Hey Guys
Happy to find this site. I just retired and moved from upstate New York to middle Tennessee. The foul weather and deadly taxes were a great motive for the decision to move. Another great thing is my son also lives here, so I get to spend time with him.
I started work on my Corvette powered five speed 1953 MG TD last fall, and took it for the first drive last weekend. The engine actualy is a 74 Corvette that had 195 factory HP. Every time I buy a SBC, the guy says its a Corvette, yeah right, (you know the story). The engine was beefed a bit and the TD frame has a 64 Corvette rear and Corvair front with disc brake conversion. The TD rack and pinion and steering column were used and seems to be just fine. The wire wheels are not what I wanted but, believe it or not I bought the wheels and tires on NY CL for a total of $50(had to be stolen). The interior was recovered by a handicap group in upstate NY and the paint by a local shop. I'm not a painter but do all my own mechanical stuff. The company I worked for had every CNC machine tool, lazer and plasma cutter known to man, so I had no problem making stuff I needed. I still need to put on the new bumpers, hood and some cosmetic items, but attached before and after pics. I have a complete pictorial esay of the process and will post when I get a chance.
take care, Dave
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Very nice Dave. Looking forward to meeting you and seeing the car next spring in Townsend.
Hello Dave, and welcome to BritishV8!
I'm especially happy to see MG-TD conversions coming forward lately because as we all know the tradition of putting American engines in MG's started strongly in the TC/TD era. There are probably still hundreds of T-series V8's out there... somewhere. In the past I haven't been able to get enough info and photos to paste-up "How It Was Done" articles. Tonight, the ice finally breaks! Check out this brand new article: <a href="http://www.britishv8.org/MG/EdLaBrush-MG-TD.htm">
Ed LaBrush's TD-V8</a>
Dave, I can't wait to see your project/car in more detail!
Curtis, maybe you should send Bill Cosby an email. I understand he had a V8 TD that Carrol Shelby built for him.
JB
Curtis
Ed's TD is a great piece of work, far beyond the engeneering of mine. I have less than $10K invested, so I'm very pleased with the results. I'm correcting a few design flaws at this time, but will have things under control soon.
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It's the diverse variety of cars that makes our community so interesting. Many of the "modest" cars are favorites!
Jim, I contacted Cosby through his agents, but he declined to comment on the TD and instead referred me to Shelby. It would have been very nice if he'd written me a letter of introduction. I haven't figured out how to contact Shelby directly.
I like the Jeepster too!!
Dave, the Corvair front appears to fit very well. What disc brakes are you running and did you have to narrow it?What rear axle did you use and is it narrowed?
As for Cosby, he also had a supercharged Super Snake Cobra.One like it sold at Barret and Jackson for $1 million a few years ago. 1 of 3 I believe. When he was on " I Spy" he was quite the hotrodder. Curtis, if you Email him about this site he may be interested.
I ***think*** Bill Cosby's car WAS a Shelby Cobra....not a TD.
No, he definitely had both, one after the other. The TD TC V8 doesn't get its fair share of publicity, but we've discussed it here before: http://forum.britishv8.org/read.php?2,1900
The car was having overheating problems so a custom aluminum radiator is being built at Brice Thomas Radiators. When I recieve the unit I will publish a thread on it.
The AC Cobra he owned was one of 2 built that had twin superchargers on a 427 and an automatic trans. The MG was a tc with a v-8, this is the only photo I could find.
Ali-and-Cosby.jpg Yes that's him riding with Ali.