Is hopping up a MG TD off or on topic?

you guys were dropping xpeg engines in td's at the factory? any other details? any pictures? welcome to the HAMB!

 

Yes, welcome!

(Is an XPEG an XPAG enlarged to 1500cc, but still different from the 1500 fitted to the MG A?)

I would love to hear more, too.

 

Where did you read they were dropping the XPEG into the TDs...I read MGA engines? And I doubt that "The Morris Garage" was the factory...but I guess he'll explain that if he writes again.

 

Another request for some scans from the March 56 issue of Hot Rod please.

Matt

 

My car (1949 MG TC) is getting closer and closer to completion...I'm hoping that I'll have it running and on the road by the end of the month...here's some photos of where it sits right now. Fender (cycle type in front, stock in rear) are painted and waiting to be put on when the car is running and I'm not banging into 'em with tools.

BTW, the rollbar is sitting a bit high right now because it's not bolted in place.

 

Damn, Damnfingers, that is very nice. This whole thread has gotten me thinkin about my TD that's sitting out back of the shop rotting, but your car has just about pushed into action.
Just gotta finish the roadster first. To many projects, not enough time, I gotta quit the work thing.

 

In the back ground is a Morris Oxfod series MO. While at school in New Zealand,a damn long time ago ,a guy I worked for after school put a flat head in one of those... and the Morris,with rack and pinion steering mounted on the firewall , the flattie had to be sited a bit forward... infact the front pulley was over the front bumper....

 

i think i read somewhere that Ken Miles' R-2 Flying Shingle also used a stronger Morris Minor rear axle...

i vote for '50's period correct modifcations in the great anglo/american roadrace special tradition...starting with a hot v8-60. correct in every respect in my book

 

Try contacting Dick Shaler in NC. [email protected]. He has worked on the MG TA, TC, and TD for years.

 

The TD in question still exists, and was still in CA (in parts) in a garage in the east bay (south of Oakland), when a friend saw it 15 years ago.

 

Boy talk about the thread that won't die! For all you would be MG techs there is a lot of good trouble shooting info on You Tube at the "University Motors" site. John Twist has been sharing his tricks and techniques for several months now and I have picked up a lot of useful stuff there. If you have a TD it is worth hitting the "subscribe" button to get them all.

 

If you want a Britsh Sporty with a V8, I've got a Triumph Spitfire hanging about my shop that has a 215 Aluminum Block Buick (same as Rover motor) that the cat wants to sell ....

 

Back in the mid-50's, and early 60's, I ran a TD MarkII in the under 1500 c.c. class, with the California Sports Car Club (Cal Club). The car had been the Class G Production champ, in at least one year (not at my hands). As with virtually all the production classes, the front runners were "cheaters". The biggest "cheat" on our car, was that we took the XPAG block, bored through the water jackets, and stuffed 2 1/2 liter Riley sleeves in it. The Mark II had, in addition to two shocks on each corner; bigger valves and carbs, with two fuel pumps. We put a factory AEG122 cam (which was legal) it; and matched and ported the head (we knew nothing of flow testing in those days). With the 4.55 gears (5.128 was stock), the car went through the traps on the back straight at Riverside, at about 95 m.p.h. (pretty good for something that's about as aerodynamic as a galleon, under full sail). Today, with the knowledge now, of the importance of cylinder block structural ridgedity; I would not recommend the bore and sleeve job. The engine "blew" big time, at it's last race at Santa Barbara. When we took the head off, THERE WAS NOTHING! Even the center web was gone. Everything was in little pieces down in the pan. At the time, I still didn't get the concept of block structure.

 

Bad Rod, I think that picture answers the question of this thread pretty clearly!

Good story, Old Dawg.

 

Finished, driven and being played with now..

 

Nicely done, damnfingers.

What wheels are those?

 

I guess it's form is function, is beauty. An MG TC is one of the few classics that really looks good with a roll bar. Damnfingers, yours is a real jewel. Have fun!
"Dawg"

 

Deuce Rails...thanks. The wheels are 16" Dunlops with Alfin brake drums.

Old Dawg...Thanks for the kind words.

 

I did a inframe rebuild on a TD about 5 years ago. I bored the block in frame with my old Van Norman broing bar. I had to shorten my knife up and had a hell of a time centering the bar. The cylinders were little smaller than the boring bar. I inframed it because the car was restored around a worn out POS engine.
had a old manual that told me you had to pull the body to get the engine out, and I didn't want to go to all that work. Ran ok but it was a dog all stock.

Not much fun. Old thread I know but I just wanted to share the story. Always wish I had taken a picture of my bar on that block, and made a black & white for fun...
Jeff

 

In the 1960s, I saw an early British sports car, which looked like either an MG TD or a Morgan, with a flathead V-8 installed. It was a very nice installation, and looked like it could have been a factory job.
I always wondered if there was any similar looking car that had come stock with a flathead V-8 . This car was sitting in a field, a bit rusty and weathered, with no hood, and no ID badges to tell me exactly what it was.

 

Just found this site and this thread. Holy smoke. I have a dis-assembled TD and the b18 out of my mother's old Volvo P44 she drove in the seventies. My eventual plan is to convert to a BW t5 transmission and MGA rear-end ratios. It'll be awhile, though.

 

I've found several MG soup-up articles in the early small books, as well as some V860 swaps...Ken Miles keeps coming up. Remember that it took at least several years into the 1950's for sporty car people and rodders to segregate themselves into different social groups, and the segregation was never entirely total, you communist tea bagger.

 

On the Volvo...that thing is as English-looking an engine as there is...I think I am correct in saying the engine was actually built in England for the '50's-'60's Volvos. On the rears...as I remember from early HRM swap articles, Volvo use an American rear (Spicer??). It used parts that could be swapped with ...Studebaker?...various USA vehicles, at any rate, for bigger and more available gear choices. This is dim memories from an early sixties Volvo V8 swap in HRM.

 

How 'bout a Stromberg 97 on a Nicson manifold for a period hop-up? gotts 52 sit'n the shed. tt

 

why would you down grade to a poorer flowing carburetor that is a piece of shit? Bolt on a pair of 1.5" SU'S from a B, they are a everywhere.

 

Bringing this thread back around because it is awesome and because I have a question. A few times in this thread and one of the others on British car engine swaps old articles on MG engine swaps are mentioned. I am looking for period guidance on American V8 into MG TD swaps...could someone point me to what specific issues of what specific mags I should be searching for are?

Thanks.

Cris

 

The early Hot rod magazine year books have those articles. Can't remember what year issue though.

and..

It would have been an Allard . 40 years later I can tell you that you missed out big time.

 

Here is good start
http://www.britishv8.org/

 

It's a total waste of effort putting a V8 into a TD TF TC or what ever . A real trad rodder would surely hop up the banger or install a hot C block and go historic racing. All we need really is a streetbeast TD rod .