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MG MGA - Need quick help

I'm about to leave on an overnighter with Maggie Mae the MGA and she's starting to act up.

While on the highway this afternoon, running about 63 mph and 3500 rpm I tried to give it a little more gas to get into the faster lane and she gave a couple of backfires.

Is the the timing too far advanced?
Tysen

Tysen, what have you recently worked on. Did you wash the car for the trip. It's probably distributor related.

For a quick grapes of wrath checkup
1. check dist for water if you just washed it
2. check plug wire order
3. pull plugs and check gap and color. backfiring is usually a lean mixture
4. If you don't have a timing light, loosen the dist clamp and turn dist a few degrees, tighten and test drive. repeat. It's amazing how much you can play around with it and still have it run.
5. this happened to me: if the fuel pump is goings bad, it won't pull over about 40 mph but under that it runs fine. I drove all the way from milw to chic that way once.
6. check points to see if the little wire for the outside terminal is loose. They get really worn after years of srvice.
Fred H

Tysen, dude..you really need to sign up as a member. You can then check the archives. The MGB tech archives are really helpful for engine problems.

I searched backfiring in the mgb technical archives and found thes three solutions to your specific problem. Actually the only three where the original poster replied with a solution. The others were related to smog equipment or weber carbs......

Chris B Posted 20 October 2000 at 05:25:48 UK time
The fault has been found. Thanks to wayne and to Chris from Octarine Services in Essex. The 2 and 3 plug leads were reversed. After correcting those the engine ran like never before.
Thanks for the help.


Thanks you, all. Changed the plugs and the car revs better abd did not sputter and break up until 4000rpm Back to idle and idle was erratic, richened the dickens out of it and problem went away.. Now I noticed that the idle varied in speed and roughness. Sucking air through throttle shaft on rear carb. Smeaed grease i on shft end and idle smoothed out. Rebush of SUs next. Thanks to all!

Ansgar Roehrborn Essen Germany
Posted 15 May 2000 at 23:16:13 UK time
I got it fixed! Mog from Surrey was - well, if not right - at least the closest: I said that feelingwise I considered it to be an ignition problem. So when I got home this evening after top speed of 48 miles on the highway for 20 miles I had a look under the distributor cap and found the bolt of the condensor to be somewhat loose. I tightened it up and there I went up to redline.

THANX A LOT!

Ansgar



dave
england
david.blake@bently.com
Posted 22 January 2003 at 13:29:15 UK time
thanks for the replies, I had a look again last night and re-made the spade connectors to the coil as per your suggestions and that appears to have fixed the problem.

Until next time, thanks
Dave



Fred H

Thanks Fred,

Actually I am a member but I forget to look there first.
Tysen

Did you find out what it was?
Fred H

Not yet.

I took the trip without incident, however the problem persisted. Basically if I accelerated agressively in 3rd or 4th gear around 3500 rpm I experienced low acceleration and the backfiring.

the engine heat seemed to have something to do with the problem.

The second day of the trip the problem virtually dissappeared, execpt once when I was accelerating up a hill.
tysen

Tysen

I've been there and know just what you mean.
Try cleaning out your dash pots. Dirt getting through the air cleaners can cause the pots to stick up making things too lean. Things can be made worse when this dirt is held in the oil film caused by over-oiling the dash pots too...
Let's hear if this works.
Pete
Pete Tipping

Sounds like fuel starvation to me. Check fuel delivery first. Disconnect fuel hose running from body to rear carb. Place hose end in catch pot. Switch on ignition to run fuel pump. If you get a gusher it's fine. If you get a trickle you found the problem. Then work back down the fuel line toward the tank looking for the obtruction or pump fault.
Barney Gaylord

This thread was discussed between 04/08/2006 and 07/08/2006

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