhere near Raleigh, NC sometime in 1969. I'll now start sizing, cutting, and glueing in the other carpeting pieces that go on the frame rail and some other miscellaneous places.
Next, I connected the new wiring harness portion to the original voltage regulator (Photo 2).
Last, I found that the repro flat press lock fasteners that go to the "MGA"-labelled engine vents in the front body were either slightly too big or slightly too small as they stood, so had to open up the holes on the smaller ones to get them to fit and stay put. Not easy reaching into the vent scoops from the inside of the engine bay, but got it done. I hope these never have to be removed, because I don't think it could be done without breaking most of the attachment studs...which is what I had to do when removing them during disassembly.
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Yes, I replaced the coil. I ended up having the carb completely rebuilt. Most likely, the cause was the float set too high, running a little rich, and the choke was most likely binding and not fully closing. I have the car mostly dialed in now, but need to put a few more miles on it and check the plugs again to be sure. Thanks for the advice.
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As a bonus, I kept working on the electrical. I'm going to just install everything and have it tested all at once by my British Car shop when I hire them to do an initial shakedown. I installed the voltage regulator and the wiring thru the firewall (Photos 1 & 2). I'll slowly hook everything up to where it needs to go based on my original labelled wiring harness. Once I get the wiring close to being set up, I'll install the gauge cluster, then hook everything up to it. Last, I was able to install the firewall grommet for the tach drive cable, so the speedometer and tach cables are ready to just screw in.
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Got another 1/2 day in the garage. Main focus was on installing the front floor carpeting. Starting with the original carpeting (what's left of it) and I pulled out all the original "Lift the Dot" fasteners for re-use (Photo 1). I only had time for one, so chose the driver's side. Luckily, all original fasteners were able to be disassembled, cleaned, and reused. I had to lay the carpet about 30 times to make sure I was able to install the fasteners in the correct place, since the Moss carpeting comes with no holes or markings. I'm sure most MGA restorers probably skip the lift the dot fasteners altogether. I also had to create a cutout flap for the accelerator pedal stop bracket. The carpet turned out very well (Photo 2).
In between, I picked up some new 3M trim adhesive spray and got back to work on the front vertical interior panels. I completed the passenger side one, it was in very good condition and just needed a good cleaning and very minimal reglueing around the cardboard backing. I was able to reuse about 70% of the original fasteners here, the other 30% was rusted or destroyed in order to remove them when I first disassembled the car. Ready to be installed (Photo 3), however, I can't install it yet, as I will need access to that area in order to install the front fenders, so it will go back into storage.
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...Last, I got out my old wiring harness to start on that (Photo 1). Here's the portion of the new wiring harness that hasn't already been installed (Photo 2). I have every wire labelled on the old harness, so I'll just have to slowly transfer certain pieces to the new harness and match everything up with the proper fasteners/connections as I go. Should be somewhat straight forward, since it's basically just the gauge cluster, fuse box, voltage regulator, and front lighting.
At the same time, I'm going to work on the rest of the carpet. Probably just switch back and forth as I see fit. I've decided to hold off on the doors and hood for now, as it's much better to leave those off until I get the entire gauge cluster and wiring set up, as having doors and a hood installed will greatly limit my access and ease of installation of all the crazy wiring and parts under the dash/gauge cluster.
Question for group: Electrics is by far my worst skill. Here's a photo of the original voltage regulator with the cover off (Photo 3). Other than just needing a quick cleaning, it looks pretty good inside. Do these things last forever if there are no obvious problems or broken things, or should I replace it? Is there an easy way to test it out? Looks like it would probably work to me, but I know very little.
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...next, I got my side curtains out and put them in the storage bag in the back (Photo 1). I also got the bag snapped in place (Photo 2). Continued...
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Feel much better today, looks like I'll be COVID free shortly. Got about 1/2 a day back in the garage. Made more good progress. Got most of the trans tunnel carpeting installed, although I ran out of trim adhesive before I could finish the very front carpet piece (Photo 1). I installed the two defroster tubes that will eventually mate up to the heater unit and I installed the steering column bracket to finally get that in the proper location (Photo 2). I also installed the "1600" badging and the "MGA" engine bay heat vents (Photo 3), although I need more speed nuts to secure the vents. While doing this work, I noticed that the front paint is really bad, just full of scratches and some areas toward the edges that I missed completely, so I will have to do another good round of polishing bring it up to "acceptable." Continued...
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COVID hit me fairly hard this morning, so didn't make it to the garage today. However, I did tackle fixing Moss' terrible sewing job on the trans fluid access cover on the carpet in the afternoon when I felt a little better (Photo 1). I had to cut out the original threads first. I then simply snapped the button so the flap was flat and hand-sewed it back on. Now ready for installation. Moss wasted about 3 hours of my time in total with this complete failure of quality work and quality control.
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Keiser, I've seen no reference to that in any of the myriad reference literature I've read. Mine did not have that on it. I doubt that was original, but you never know, I guess. Most current owners add aftermarket heat shields of some kind to their cars. I'll probably end up doing the same if it's as intolerable as other MGA owners say.
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Another post, since I couldn't add all the photos to the previous post. Here's a photo of the interior, currently. I cut and installed the repro jute padding in the footwell/front floor and glued it down. Curiously, there was never any jute padding under the seat area, so I'm just leaving it alone, as original. I will revisit all this after I get the car running, as the footwells are notoriously too hot with the exhaust going right under it with no heat shielding except the wood floor, jute padding, and carpeting. I'll see how it feels, then address it if needed. Luckily, the original carpeting just snaps in, so I'll have easy access if I need to add some heat barriers. Unfortunately, this also means I have to transfer the original snaps from my original trashed carpeting to the repro carpeting, which hopefully won't be too difficult, but it is a hassle compared to just laying down carpet.
Next, I fit the center carpeting section (with no hole cut for the shifter, thanks Moss), but I left it loose for additional adjustment. I next installed the rear carpeting with the sewn-in arm rest. I just glued the top part to ensure I had a good bond, as putting your arm there could force the whole thing loose if it's not glued down properly. I'll follow up with glueing down the rest if the arm rest passes the test (Photo 1).
My next task will be to restore the original front trim panels that go vertically next to the footwells. They are in good shape, just need cleaning and re-glueing to the card backing. I'm going to try to save the original fasteners, but they may be too rusty to use again, so may have to head off to the hardware store.
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Got COVID again for the 3rd time. Now it's just a very minor cold where I feel fine, but it lasts for about 10 days, which is a hassle. Couldn't do much in public, so guess where I spent most of the day? Very productive today.
First, a complaint. I started working with my new carpeting and found that Moss' craftsmanship leaves a lot to be desired. Here's a photo of the very front transmission hump carpeting piece with the transmission oil access flap built in (Photo 1). The snaps are about 1 1/8" away from each other; not even close. I'll have to cut the stitching from the top of the flap and restitch it properly. How does this happen? You put the snap in place, snap it, then sew the top of the flap so it lays flat. This will be a huge waste of my time, thanks Moss.
I got the two rear trim pieces finished (Photo 2). They look pretty good, and since these really aren't seen, I'm happy to reuse the originals. The three loose bolts are where the roadster top attaches.
Next, I moved on to the defroster vents on the cowl and the duct ends that attach underneath them. I also installed the tonneau cover hold down fasteners and the rear-view mirror, since these were all just easy screw in and done projects (Photo 3).
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Ron, amazing work, as usual. Where do you get your fasteners for this car, such as the nuts, bolts, washers for your exhaust cut-out? Do you have the originals, a stash of period fasteners, or do you have to do your best at the hardware store...or maybe all the above?
1960 MGA Restoration
in Our Cars & Restoration Projects
Posted
56s,
I may try that, but the valleys of the lettering are so shallow that if I try to wipe anything, it will probably wipe into the letter valley and erase/smear it. What I'm going to try is use a magnifying glass and a very, very thin brush and try to just freehand it and see what happens. I can probably get it mostly right, then use a razorblade to remove any paint that doesn't belong when it gets a little tacky. I think your water-based paint idea is good, so I'll probably track some of that down and use a razor blade to "wipe."
Yes, I'm doing okay with the wiring, just a little frustrated by the extra time I will need because of Moss' lack of quality control and attention to detail. I'm slammed with other problems at the moment, so probably won't get back to the MG for another week.
Off topic, but I finally successfully repacked my water pump on my '30 Plymouth with the original graphite-style packing after struggling with it for years, having it rebuilt with someone installing a "plastic" type seal that eventually spun itself thru the packing nut onto the shaft, and constant coolant leaks, up to current time with a leak so bad it was undrivable. No leaks at the moment! Very proud of finally tackling something so simple to other people, but I had so many problems with over the last 8 years or more, not really knowing what I was doing. Eventually I learn how to do things, but with no one to show me how, it takes my 3x-10x as long as normal car people. Ok, back to dealing with life's absolute nonsense again for while...