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MG Midget and Sprite Technical - Morale Booster

I suspect many car enthusiasts have been excited when starting a restoration or other large job only to become despondent when things start to go wrong. I rebuilt a MG TF a few years ago and one of the first things I did was to restore the dash board. It looked superb and I stored it in our dining room. When ever a job was getting me down I could go and look at it and my spirits were lifted. I was recommended to do this by a friend who stored his Dolomite Sprint cylinder head in the kitchen. I might add he did this so he could grind in the sixteen valves in whilst watching the television at night.

Jan T
J Targosz

That’s one of the reasons why I did my blog.

Whenever the scale of the project started to overwhelm me, I’d go back through my blog and it would remind me why I was going it in the first place and helped me see how far I had got and the challenges I had overcome.

So close now!


James Paul

A similar top tip(s) for keeping morale up, I can't remember who it came from:

Don't ever do "one last job", as they always go wrong. Instead try to finish 10 minutes early to tidy up. That way you finish on a positive so you then come back to it feeling good about the project. If you do that one last job and it goes wrong (as it will!) you will be hacked off with the whole thing and not want to go back into the garage.

James, your car is looking superb! Wow! :-)

Malc.
Malcolm

If you want to push ahead with it then get into a routine of doing one hour every day. Even if that hour is spent thinking, measuring, ordering parts or any such activity. Even lying on your back under the car just looking at it and working out the fuel and brake pipe routes. That hour a day totals a full day's progress every week on top of any time you might add at the weekend and definitely speeds things along.
GuyW

And make lists! Preferably including a few things already done so you can tick them off straight away! Great morale booster🤣

Include small and big jobs so when you have time to spare you can pick appropriate task from the list without wasting time deciding what to do next. 10 minutes free? Fit engine mounts. 1/2 hour? Instal gearbox. 4 days? Bleed clutch !! 😂😂😂
GuyW

I can recommend a white board on the back of the workshop door. Ideal for To Do lists, To Buy lists and other quick memos written while I'm thinking about it 'cos I know I'll have forgotten by the time I get indoors. I also use a large white ceramic tile that didn't make it to the tip as a mobile white board in the garage - good for jotting down compression figures and other measurements. Not exactly morale boosters but they give you something to tick when you need a bit of a lift.

Colin
C Mee

Don't feel compelled to work on it everyday. Take a day, a week, or even a month off. I find taking time away from it, let's my enthusiasm build back. Esp' if I've commited Malc's one last job sin. 😶

I also have an area of my garage wall reserved for marking.

I mark it with a hammer, when I'm REALLY pissed off.🤣🤣🤣🤣



anamnesis

I very much agree with and have suffered from the doing a last or another job. Because I always leave plenty of time to do, or avoid doing, anything on a car that's mine, if things have unusually gone well, or I think they have at the time, I've thought I could fit in another little job and that's often proven to be a mistake.

I also follow Colin's idea of doing a list before I forget, when I remembered.

I totally agree with walking away for a while and if required deconstructing a part for recycling to get rid of frustration.

Not that I'd ever restore a car other than trying to put right the restoration work of others whilst using the car then putting right the work I'd done.

Totally, totally beyond me, though I can partly understand it, is the restoring a car and then not using it at all or not much but each to their own.

Nigel Atkins

I walked away from this for years 😧...


Jeremy MkIII

The mention of 'just another quick job' before lunch (sorry, its very NMC) was when I found the drain was blocked. This was not an unusual occurrence in our ancient rustic abode and I knew the job was 18 rods and 10 minutes worth, but not this time!

With all 18 rods deployed all was going well until the rods jammed. I tried pushing, pulling, twisting (clockwise) but they wouldn't shift so the only solution left was to start digging. 18 rods meant it was right at the septic tank end. The pipe wasn't very deep and our ground's soft so the digging was easy. It wasn't the clay pipes that I expected to find but a brown PVC pipe, so, after exposing about five metres worth and chipping a bit of concrete I was able to lift the end and peer inside and there were my rods, but so too were the previous occupant's, complete with rubber disk end. I've no idea how anything had made it as far as the septic tank. The PO swore that they'd never had any drainage problems, clearly just one of many untruths they told us.

Lunch was a bit delayed that day but, with the pipe back in place, the drain emptied perfectly and has done ever since.

Colin
C Mee

Sorry Colin I have to smile at that story but just think how lucky you were really.
Nigel Atkins

Nigel. We know we're really lucky to be living here despite all the inconveniences - it's what we chose. Rodding drains is just one of the many things you have to get used to in places like this unless you've got pots of money to employ folk to do it for you.

Sorry for the thread drift.

To return to the thread, my morale is boosted significantly now that I'm getting warm after an afternoon in the workshop trying to seat the bearing on my gearbox input shaft. Leaving the shaft in the freezer for three days and heating the bearing in boiling water only got it part way on. Several hours of work with a brass drift and a lump hammer have finally got it all the way. With that done I feel I've turned a corner and am into re-assembly mode. Definitely morale boosting.
C Mee

Colin, I was thinking you were lucky to have found the previous rods - and now you have even more rodding kit, you fell into ... and came out smelling of a good quality synthetic oil.

As Monty Python's Life of Brian would have it "You, lucky, lucky
Nigel Atkins

I'm with Guy on this. Give it an hour or so daily, even if you're not doing a lot. It gets you used to being there and more importantly, used to making space for it in the rest of your daily routine.
Of course some things go together more quickly which is hugely satisfying. I spent six or seven hours one day last year building up a six pot Triumph engine from completely dismantled, but the workshop doors were open, the bees were buzzing in the honeysuckle, Radio 4 in the background and the faithful Jack Russell was snoozing in the drivers seat.

Wouldn't fancy it today!

And the 'quick job before lunch" scenario...
Been there too!
Greybeard

Agree Grey.-I do 'something' each day and hopefully one day all the somethings will add up to a single something--never was any good at maths-

willy
William Revit

This is a very informative and helpful thread.

My car project has taken too long due to morale issues as well as having nowhere particularly suitable to work on it (lockup away from home with no power or light) plus work stress (now hopefully resolved) so many breaks. Fixing old cars for fun gets relegated to the bottom of the priority pile. You folk keep me going, rekindle my enthusiasm and vaguely sane as well as informed, advised and amused! Big thanks.

Funnily enough the one last job issue is a very good rule. Stop before you are too tired/hacked off or even feeling smug with progress and kid yourself you can ‘do’ a bit more. It is supposed to be fun for recreation rather than for essential transport!

I find all the above, except the fun part, applies just as much to DIY jobs as well as old car fixing. I am redecorating our front room in our early 20th C house and stripping wallpaper - just one last bit the other night and I slipped and removed a very small chunk of the plaster cornicing that otherwise was just going to be gently cleaned having been repainted carefully by me 10 years ago - doh!

There was a superb thread a while back on car and DIY disasters that had been done by ‘a friend’.

Reposting this image from another thread.

Cheers
Mike

PS hoping in 2023 for a garage at home, even the space to build one.




M Wood

That image is spot on Mike. But just once in a while it goes the other way.
I was dreading changing the front discs and pads on Mrs. GBs Focus because of the horrors seen previously - I'd convinced myself I was in for a nightmare.
Wheels up to wheels down and done inside an hour. Easiest one I've ever done.
I told Mrs. GB I was done fixing her car and she said Oh - I thought you'd gone to the pub!

Not yet, Pet - but watch this!

Doesn't happen often.
Greybeard

I think facilities make a huge difference. Like many here, I struggled in a single garage, containing four bikes (garden shed not big enough). So I hung two bikes from the (high) ceiling and move the other (regular use) ones when I do some work.

When the Frogeye was initially stripped, it was difficult. I sometimes thought "what the hell am I doing". The garage was full of stuff and you're on top of yourself trying to work and spending too much time "getting things out" and moving things around each day you work. That's why, for many restoration jobs and certainly for me at least, it often wasn't worth spending a single hour in there but I do agree with Guy, where it's practicable.

However, if you have a two car, four car or larger garage/ building then you can leave everything as is and walk straight in to the job. In that case, maybe even half an hour is useful.

I also find that if I do a whole day, I'm too tired to tidy up properly so I end up with cluttered horizontal surfaces, although that's partly due to my ongoing untidy nature 😉

I'll tell you what kept me going - to hold the thought in my head: "never, never give up, you're not a quitter". That and this forum!

Bill Bretherton

Absolutely Bill this forum has been a godsend.
The very first time of posting, the first two replies were IIRC from Willy in Tasmania and David Lieb(?) from the US. I do remember thinking 'wow this forum has a wide reach!'
Jeremy MkIII

Think Shackleton. 😁
anamnesis

Talking of small garages. Mine is great for access as it's just a door off the house kitchen. But it has everything in there! If I park the frog close over to one side I get a working space of a couple of feet down the other side. Not exactly ideal for a full nut'n bolt restoration!

Years ago 'a friend' was swapping a diff on his 1275 Sprite. Having jacked it up, removed wheels, and drums, undone propshaft and removed the diff housing nuts it suddenly dawned in 'friend' that the half shafts needed removing, and of course there wasn't enough width in the garage to do this. So, drums and wheels back on, off the axle stands and pushed out into the open air. Repeat jacking etc.etc only then to realise that the half shafts only need be withdrawn by a few inches each side and it could have been done where it was all along! Only slight saving grace was that having fully removed the half shafts at least the hub seals could be properly re-done!
GuyW

Just struck me. We/I'm only moaning about motivation because I'm 'old' now. 😄. I used to be motivated enough, with or without a small garage to squeeze into.

But, when needs must, I can still get motivated, quick as a flash.

Just got the ladder out to get the snow off my dish lnb, coz I lost my signal. 😁. I can still surprise myself. 😄😄









anamnesis

Besides keeping my mk3 Sprite in decent fettle, I am 9 years 11 months into a 1 year restoration of a ‘73 midget. 🤣 Like all projects, it was much worse than I at first thought.

Many times in those years, I’ve thought I would be better off scrapping the shell and selling off the remaining components, but the words of Magnus Magnusson “I’ve started, so I’ll finish” come into my mind. So I look at the photos I’ve taken during the rebuild and they let me see how far I’ve come with it. But there always seems to be so much more to do.

The shell is now at the stage where I can paint some of it before I start to permanently fix the Ashley hard top to it, in order to make a miniature GT.

I hope to get it finished before this time next year……….. We’ll see. 🤔

Bernie.
b higginson

Good for you Bernie. I always think that the best single bit of advice about doing a restoration is that you need to enjoy doing the restoration work itself. Doing it only because you want the final end result is going to end in frustration, heartache and burn out before you get there!
GuyW

I bet you run marathons too Bernie. Brilliant. 10 years will be a nice round figure to aim for. 😉.

I agree with Guy too.
anamnesis

Guy. I’ve suffered from burn out a few times over the years, but a drive in my Sprite is often the antidote.

Anam. I only thought about running marathons a couple of times, but the pub usually won that battle. BTW, you’ve got more bottle than I have, going up ladders at night, and in this weather !!!. My missus put a stop to any ideas about me and ladders quite a few years ago, so I am currently looking for someone to clear my gutters as I have sold my ladder. Remember Rod Hull?? Stay safe up there.🙂

Bernie.
b higginson

A former work colleague had a nasty ladder accident, making the classic mistake of using it at too low an angle. As he got to the top the base slid back away from the wall. He did the involuntary thing of putting both hands out in front. Both forearms went through between the rungs and as it hit the deck both bones in both forearms snapped! Ulnus and radius X 2 Ugh! Compound fractures too. Very unpleasant.
Take double double care!
GuyW

That sounds horrific, Guy. Don't mind ladders generally but step ladders can wobble and have had a couple of tumbles form lowish (6') heights which makes you realise you need to be more careful.

Morale boosting - went out in the Midget today (the LA is so short of cash it's stopped salting the roads 😲); woolly hat, gloves, heater fan on and with wind stop in place (thanks Nigel), it was toasty.
Coming home the almost forgotten misfire reappeared.
So a spell in the cold garage is required. Strangely not annoyed as it gives a focus for something to remedy.
Jeremy MkIII

Yep, gotta be careful using ladders. But as long as you are, they're as safe as the house you lean it against. Lol.

The ladder in my picture was a gift from my neighbour. His wife banned him from using it when he was 88. He was 90 and still going up a short ladder to clean leaves off his conservatory glass roof. 🤣. He was an amazing old boy. He finally checked out at 98. I should be so lucky. But only if I stay as fit and healthy as he was. Cheers Dick.

anamnesis

This thread was discussed between 09/12/2022 and 14/12/2022

MG Midget and Sprite Technical index

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