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MG MGA - Tachometer bracket & other projects

As it looks like they want us to lock ourselves away for a month or two, I'm looking for jobs to keep me busy in the garage.

If I had realised that things would have turned out like this I would have delayed the two big winter projects that I have done to help fill the next few weeks.

The first of these was removing the cylinder head to have it gas flowed and new valve springs fitted.

The second was fitting an Electric Power Steering Kit.
This is up and running well on the car but I will let you all know how it feels once I have driven it to see how it feels on the car.

I have had an annoying issue with the speedometer which is loose in the dash. After a number of miles, the action of the cable tends to rotate the gauge by about 15 degrees. The fixing bracket on it doesn't quite reach the back surface of the dashboard and so it isn't really putting enough pressure on it to hold it in place.

I think it may be the wrong bracket for the car and I wondered if anyone has an old one they may be willing to sell? Moss do sell them in pairs but they are well over £50 a pair (plus 20% Vat)

The other option would be to put some packing under the legs of the bracket to get it to grip the dash, but it would probably be a "bodge", which I don't really like to do.

The other job I am going to do is to remove the heater and fit a new motor and up-rated fan, I have had the parts for a while but now seems like a good time to make a start on this.

I have got to modify the flange on the motor to get it to fit because the new replacements are not exactly the same as the original ones.

So I could probably stretch the job along for quite some time, especially if I take lots of pictures and write about it on here.

I will let you all know how this goes.

Cheers
Colyn




Colyn Firth

With regard to the speedo bracket, could you not just weld a couple of extensions onto the existing bracket?

Which power steering kit did you use?
Dave O'Neill 2

Hi Colyn
If you are still looking for a speedo bracket I think I will have one in garage loft boxes, do you want me to look?
Paul
Paul Dean

Dave,
I used the Toyota Yaris EPS based kit from Giovanni Delicio in Germany, it has a dynamic control system that reduces the steering assistance as the road speed increases. (this was designed and developed by Dominic Clancy)

I am in the process of writing a review of it but I haven't really had the chance to drive it for more than about 50 miles in total.

So I will do a write up of the installation process and let you all know what it feels like to drive once I have given it a few fast runs on some of my favourite bendy roads.

Paul,
I would love to take you up on your offer of the speedometer bracket, if your storage system is similar to mine, I know it may take some time to pinpoint it. :^)

Cheers
Colyn

PS Hope we are all allowed back on the road in time to see you at Scottish MGA Day.
Colyn Firth

The kit from Gio is in ongoing refinement - he is currently making a change to the upper column mount, and Steves (the first RHD installation ) identified a need for a change to the lower motor mount.

I have had it for a year in the dynamic setup, and every A owner who drives my car wants to buy it ! The combination of 1950cc, five speed and EPS makes for a very nice but still identifiably MGA driving experience. Gio's kit looks almost identical to the stock fixed installation (only the absence of the collar is different to an adjustable installation) but it is adjustable for height and reach.

The dynamic kit replaces Gio's potentiometer with a really cheap sensor (£4), a 15cm bracket at the diff (30mm * 30mm angle scrap) and 5m of shielded cable (£5 XLR cable on eBay), a few strong cube magnets (£2 on eBay) and a 3D printed collar from my local expert (£ a GOOD bottle of wine per unit - his family owns a vineyard so he can't be fobbed off with plonk!) - I believe it works out cheaper than the potentiometer (which is a bit special and didn't work for me.)

Colyn had a few questions on installation which were down to brain farts from me when writing them before my big operation last year, but we sorted those out by email (thanks to his patience) and Gio is a very big help too when we were trying to figure out the optimal upper mount - it gets very short of wriggle room behind the MGA dash if you start introducing any more than the standard hardware - amazing how they managed all of that before 3D CAD drawings.

I'll be fitting another kit in a late 1622 on Thursday, but as this was trial fitted in my car last year I know exactly where the problems are so it should be done in a few hours.
Dominic Clancy

Forgot to stay on topic. Colyn, the legs of your bracket are probably slipping on the back of the dash because they are at an angle when starting. Make sure they are at 90 degrees to the dash and add a rubber pad on the dash where they contact (self adhesive ones from hardware store) and they will stay put unless the bracket is too short, in which case you can either hope Paul finds his in the loft, or you can pop rivet extensions to the existing ones.

And now I put my hand out..... Has anyone a spare dual gauge bracket with the lighting holder?
Dominic Clancy

What Dominic hasn't told you is how he somehow did a "Bletchley Park" job on the Toyota's ECU and decoded it so as to calculate which frequencies the 3 levels of power assistance cut in.
Then he designed both a brilliant speed sensor and a magnetic collar on the diff flange which generates the square waveform frequencies to simulate the Yaris's original speed sensor.

And it works really well! Hats off to you Dominic.

I really enjoyed the fitting process and thanks so much for all the help and advice Dominic, but maybe under present circumstances, I should have stretched the process out for a few more weeks :^)

Cheers
Colyn
Colyn Firth

Colyn is too generous with his comments.

My "Bletchley Park" work was just some mammoth google sessions which gave me various parts of the answer (some from Toyota, others from various forums for Ford Mustangs and kit cars, sensor sites, and rally preparation sites and then another to find the bits for the first kit to try it out. I wasn't sure it would work, and only after hitting 60kph after fitting it was I sure that it does.

All I did was put the puzzle together from all the preparatory work I found, and now it is being used a lot in the US to install EPS in 60's cars where power steering is either hydraulic and leaks, or an expensive kit from a customisation shop.

There are some very creative and capable guys on those forums, and lots of trying out of the various Toyota columns (from Prius too) but the Yaris unit is perfect for the weight of the MGA. The trick is you must have a unit from a NON ABS car, then it's easy. ABS units have a CANBUS speed input and then my trick doesn't work, but apparently there is a box available now that simulates the Canbus signal, but again it uses a potentiometer and isn't dynamic like my version.

Gio's kit is beautifully done, and I can supply drawings and specs for all the dynamic control bits, and magnet holding collars for the cost of the wine plus collar postage to your location.

I hope Gio has enough kits to meet demand, I am waiting for things to normalise so he can bring me one more!

Dominic Clancy

Hi Dom, I may have a gauge bracket somewhere - I have plenty of time to go look for it !

Been busy cutting logs while the weather is good - I have 4 trees worth to deal with and it is taking a while due to the arthritis in my shoulder!

Weather is due to take a turn for the colder this weekend so I can go on a garage hunt then.

Keep safe.
Chris at Octarine Services

Hi Colyn

Here it is. Not too difficult to find as I have a box specifically of instruments bits. I will get it dropped in post if you email me your address.

The great advantage of having committed the ultimate crime of breaking an MGA, albeit a rust bucket in 1972, I have most things as I kept everything except chassis and central body shell. Most useful was putting the bonnet, now worth a grand, back into service a couple of years ago.

I try to be optimistic about the Scottish day, although in reality perhaps it will go same way as Olympics.

Paul



Paul Dean

Paul,
thanks for looking out the bracket for me, I will email you my address.

Cheers
Colyn
PS. If you can send it, don't forget to include how much I owe you.
Colyn Firth

Paul
I need the same bracket for a dual gauge, do you happen to still have one of those?
Dominic
Dominic Clancy

Don't feel too bad about breaking an MGA for spares because I have actually broken two for spares!

Before anyone blames my "press-on" style of driving, neither car was written off by me. :^)

When I first got an MGA in around 1973, it was a 1960 FHC 1600, it looked pretty good to me at the time but it turned out to be held together by wooden beams in the chassis rail next to the sills (rockers in US speak)
I then found out that the goal post sections had also been very neatly replaced by sections of pine!

No I didn't find out during a restoration project, but it only showed up after the car was "T-boned" by another car on a blind corner! The driver explained that she didn't see the corner, unfortunately the impact put my wife into hospital for a few days with concussion and the car was bent like a banana. I remember the steering wheel rim was bent forward around the steering column like a mexican taco!

So as it was written off, I bought the wreck back for spares and stripped it bare. All the stuff went into my garage and I have made good use of it since then.
Whilst I was stripping it down, a neighbour asked me if I would like another MGA FHC to strip down, apparently it was his brothers and it was so badly corroded that it was falling in half. So naturally I said yes and I stripped both down, my garage was full to the brim of spares for the next 25 years.
(If only I had thought to keep the tank sender units and the brake light switches)

To replace my original car I went out and bought another FHC, a late Mk II which had been made to look pretty, but wasn't particularly good under the filler.

In 1975 (pre-children) we drove that car towing a camping trailer to Interlaken Switzerland in mid August and discovered that the FHC was not a very well ventilated car for very hot summer continental travel. We arrived after 3 of days but my poor wife Chris was suffering from a combination of heat exhaustion, carbon monoxide poisoning and blistered feet from the exhaust! But she was fine after 24 hours in the fresh Swiss air.

I was also a bit worried about the car because the big-ends had gone 7 days before we went and I had to do a couple of marathon over-night engine rebuild sessions.
I got the engine back into the car the night before we left and the engine was a bit tight when we left home.
In fact it boiled up after 50 miles when we arrived at the North Sea Ferries port, but fortunately all seemed well the next day when we arrived in Europe and the car ran well after that.

I ran that car for about 8 years as my everyday driver, but when the children arrived I decided to mothball it.
It stayed in my garage waiting for a resto until
2009 when I spotted my present roadster at Bob Wests.

I sold the Coupe and then traded many of the garage full of spares against the price of my new car.

I remember having, three spare steering racks, numerous bonnets, boot lids, doors, complete dashboards, axles gearboxes engines, a few spare sets of coupe window glass, etc. Which offset the price of the roadster by a fair amount at the time.

I wish though that I had kept the 4.1 diff!

I still have quite a lot of spare parts up in the roof space of my garage, but unlike you Paul, although I marked each storage box with its content, I never thought to document where each box went.

Maybe now is a good time to sort all those boxes out.

Cheers
Colyn






Colyn Firth

Hi All,

Several years ago I built an MGA 1600 roadster race car and I was later asked if I was interested in buying another similar car but in rough condition. I thought that it might be a useful source of parts should I need them so I bought it and put it in the back of the garage and basically did nothing with it.

After racing the car for a few years I put a rod through the block at Oulton Park, and a friend of mine said he would like to buy it and turn it back into a road car, so I sold it.

Of course I immediately regretted selling it and my thoughts turned to the rough old car in the back of the garage. Anyway, to cut a long story short, the latest car is now pristine in it's new paintwork and many new body panels. One of the things missing from this car was the dashboard and instruments and switches. I've acquired a decent dashboard which has been newly painted, but I'm still missing a full set of instruments and switches, and, reading this thread has prompted me to ask if anyone has any of these items suitable for a Mk. 1 1600 lurking in their garage, I'd be happy to buy a set and pay the going rate.

I look forward to hearing from you!

Maurice.
M. Standish

Hi Maurice

I have fuel gauges, a tacho, and will shortly be receiving a dual gauge in need of revival. I may also have a MPH speedo kicking around if I look in the boxes a bit.

Dominic
Dominic Clancy

Morning Dominic,

Many thanks for the quick response. Could you let me know please if these gauges are Smiths or Jaeger. I realise they were all made by Smiths, but I would like to have a matching set of either type.

Thanks,

Maurice.
M. Standish

Fuel gauge and Tacho are Jaeger and are good to use

Dual gauge not sure as it hasn't arrived yet and needs to be redone
Or I have a Smiths one ready to go

MPH Speedo seems to have gone, probably sold already or converted to KPH
Dominic Clancy

Morning Dominic,

By coincidence I spoke [by phone]yesterday to an MG friend who lives locally who was asking how I was getting on with the rebuild, and he has a Jaeger dual gauge which is in good usable condition, so I'm now looking for Jaeger gauges. I'd be happy to buy your fuel gauge and tacho if you can let me know what you are looking for [my email address is above], please.

Thanks,

Maurice.
M. Standish

Your mail address bounces back with the message
This user doesn't have a aol.com account (mauricestandish@aol.com)
Dominic Clancy

Hi Dominic,

Apologies for that - I didn't realise that I hadn't updated my email address on this forum. My current email address is m.standish521@btinternet.com.

Thanks,

Maurice.
M. Standish

Perfect. BT also blocks my personal mails, but thankfully my work email gets through .....
Dominic Clancy

Dominic
Hi are you still looking for a small instrument bracket. If so I have got one as per photo. The genuine one that I would send is the dirty one with pilot light support, I presume the shiny one I found is an after market one that lacks pilot light support. If you want it email your details.
Paul


Paul Dean

Well I fitted the speedometer bracket you sent me Paul and it is a much better fit thanks, I superglued some thin rubber pads onto the ends of the "legs" to make sure they gripped the dashboard.
I have attached a picture of the one it is replacing and it looks
quite different. The "legs" are approx 1/4" shorter and bent inwards.
Maybe it's from another model.

I keep finding other things to do on the car, I have removed the rear-view mirror and remounted it on some 1/8th inch thick butyl rubber sheet. I'm hoping that this will damp down some of the vibrations it is susceptible to at over 50 mph.

I have got some anti-vibration washers that do a similar good job on mounting my Weber carb but they are about 1/8" too wide and looked awful. Also used a bit of superglue on the spindle where it fits into the mirror base as it has worked loose. It used to move around quite a bit but feels more rigid now.

Just need to be able drive it again to test it out. Hope we will all be out there driving again soon.

Colyn







Colyn Firth

I keep finding other dashboard related jobs to do, I fitted a new heater blower switch from Moss last year because the original one was running very hot. (It got so hot that I once blistered my finger when I put it onto the wires under the switch)

The new switch worked fine electrically but the lever would tend to become stuck at the "Hot" position when I slid it over there.

Well yesterday I checked it and it was stuck fast in the hot position.

So I unbolted it from the dash and dropped it down to look at it.
I could see that the little "detent" button had clicked into the slot at the hot end and I had to click it out of the slot with a screwdriver to release it.
For some reason the manufacturer has made the slot a completely square one instead of having a gently rounded profile.
So the detent button would latch in and then would not come back out.
So I have used a couple of small files to re-shape the profile into a smooth rounder shape, put a spot of grease onto it and the detent button now easily moves in and out of it.

I took a pic of the switch before I filed off the square corner but I forgot to take one after (sorry guys)
Maybe I will take it off again tomorrow for a picture and to give me another job😀.

Cheers
Colyn



Colyn Firth

I'm still looking for little projects to do and a couple of days ago I remembered that my rear-view mirror has become a little loose in the base.
It had begun to rotate from right to left as I drive along, so I was forever re-adjusting it.

Also, the mirror had begun to vibrate at around 50 mph, so much so that if I needed to use it, I had to hold it to damp the vibration so that I could see anything.

I first thought of using some Weber DCOE anti-vibe rubber washers but they were a little to big for the job and a bit clumsy looking, so I decided to try a different approach.

I found some 3 mm thick butyl (rubber) sheet and I decided to cut out a piece for the base to sit on to see if this would act as a vibration damper between the base and the scuttle.

The mirror base is hollow and so I cut some more pieces of sheet out to fit inside it and these made it a more solid base as well as raising the base another 1 mm.

(The second picture I have posted of the mirror re-fitted, is actually inverted but it still shows the rubber base pretty well)

The butyl spacer looks ok but only time will tell if it solves the vibration problem. Hopefully we will all soon be able to drive our cars again and then I will let you know if this mod works (or not).

The other option I considered was to attach some kind of weight to the back of the mirror to see if this would alter the natural resonant frequency of the mirror.
If the rubber base solution doesn't work I will give this a try.

Everybody keep well.
Cheers
Colyn

To solve the loose pillar I simply loosened its fixing screw, ran some superglue into the threads and the head of the screw and very quickly re-tightened it.








Colyn Firth

This thread was discussed between 22/03/2020 and 29/04/2020

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This thread is from the archive. The Live MG MGA BBS is active now.