New Addition

I have been looking at a number of cars for opportunities to buy, strip and sell so as to afford my hobby. In addition, I really wanted another GT, especially having crushed Pricilla last year. She was beyond restoration, so I don't regret that decision, but of all MGs, my favorite are the GTs.

My buddy Kevin has a former business partner that has three GTs in various conditions located in Advance, NC. Of those three was this one. A white '69 MG BGT.

This car has a solid body - rust exists in the normal locations - but serves as a strong starting point. The bonus is that it has a highly coveted overdrive transmission. Sale of the overdrive will nearly fund the entire purchase price of the automobile.

I don't anticipate restoring this car anytime soon, but when I am ready, I'll have a great place to begin.

Sweet metal fabrication

Another problem I had at CMP was extremely high oil temperatures. One of the culprits, we believed to be very poor air flow through the oil cooler.

I relocated mine to below the shelf from its stock position. But I did not provide any air deflection, so most likely the air went the path of least resistance, passing around the cooler and not through it.

I was at my parents house in Northern Virginia last week and Saturday was play in the garage day, so dad and I made this.

He has a slightly shorter one for his 10 row cooler. Mine is 1 3/4" taller with 16 rows. It is a sturdy aluminum and is designed to connect to the oil cooler in the back using the stock mounting points and there is a bracket for the front.

Once I get home, I will mount it and do a few other things to ensure an air tight fit, but this is a great beginning. I'm real pleased with how it turned out.

Dad gave me the patterns that he made, so I am going to make a few more to sell for some extra money.

NC Mountain Drive in a MGB

A first for me since the 90s

Highway 66 and 89 are some fine roads if you ever want to take your sports car out for a spirited drive. Lots of fast swooping turns and tight switch backs. Plenty of people along the way to wave at and a few quirky General Stores to stop off and grab a cold drink.

That is what about five of us did this morning as part of the regular meet up of Winston-Salem area MG owners. It was a blast and the first outing of that kind for me since the 90s. Man oh man was it fun and the whole time I imagined that, "if only I had a BGT, then the whole family could be with me right now."

It was a good time, with good people. I made a movie about it. Pretty funny, but I tapped into this muvee software that is on my computer. It's really cool. The quality is a bit poor, but what can you expect with a cheap digital still camera. Enjoy!!

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=38815994

Oh, and as a special bonus, I picked up a special package on the way back to get my car - my son.

Going off-topic

I just realized that this is an incredibly boring blog, but since no one reads it, it really doesn't matter. However, tomorrow morning has given me a great reason to go slightly off topic.

There is a good friend of mine who owns MGs who is making a great effort at getting local Triad area MG owners together on a regular basis. Nothing organized, like a club, but simply a, "hey let's meet up and go for a drive, have breakfast, or share some tips" everynow and then.

Anyhow, tomorrow we are meeting up at 9 a.m. for a group drive into the mountains. Now, I am attending these gatherings, but I don't own a street MG, so I am that one random guy that shows up in a Ford. And, though I miss not having a street car, I still enjoy hanging out with like minded people and their beautiful cars.

So going back to my buddy - he owns two MGs and asked me earlier this week if I wanted to drive his blue '75 MGB during tomorrow's drive. I said yes - of course - but what is really cool about it, is that I have not driven a street stock MG since the 90s.

I am really looking forward to it. I'll get some pictures and post a follow up tomorrow.

A Slow Lap around Carolina Motorsports Park

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=38449732

I did get some video of my first of only three laps. Little did I know what the day held for me, but this particular lap was plaqued with a stuck accelerator pedal. So I eased my way around, went into the pits, got it unstuck and then completed my other two laps.

On another positive note, the exhaust has been fixed. I picked it up from the professionals yesterday. So, no more homemade exhausts from me for a while. It turned out to be much cheaper to have it done by someone who knows what they are doing.

Successfully unsuccessful

Well, to avoid a lot of the nasty details, this past weekend I did my scheduled test day to ensure that we worked out the bugs prior to our July SCCA race.

It did not go very well. Well, actually depending on how you look at it, it also went very well. But what I thought was going to be simple arrive and drive, turned out to be a three lap fiasco, followed by a full morning and afternoon of tuning, tweaking and then ultimately throwing in the towel.

One very important issue was solved - tire rub. However, three issues popped up - distributor or coil is shot (being sent off to Jeff S. for repair as I type and I don't currently have a spare), exhaust needs to be tweaked (I cooked the pain off part of the rear valence because of a poor design on my part) and engine oil cooling (the oil temp gauge is pegged at 300 degrees - should be around 210 - thanks to poor air venting). All easily fixable, but requires time.

The end result is that I in no way can solve for all of these issues in the 1 1/2 weeks leading up to the Road Atlanta race and to try would most certainly result in a complete waste of resources. I know that this is not uncommon, but because I am new, I am learning this along the way. It is a brand new car that requires tweaking and adjusting until the sweet spot is found. At that point, it will run. Unfortunately, we are just not there yet.

I did have a great time though despite the disappointment and have to say thanks to a number of forum member's from http://www.mgexperience.net/ who were there to help and offer support.

Thanks to Hap, Kevin Hart and Torsten for your efforts, expertise and time. We all wanted to see the car run and for one of those three laps, it did pretty darn good. Also thanks to Jeff Schlemmer who took our call on the weekend for ignition advice.

I have since withdrawn from the Road Atlanta race and will circle up with the calendar to determine next steps. I have a few people thinking through fixes and next steps including my dad who is already designing a box to provide the air needed to the cooler.

The development continues - and so will the posts.