My MG is running!

[Tab]

I'm sorry, I know this isn't an automotive forum, but you're the friends I've got.

It's been down for a year - stalled, couldn't get it going, didn't have the time or experience to resolve it.

Finally hired a mechanic neighbor of mine, and it now roars.

(NOTE: Cooking reference follows for political correctness reasones): This makes up for not having an induction stove.

[Stinky The Clown]

1. A 1975-1980 B .... fun car.

I have a 1959 Bugeye. It is in pieces in my garage, where it has been for something in excess of 20 years. It used to look a lot like this.

[Tab]

2. You've got a Bugeyed Sprite!

What is it doing in pieces?

Sprites (also called "spridgets" because they're effectively the same (mechanically) as an MG Midget) are cute little cars. They always look like they're smiling.

I think I'd like one of those at some point. I can't collect these things though - I can have just one - any more I'll need more excuses for my wife's benefit than I can come up with - but to have just one is wonderful. I don't know why people spend $50k on a BMW Z3 that people have seen a zillion times when you can spend just a fraction of that for something MUCH cooler.

Hope you get your Sprite running one day.

[Longhorn]

3. We had a 71 or 72 MG Midget convertible when we first got married in '76.

I learned to drive a standard on that car; hence, my husband had to replace the clutch three times. Unfortunately, in order to place the clutch, he had to pull the engine! He got pretty good at it after awhile. :)

I loved that little car! Unfortunately, it was too little when we started our family. Now that our four kids are grown, I drive a 2001 Saleen Mustang convertible. I can even get all five dogs in it! :D

[Tab]

4. I differentiate between my cars

I have a Saab, which is my "real" car.
The MG is my surreal car.

I also own a Honda Odyssey which my wife drives.

Nevertheless, nothing's better than a surreal car on a nice spring or fall day.

[Stinky The Clown]

6. When I was yunger, we used to pull Sprite engines with two strapping young men and a rope loop

Put the loop under the engine and around the back and shoulders of the two strapping young me (my friend Richie and me). With everything disconnected, we'd walk apart and pull on the engine. It would float right up and out. Disconnect the transmission, pop in a new clutch and throw out bearing, and float the whole assembly back in again. We could do this in less than an hour.

Richie was well over 6-3. We took his Sprite on a road trip from CT to FL one time. Did you know that by removing the seat back (only two bolts involved) from the passenger seat, putting a pile of junk in the foot well, covering it with the now removed seat back, and putting a pillow on the boot floor behind the seat, one could stretch out and sleep in a Bugeye?

[Longhorn]

9. That's quite an image -- y'all hauling that engine out of the car!

Mr. Longhorn used a "come-along" and an A-frame that he rented. :)

[housewolf]

5. It's gorgeous!

Oh, that looks like fun! It's body is in beautiful condition, hope it runs as well as it looks. I know you'll get lots of miles of enjoyment from that set of wheels.

That takes me back a few years.. I had one of these (but in dark blue, Alfa Romeo Spider) about 30 years ago... I loved it to death and haven't given my heart to a car since!

http://www.delest.nl.nyud.net:8090/media/img/DCP_3045.JPG

[Stinky The Clown]

8. Alfa, the prototypical Italian Sports Car

Sexy, sexy, sexy.

[housewolf]

10. Yeah... welll...

That was a REAL long time ago... I loved it dearly. It kept me happy through a turbulent romance and a bout with cancer. I finally sold it when it needed it's 2nd replacement engine. I sold it and went to Manhattan for a couple/three years.

I've had cars I've appreciated since then, but nothing I've really loved like I loved the Alfa.

[Tab]

12. Actually that wasn't MY car

But mine is nearly identical - it's a rubber-bumper MG (as Husb2Sparkly picked up on - due to the 1976 safety requirements, they had to change the design, which they did in mid-1974. In fact, this is the only breed of car that I'm aware of where they differentiate within a year - there's such a thing as a 1974 1/2 - yes, one-half - which is when the RBBs (Rubber Bumper B's) came out.

Mine looks nearly identical to the posting, except it's BRG (British Racing Green) and it has a high-performance engine and overdrive and an Alpine stereo. I don't drive it over 85 though because I don't trust the suspension (or the brakes) beyond that point, but that doesn't matter - it's not a highway car, it's meant to be driven along these twisty New England roads.

Knowing a road makes a big difference. I drive it where I grew up in Vermont and know the roads intuitively and we can just fly.

I've taken it down to Boston a few times (actually I work in Cambridge) but it just ain't the same.

I wonder how many cooks have (or want) unusual cars. I suspect there's quite a few from the responses here.

[Tab]

18. I love those

I've also always wanted a Fiat Spyder, just could never afford the oil it would go through.

I'd love to drive an Alfa though.

[htuttle]

7. My very first car in High School was a '63 MG Midget -- got it for $650.00

Spoked wheels with knock-off hubs, "British Racing Green" paint, close ratio gears and dual Weber carbuerators. Total. Chick. Magnet. Especially when the top was down. :D

It had a positive ground electrical system. I didn't know that when I first installed the 8-Track player (dating myself...), and it ran a few tapes backwards -- eating them -- before I realized what was going on.

I left a lot of skid marks on the highways of Waukesha County, WI with that car.

[Stinky The Clown]

11. British sports cars ..... rolling anachronisms

Positive earth ...... indeed.

[Tab]

15. Well, not any more

I think they changed over in the late 60's.

Still, great way to get electrocuted if you don't know what's going on, and god forbid you have to jump the car.

Jumping in a pain in the ass on these things - I didn't mean to get off on a tangent - but it's the one thing I dislike. The battery is in the frickin' back storage area, so if the weather's crappy (rain or snow), everyone has to get out, the roof has to go down (I guess you could do it by snaking it through the window carefully) to get access to the battery.

I've never jumped from a negative to a positive ground - maybe it's the same, but it seems to me to be fraught with danger.

[TygrBright]

13. aw, COOL! Reminds me of when I was a kid...

...one of my uncles was a sportscar nut. He had an MG first, then an Austin Healy, then a little bitty Porsche, then went back to another MG.

He'd take us for ride wit the top down every summer. He only ever drove them in summer, it was Minnesota, after all. But there was nothing like riding up and down the river drive in a little two-seater sportscar crammed with Uncle Kenny smoking a big ol' seegar and two-three other kids.

nostalgically,
Bright

[Tab]

16. I didn't find out until long after I bought the MG

(I think I got it in 2000). Throughout growing up, these things were in my life - a girl "friend" had what must have been a 60's MG, a doctor friend of the family had what I thought was an MG but apparently was a Triumph or something, and I vaguely remember my dad having a Triumph.

My dad did have lots of weird cars - I think he picked up the interest from time in Europe during WWII. He had Renaults, Audi's (pieces of crap), Austin Healey's, a Morgan, Triumphs, Saabs, lots of other things. Some of this was the 60s and early 70s, others before that. The thing was that we lived in Vermont and I have no idea where the hell he got these things fixed. It was just weird learning this after getting my own MG. Maybe it's genetic.

[sazemisery]

14. My stepdaughter left her MG Midget with me for a year

back in the '80's. I loved that car. It took the curves on my road home like they were a straight line. I was the coolest mom at my kids' grade school.

[Tab]

17. There's nothing cooler.

A Porsche Carrerra screams "money" but an MG screams "exotic european classic cool".