Chad's 1959 MGA

 Today we bled the brakes and clutch, after finally getting all the parts needed to complete the hydraulic circuits.  As usual, we have to try about four different approaches to get all the air out - mighty vac, single pedal depression, power bleeder, pump up several times and hold, etc.  Seems like we always get there, but takes a while and consumes about a pint of fluid.  Brakes stop but still need some more work.  Clutch felt fine but did not disengage.  We've seen this before, clutch disc seizes to the flywheel.  So started the engine with clutch pedal down and in second gear - starter struggled a bit but eventually it broke the disc free.  Time to drive it! Engine continues to run fine.  Clutch and gearbox operated fine, got into all four gears.  I'm sitting kinda high in the car because I'm sitting on a plastic crate which is about 6 inches tall, the normal seat bottom is about 3 inches tall.  

Had two fine examples of crud found in the MGA.  The first was inside the thermostat housing.  When the engine first ran, it eventually ran hot, which we thought was a stuck thermostat.  We now suspect it's actually this crud blocking the flow: We had also noticed the passenger side rear brake shoes had some differential oil on them, and an attempt had been made to seal the end of the differential at some point in the past.  We've learned about the root cause of this issue, see this picture from the Moss catalog (grey box, starts with remember): then here's what the vent looked like on this car: Lots of crud.  So hopefully we don't need to do anything further on the differential oil leak.

 With some help from Clay we determined there was indeed spark, perhaps helped by resetting the points again and filing them clean.  Cleaned up spark plugs.  Freed up dampers in carbs and added oil.  Sprayed ether into carbs.  Little blip of the throttle (by hand, throttle cable rusted solid) and the sucker took right off: Idles very well, no major coolant leaks.  After several minutes it got pretty hot, we suspect the thermostat is stuck.  New thermostat and throttle cable, then we'll run it some more.   Compression, as expected, is getting better - now 120/120/110/90.  We also adjusted the valve clearances to 0.018 cold.

 We have removed the two seats and six pieces of cockpit trim.  These will be taken to Too Tall Tim in OH by the car's owner, where Too Tall will rebuild the seats and recover the cockpit trim in the red color selected by the owner.  Here's the removed parts ready to go (yes there is a second seat behind the first one): We had a heck of a time getting the seats out, lots of rusty bolts. We then removed the black carpet which had been holding the awful smell.  Carpet tacks had been used to hold it down, which we removed. We were able to take the ignition switch to a local key shop, they used the code on the switch to look up the key pattern and make us a key.  We hope it's not indicative of a demonic car, the code was FP 666. We also installed a battery cutoff switch, a Miata battery, and lines for a trickle charger, like we do on all MGA's.  For some reason this car's body had more room between the body and the frame for installation of the switch. Then tri...

 Engine update first.  Stuck valve (#1 exhaust) is now free after soaking the stem/spring in PB Blaster and WD40.  Performed new compression check, getting better, #1 went from zero to 90, #2 from 60 to 85, #3 from 40 to 75, #4 from 40 to 70.  Doused all four cylinders in Marvel Mystery Oil and will let it sit some more. Replaced hoses on radiator and heater and refilled cooling system.  Replaced flexible fuel and oil pressure lines.  Fuel pump makes noise.  Next step after more soaking is to start the engine up and see how it runs. Meantime brakes and clutch hydraulics would be done except for a new part snafu.  Good thing we ordered all new brake lines, we had four lines break when removed, two due to rusting through right in the middle of the line!  All six wheel cylinders replaced on the drum brakes, new master cylinder for brake and clutch, and new slave cylinder for clutch.   The snafu we have is the new brake lines will not t...