Well, this week was spent on one of the less glamourous parts of MG
ownership. Me, a coffee can, an oil change pan, various solvents, rags and
brushes, and lots of greasy dirty parts. I started out using Simple Green
but by the weekend I had changed to Gunk and various more aggressive
solvents such as STP brake cleaner. The result is that I now have many zip
lock bags full of clean parts waiting for reassembly. That and the girls
complain about the smell.
The driveshaft and the carbs are fixed now and awaiting reassembly. I have
cleaned the combustion chamber and ports and have hand lapped the valves
into the seats. The intakes look good although the seats are a little
wider than optimal. The exhaust seats cleaned up well but the valves are
shaky. I am going to call around today and see if someone will "sharpen"
them for me. I would just by new ones but by now I would have to UPS Red
them here in order to have them in time for reassembly. they will probably
seal but they have some pits in the sealing surface. On the bright side
the head was flat as a pancake- less than .002" warpage (my thinnest feeler
gage).
The block is out for honing and new cam bearings. I chased the threads
with a tap to ease reassembly. All of the parts should show up in the next
day or two so things should start happening quickly. In the "Murphy's law
for MG rebuilders" category, quite a few of the parts already ordered are
now on sale at Moss. Oh well.
Regards,
Bill Eastman
61 MGA getting cleaner one piece at a time.
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