Build Diary for
2013-03-17 - Chassis

Busy week this week. I spent the evenings building up the bottom end of the engine while the weather was rubbish.

My darling wife does put up with a lot and I built the engine on the pool table in the dining room! Well it was warmer than the garage!

I had to send off to Rimmer Bros for some oversize thrust washers, as I wanted to reduce the crankshaft end float on the engine from the 0.008 - 0.014 thou to 0.002-0.004 thou that was recommended by a number of engine builders of the MG Midget/Spitfire 1500 engines. While it was apart I might as well make sure it is going to last!

New exhaust and inlet valves were lapped in and new piston rings put in freshly honed bores, so hopefully it should go pretty well when it is all finished. Even turning it over by hand the compression is very good and all is lovely and smooth.

Luckily the weather cheered up for a few hours on Saturday and Sunday, and so I stripped down the chassis and moved it to the back garden where it got the first coat of chassis black paint.

I have been really fortunate with this chassis; as I mentioned before, I bought it off ebay as a reconditioned rolling chassis and it then stood for 6 years. Everything was replaced at that time, and then it was waxoyled so every nut and bolt was a joy to remove - no snapped bolts or rounded nuts! Bliss! Even the front brake callipers, and rear drums were brand new, with light surface rust. Everything just needs a strip down, clean up and then paint - which is what it will get this week, with a view to maybe getting it built up next weekend.