Pretty Fly For A White Guy

Before the engine was mounted on it's trolly I needed to adapt the back plate to fit. This I did by using a Rover 820 back plate, cutting the excess material off it and using a fixture I made up to locate the center line of the crank I was able to clamp it to the MGB back place. I could then drill through the holes and thus make the MGB part fit the Rover engine.

Once the back plate was done it was bolted to the engine and the flywheel fitted.















By using the MGB flywheel I can use the standard MGB starter motor and clutch. However, because this engine will be a lot more powerful than the old unit I will be fitting an uprated clutch. The other bonus is that I can now bolt up a standard 4 syncro gearbox to the new engine. My car is fitted with an ordinary 4 speed gearbox. But, I do have a couple (as you do) of spare 4 syncro with overdrive gearboxes. One of which I have cleaned up and inspected.

This shot shows the cleaned gearbox partially assembled, obviously with out the overdrive unit fitted. The reason it was not fitted was because when I reassembled it I forgot to line up the sprines inside it so I could only slide it part way on to the output shaft of the gearbox.

















This shot shows the gearbox finally mated to the T series block. Still without the overdrive though. In the forground you can see the Rover 820 back plate I used to locate the holes I needed to drill in the MGB back plate.

So the situation at this moment in time is. I have a new engine and a gearbox that fits it. I can now wheel the engine around my garage if I need to move it. I have partly fabricated my inlet manifold. To which I will be fitting a set of carbs from a Suzuki GSXR 1100 motorbike (more of this later) and I have started to fabricate what will be a tubular exhaust manifold from stainless steel I have laying around. As for ignition I have bought a megajolt unit. I will explain each of these items in more deatil as I make progree on them. Wish me luck.