MGB Roadmaster

[BlownMGB-V8]

Here's a first shot of the tray:



That's all I'll get done on it for a few days but not a bad start I think. Probably doing everything in the wrong order. Again. Oh well.

Jim, here are some shots of the fenders:







To get that curve, all I did was bend a 1/4" rod around a rim bead, 16" I think, it had some spring. But it isn't that easy welding sheet metal to the heavier rod.

JB

[Jim Stabe]

Thanks for the pictures. The contour look nice, I can't wait to see them blended in and painted.

Jim

[BlownMGB-V8]

I'm back, spent a few days in Florida soaking up the heat.

Ted sent the new rear springs while I was away (Fast Cars) and the epoxy adhesive for the fiberglass work came in also. I'm headed over to Graingers to pick up some 1/8" fiberglass sheet to dress the hood opening with. More work on the tray is scheduled for the next couple of days, then attachment of the other fender flare and some bolt bosses for the bumper bolts.

We need some 1-7/8 x 1-7/8" (outside dimension) square tubing for the bumper supports. About 4 ft of it would do the trick nicely. Wall thickness in the range of about 1/8 to 3/16" would be ideal. If anyone can find a piece of that it's probably one of the last pieces of raw materials we are going to need. But it isn't a real common size.

Scheduling: OK this is where I do poorly, and I've been on vacation for a few days so at this point I'm thoroughly confused and won't be right for several days. (If you can call my normal state "right" which is highly doubtful) Several of you have expressed an interest in coming to help work on the car and we have a couple of weekends scheduled. Some time in the next few days I'll attempt to add some clarity to the picture, that's about all I can promise. But the good news is that we are ahead of schedule.

JB

[BlownMGB-V8]

New springs are installed and the ride height adjusted. I think it has a pretty good stance but I'm not entirely happy with the mismatch between front and rear flares. There's only so much I can do though.



More work on the air cleaner pan. The hood will now close on it and it's far enough along to start fiberglass work.







Obviously the edges need trimmed and shaped and the whole thing needs painted, probably semi-gloss black. Anyway, it's back to the flares next. I can't wait to get this all done so I can clean up the shop, but no point in wasting effort on that while I'm still generating great horrendous messes!

JB

[rficalora]

Jim, I wish I were closer & could come help out.  You've taken a ton of hours from your car & it would probably be on the road again if more of us could make it out there.  I guess the good news is there's light at the end of the tunnel & its looking great.

[mowog1]

Short of shaving the fiberglass front wings, what can be done to make them appear more like the rear flares (which look GREAT).

[BlownMGB-V8]

Speaking of which, the rear flares are done.







Have to weld a 4 bolt reinforcements to the "Tusks" for the bumper mounts and then I think all the welding is done.

I think the second flare came out a little better (as is usually the case), at least I had a lot less shrinking needed on it and I think the lines are slightly cleaner. But don't worry it'll take a close comparison to see the difference, and it's in keeping with the old panel beater's tradition anyway. Like I said before I started, what you get may not be what you had in mind. It is what it is, and it'll be fine. Very solid.

I guess that leaves the fiberglass. Can't put it off any longer.

By the way, I really need some 1-7/8" square tubing. The front of the car will definitely not look right without the bumper, due to that godawfulbig radiator.

JB

[BlownMGB-V8]

I expect some of you have been wondering about the progress, well it's finished. The fiberglass work is done, the air cleaner tray is done, and we're ready to start stripping down the car. We really should install the hood struts before it goes to paint but afaik the struts are still sitting on the shelf at Mantell Motorsports so they'll have to get here for that to happen. Here are some photos.







Graham is coming down to work on the car next Friday and Saturday, Dave Kirkman will be here the following Friday and Saturday, and then Steve D will be coming in the Thursday after Labor Day to finish up and transport the car. Right on schedule guys!

JB

[Bill Young]

Looks great Jim. I didn't hear any more about the steel you wanted for the buper mounts, figure you found something else for that. I'll send a check to help with the transportation expense after the first of the month.

[BlownMGB-V8]

Thanks Bill. I'm still looking for the 1-7/8" square tubing and expect to keep looking until I find it. I've found one large supplier who makes it but hope to avoid minimum quantity charges. We should have plenty of time on that, as the bumper will slip in and be secured with two bolts.

Let's take a moment to look back on our accomplishments and think about what we have done.

We've created a whole new way to build a car that, to my knowledge has never been done before. No small feat in today's world. Couldn't say if it'll ever happen that way again, but we did do it.

We created a fledgling charitable non-profit organization. How long it will last and what it will accomplish is still uncertain but it is "our" charity.

We created a focal point to pull the brotherhood together, and I think it has worked. (Not meaning to exclude female owners here, I just couldn't think of a better, more inclusive word) Certainly we know each other better and are a more cohesive group than when we started. We are stronger and have members previously unknown.

And then there is the car itself. Although it pales in comparison to the above accomplishments, it is a powerful statement in its own right. The first street driven MGB to have a big block engine, we managed to do it and make it look almost stock. Were it not for the fender flares and the air cleaner, once the car is painted and assembled no one would be the wiser. We could have easily built it without the flares, and we could have built an intake that let us keep the stock hood, if that had been the intent. Under the hood it looks as if the Buick 455 grew there.

At the same time we developed an entirely new IRS rear suspension that as a unit can be bolted in place of the stock rear suspension and has significant advantages over the commercially available units.

In addition to this there have been a notable number of smaller but still quite significant accomplishments. A completely new type of exhaust system. A completely new ultra high capacity cooling system, custom seats, custom brakes, custom gages, hood and hatch struts, and more. And of course there is the paint.

I'd love to be able to go through the entire list of contributors and give credit where it is due, and by the time the car is completed I hope to do just that, creating at the same time a sort of press release that can be displayed with the car. For now, we are pretty familiar with those who have contributed, especially the major items. I don't want to leave anyone off but it's just impossible to find the right place to draw the line and I'm not going to list everyone right here, so that will have to come later. Despite that, we all know that practically every one of our traditional BritishV8 vendors have found some way to contribute to the cause and have helped make this project possible. If I was a little less frazzled from the end of the build maybe I could do a better job of representing them here as well as all the smaller contributors but have no fear, I'm bouncing back and will be back in top form before long. Our list of contributors is 45 members long and there are many others who have made anonymous donations.

I just want to give a big "Thank You" to you all. Give yourself a pat on the back, have a Bass Ale and celebrate! You deserve it.

JB

[BlownMGB-V8]

Just to add perspective I added a bit of rattle-can paint.

JB

[BlownMGB-V8]

Perhaps I should post a retraction. NOT the first street driven big block. Perhaps the first street driven only, most likely the first street driven only BBB, but definitely not the first street driven big block. My humble apologies to those who have gone before.

JB

[302GT]

Congratulations on producing a working big block MGB! It also looks like the rear flares came out really nice.

Now that the Roadmaster is finished, how much has it been driven? I know that the people building the car were very experienced, but this car stretched the bounds of technology. Therefore, I think it would be a good idea to drive the car enough to make sure it is working properly and is free of annoying traits before it is painted. Once painted, making changes becomes much more difficult or impossible. Even a car that has been restored to stock condition usually has some issues, especially if it was not running before the restoration.

[BlownMGB-V8]

Normally I'd agree with you Larry, (and thanks for the compliments btw) but in this case the advantages of driving the car are counterbalanced by other factors. We have no plates yet. We are now working on getting insurance for the car and this may take some time. Terry is in a bit of a hurry to get the paint done, and finally we really want quite badly to have the car together for next summer's meet if at all possible.

I really don't foresee any issues that would impact on the bodywork or paint, other than the need to go one size smaller on the tires, an issue that we recognized a year ago. And in the worst case, if we have to repaint a panel or two due to repairs or modification we can do that, at least that way we can stay on schedule.

I think most of the mods, taken individually, are pretty conventional and well proven so I have no concerns about that. Possibly we could run into trouble where they combine, or in the final assembly with items such as the cooling system surge tank, so if anyone has spotted a potential problem area please point it out. Other than that, as much as I do appreciate the suggestion and agree wholeheartedly in principle, I think by this point we are all more concerned about seeing the car put into operation than with making it perfect. If I've made a false assumption there, of course I'd like to be corrected.

The bottom line is, we could drive it. But in doing so we will delay the project one more year. And I'm not saying it would happen, Terry's a stand up guy and is good for his word, but risking the loss of the paint to me just doesn't seem worth it and you never know what tomorrow might bring. I think we need to make hay while the sun shines.

JB

[trevorwj]

"make hay while the sun shines".... just like my pappy used to say.  

[Dan B]

Where you from, Trevor?  I know Jim used to get around quite a bit....

[BlownMGB-V8]

Hay! That's not Funny! ;-)

Here's a photo of this weekend's work in progress:



As you can see, Graham is hard at work while I'm off messing around with the camera and stuff like that. Under those conditions it's quite surprising how far we got, and we continue at this point to be ahead of schedule. All of the interior is out except for the headliner, most of the trim is removed as well, and we even managed a couple of the mechanical bits such as the driveshaft and exhaust. The wiring harness is out as well. So next week when Dave gets here we will first concentrate on the final configuration of the upper radiator hose, after which we can remove the radiator, the brake parts that need to come off, and the rest of the trim. That will leave the simple task of hoisting the engine and transmission out and Steve is bringing a cart we plan to use to store that when he comes. In the meantime I will talk to Steve and Terry about possibly modifying our delivery timetable since Steve and I won't need a day and a half to pull the engine and load the car.

The project is coming along very well guys, and I sure can't wait to see how it looks with paint.

Now, a quick word about our finances is in order. At present we have something over $500 in the bank. Truthfully, most of that is money we managed to carry over from the V8 meet a year ago in Virginia. For whatever reasons we were much more effective that year in fund raising than in this last meet and that is going to cost us. I really appreciate those of you who bought T-shirts and made donations but sales were down dramatically and donations were hardly enough to even make a comparison. Obviously we were not as well organized, and of course the economy played it's part as well. But the bottom line is that we do not have the money we need to assemble the car. That is a crucial problem if we expect to have it at the meet next spring. Few, if any of the soft rubber parts are usable. We must buy door and window seals, door panels, and a variety of other parts that you are all familiar with to put the car back together, including new hardware. I'm fully aware that it doesn't have to be perfect but a ripped and wasted door seal or a panel with the lower half rotted away is simply not acceptable. Better to put it together without any at all like a race car in my opinion. And then there's the insurance, which we have one or two members looking into, and finally there are the tires. The tires on the car WILL rub paint off the body if they are left on there. We must go one size smaller. They hit the bulge in the inner fender in front and wheel spacers are not an option. I know we'd like to use them up first, so maybe we can go one size smaller on the front and use these on the rear until they're slicks before buying new ones there and that will spread the cost out some. And lest I forget it, there is also the cost of fuel for delivering the car to Terry for paint (Schulte Management Company, Chrysler,Dodge, Jeep, Subaru, Sioux Falls, SD). So, if you can see your way clear to do it, now would be a good time to send a donation to Steve DeGroat our Treasurer. http://forum.britishv8.org/profile.php?2,56

JB

[Bill Young]

I'll be sending a check to Steve after the first of the month when the interest checks come in. As for tires, what size do we want? Front and Rear will be the same size? I'm hoping we can get some sponsorship in that area, after all the tires are very prominent on the car and the car will be shown all around the country so the sponsor would certainly get good bang for their bucks.

[BlownMGB-V8]

Thanks Bill, that will help.Anyone else who would like to contribute, it'll be a big help this winter when we are putting the car back together. As it stands right now we don't have enough money to do the job and that is the one thing most likely to cause us to miss our deadline.

Bill, the tires on the car right now are 245/50-17 and they rub just a little too much on the front inner fender bulges and touch the frame extensions as well. On the back they are probably within 1/8" of touching in several places. So I'm guessing maybe a 225 would be what we'd want, or perhaps a 60 series might work also. I think we can tolerate a little extra height possibly, depending on the profile.



Dave did a lot of work this weekend, while I took picture...(just one). I think we have it ready to transport and we even loaded it up on the trailer before he left. Among the items left undone, we didn't remove the headliner, as we felt Terry's guys would do a better job on that, and we neglected to remove the chrome strips from the doors. But I think we took care of everything else that could reasonably be expected to be done to prep it for cleanup, bodywork and paint. Hopefully the bodywork won't amount to much other than smoothing and covering some seams.

In the days ahead I'll get to work on our travel plans. We are expecting to stop by Putnam Park to check out the Chump Car series on Saturday morning. Can't say yet how long we'll be able to stay but if anyone else is curious about it we'd be pleased to meet you there.

JB

[BlownMGB-V8]

My sister gave me some tires we can try on the car for fit. They are a couple sizes smaller than the ones that are on there, 225/45-17. Should at least give us an idea of final tire selection.

Saturday is the day. The plan is to leave early enough to stop at Putnam Park and check out the Chump Car Series before heading on up to Terry's place to drop off the car Sunday morning. Anyone who would like to meet up with us at the race track is certainly invited. I don't know much about this racing series but it sounds like a lot of fun.

JB

[Dan B]

I talked to Jim a while ago.  They were in Iowa, planning to make Sioux Falls, SD this evening, spend the night, and drop off the GT body with Terry in the morning.  Thanks to Jim and Steve for making the trip.

Also, Happy Birthday to my OLDER brother.

Dan B.

[MGBV8]

Happy Birthday, Jim!

I spoke to him a little over an hour ago, he & Steve were almost to Sioux Falls. Didn't think to wish him Happy Birthday, though.

[mowog1]

Happy birthday, Boss!

[BlownMGB-V8]

Thanks for the birthday wishes guys, it was indeed a day to remember. But first off, I am now back home and partially rested, but Steve DeGroat is still on the road. The guy is a real trooper. There is no way I could have made the trip without him and yet he drove about 7 hours to come here and is doing another 7 hours to go home, having left here a little after nine this morning. We got in about 4 AM. So how he could be doing anything but running on fumes is way beyond my comprehension. I traveled about 1800 miles, but Steve? Well you'll just have to ask him. Have a safe trip home Steve!

To hit the highlights, naturally our visit with Terry Schulte at Schulte Subaru in Sioux Falls, South Dakota was the apex of the trip. But I'm going to approach it more chronologically and start with the main event of Saturday which, despite what some may think, was not driving through Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota, not to mention Ohio and Kentucky. Hitting seven states in one day and then coming back the next may be a pretty good accomplishment but instead I'd have to pick the visit to the Chump Car Series races at Putnam Park. We only stayed a couple hours, but ever since then Steve and I have been asking each other, "How about that car?" The basic Idea is that of a very low budget way to go racing, and actually be somewhat serious about it, and we came away wanting to take a close look at the rules to see what we could do to campaign a car in a few races possibly next year, and have a reasonable chance of winning. Well, heck, OK I'll admit it, I want to dominate. But hey, that's only natural, right? Because they place a $500 limit on the purchase price of the car (not including safety equipment) and then have a provision for the purchase of the winning car at a fixed price (not often used but there has been one instance this season) it helps to even the field and the low cost keeps tensions down. It's an endurance event, with 12 and 24 hour races being common, although at Putnam Park they were running a 7 hour race each of the two days. So it is a multiple driver effort, with each driver limited to 2 hours of continuous racing. That's about all most people would want in one stretch anyway. Minimum number of drivers is 2 and there doesn't seem to be a maximum, so I can think of a pretty good sized group among us that might be interested. As far as costs go, each driver pays $100 per race and if they need driving school that is another $25 for about an hour and a half. Team registration starts out at $500 for the first race and drops by 10% per race and then the 6th race is free. For that to apply two drivers must participate in all of the races and the team name must stay the same. After that I don't know. Their provision for purchase of the winning car is around $1500 but it seems there may be a provision for buy-back for another $250 but here we're getting into the details that we need more research on. The overall mood was quite relaxed, there was nowhere near the kind of intensity on pit row that many of us are used to seeing, and track action was altogether more of a gentlemanly sort, although we did see a decent amount of sliding, agricultural racing, and at one point even a large cloud of smoke rising over turn 8. The range of cars was striking, with everything from a Neon to a Volvo and a Buick Regal, with a fair number of small cars that we just couldn't quite seem to identify. The level of hokiness was surprisingly low for such an event, although one car did have a chicken on the roof, another had a pair of bat wings, and the Regal had the shaft of a golf club sticking out one of the back windows. Our impression was that it would be a lot of fun.

As for other highlights, we saw an amazing number of wind turbines, and quite a few trucks carrying blades and other parts. We thought they should put high intensity LED lights on the blades to make a light show at night. On the way back, Steve noted that some of the turbines were turning clockwise while others were anti-clockwise and I thoughtfully informed him that this was so that the rotation of the earth wouldn't be thrown off. We then speculated on whether the wind was turning the blades or the other way around. As you can see, by that point "Rapture of the Road" was peeking over the horizon. Through upper Iowa and Minnesota we collected so many bugs on the windshield and the front of the car that it looked fuzzy. The next morning we left our motel and discovered that in addition to all of the bugs we had a bunch of flies which had landed and were feeding on the bugs and they stayed until the wind blew them away.

And that brings us to Schulte Subaru. I want to thank you all for sticking with me through the rambling build up, and I realize it was more fun for me than it was for you, but just the same I hope some got a chuckle out of it or found a useful nugget.

Terry's Subaru dealership is a nice medium sized facility somewhere in the middle of town and you wouldn't suspect there was anything special about it other than a decently large number of cars waiting for their new owners until, passing the building at the end of the lot you glanced through the large front window and saw a Ferrari red Griffin sitting inside, Or his fabulous MGB-GT, or sandwiched between them a very slenderized and mean looking black Mercedes, or any one of the other cars he keeps and rotates through the show room as his whim dictates. It could be said that a tour of the facilities has a way of overwhelming the senses. Now I have a confession to make. I have not been a student of the esoteric in the automotive and sports car world, so the names of many of the cars Terry owns do not simply roll off my tongue as if I were born next to the tracks they were racing on. I have seen them, heard of them, and in some cases even know a little about them. But for me to sit here and try to tell you about them in intimate detail of any sort would only serve to display my own ignorance. I mean, how do you describe "that beautiful bright yellow exotic sports car with the big honkin' V8 engine that they only made 27 of but Terry has the 28th one that was sold only after the company went bankrupt, only for the moment the name escapes me"? Oh, and it's worth boatloads of money. I mean, change a detail here, a detail there and it fits any of his cars. I'm at a total loss! I'm really just praying that Steve can help bail me out here. If only someone like Pete or Rick had been able to go along! Each of these cars has a history, some of which we were privileged to hear, and to his credit, Terry has collected the cars that have some sort of significance to him personally. He is a true enthusiast, and even has a basement full of spare parts to prove it. The complex has two separate buildings, one of which is the dealership building, and the other, with the aforementioned showroom, is Terry's office building, to which he has essentially retired and left the day to day dealership operations to his son Mike. It seems to me a fine sort of retirement. The office building appears deceptively small on the outside, yet once inside it just goes on and on and on, room after room, and I'm not just talking offices here. Offices he's got, and his own personal office is fittingly lavish. But I think the man has happened across some sort of space warp device somewhere in his past because there's just no way you can fit all of those rooms, cars, parts, space, showroom, offices and other facilities in a building that size. As a fitting side note, I'm pleased to say that Terry honors his father in a way I found quite right. It turns out that in a back corner of the showroom on a stand he keeps a go-kart. At a casual glance you might not notice anything special about it but there is, oh yes. This was the kart lovingly crafted by a father for his son, using only the parts found at hand and the ingenuity God had given him. The transmission was taken from a Maytag washing machine and had an over-riding clutch that made it a 2 speed, by far just about the most glorious thing that could be imagined. It didn't end there. For the steering he crafted a true rack and pinion, using a small straight cut gear and a flat rack that from all appearances he might have cut himself out of a square bar, the whole works cradled in a simple bent metal bracket. Ingenuity at it's very best. Then for a nerf bar he adapted an inverted set of bicycle handlebars.

This is the stock that Terry and Mike come from, true Americana at it's finest. They've worked hard, succeeded at the American Dream and are rightfully enjoying the fruits of their labors. I for one am pleased and happy to be able to count them as friends and co-conspirators in the MG-Roadmaster project. If you can arrange it, pay them a visit sometime. I'm pretty sure you will find it worthwhile. Oh, and Mike is a fine salesman with an extremely good history so if a Subaru could be in your future it sure wouldn't hurt to talk to him.

I could stop now but there is so much more to tell. To begin with, Terry is most proud of his and his employees' accomplishments not only in assembling the car bodies (in many cases going to great lengths to replace or repair long since unobtainable parts, trim and components) but perhaps even more so in their craftsmanship when it comes to the car interiors. Now I've done some interior work, made some custom pieces, and even done some seam work and having that experience really does give me a true appreciation of what these guys have the skills for. Time after time we looked at one-off restoration or custom interior pieces and never was there a stitch out of place or a crooked line. I don't honestly believe I could ever do that, no matter how much I practiced. And I'm really not that bad at it. These guys simply are on another level entirely. I'm thrilled to death that Terry has taken on the paint and finish body work. But at the same time I'm afraid we will probably embarrass the paint with our interior. Steve made a valid point of course, we don't want the car so nice we are afraid to drive it, but it sure is nice when all the edges are nicely and properly tucked in for instance, and that just isn't one of my strong suits.

So maybe that is a good spot to discuss some of my shortcomings on this project. Paint, obviously (take a close look at my roadster for instance), interior, and then wiring and general tidiness. I do try but, well let me just say that within our group I'm not within the top ten percent. Or twenty. Or thirty... You get my point I hope. I do very well in other areas but not those. Steve has informed me that Jack Austin (Twigworker) has offered to install the wiring and I think we should look into that. As for the interior, I don't have any answer yet for that other than to just slap in the old stuff. There could be some possibility Terry might have some interest in that part as well but I think it's best to wait until he's done with the paint to even explore that possibility. I know Mike was mentally watching his workload go up in order to pay for what Terry has already taken on and I respect that. So we'll just have to see how things go. As for the time-line, Terry said that the first of the year would be too soon to expect the car to be done so finishing the car before May is probably out of the question. With luck though we may be able to have it there to show off it's new paint.

JB

[Dan B]

Cool!