Philip's 1972 MGB with Jaguar 3.0 V6 engine

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Owner: Philip Waterman
City: Taunton UK
Car Model: 1972 MGB GT
Engine:
Jaguar AJV6 3.0 litre engine built at the Cleveland engine plants

Cooling:
Chinese aluminium copy of  late model radiator, Pierburg EWP

Exhaust:

Transmission:
RX8 five speed European market version

Rear Axle:
MGB tube axle, 3.31 CWP, Blackline LSD Hubs converted to 5 x 43/4" PCD using MGC wire wheel hubs

Front Susp.:
Lower  suspension pivot s moved 1/14" outwards and upwards each side on the crossmember,  standard springs. New upper wishbones and Bilstein tube dampers. Hubs converted to 5  x 43/4" PCD with Chevelle hubs.

Rear Susp.:
Home made  four link suspension with Bilstein coil overs.

Brakes:
(master) Late model dual circuit with standard servo.
(front)  BMW  276mm vented front discs RX7 callipers
(rear) BMW 274mm solid rear discs Mazda MX5 NC brake callipers

Wheels/Tires: BMW Z4 7x 16 wheels

Body Mods: Midget rear valance, VW Golf wheel arch flares

Interior:

Electrical:





The winter was spent fitting the front wings and doors which is when I hit another snag which you can read about here;
https://www.mgexp.com/forum/mgb-and-gt-forum.1/mgb-gt-doors-sit-too-low.4902499/
I am totally convinced that the cause of the problem was that the sills were welded too high up the door post with the right hand side being the worst by far. I also remade the engine mounts for the very wide Jaguar engine, I had tried to fix the to the top of the cross member fixing bolts but eventually located them on the cross member itself.

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It's long time for an update, the last photos were from over a year ago and quite a bit has been done since then. In short I have made progress with the engine and it is almost ready to install, I may leave painting the cam covers until after the installation. The inlet manifold  is finished apart from various ports for sensors, brake servo etc.
I actually got it painted before the end of September, it's a long time since I sprayed a car, it's not perfect by any means but I am very happy with my efforts. Since then I have built the bracket that hangs on the front of the engine and it carries the alternator, Pierburg EWP and aircon compressor, it's all compacted together and mounted to five bosses on the front cover, I may add a brace from the cylinder head to the air con mount to prevent any wobble. The MGTF EPAS is finished bar the wiring although nothing is finally tightened up, I had to lower the column in the engine bay to clear the exhaust manifolds. Two weeks ago the tailgate was fitted, Ruth and I fitted the glass which went very smoothly but the aluminium finishing strips look like much harder work, this had to be done because I have brought the GT home. No more thirty mile round trips, not only time and fuel wasted but too many times I arrived over there only to find that something was left at home. The downside is that the garage is only two feet longer than the GT and has no doors to keep the wind and rain out although not the best place to work at least I can go into the house to warm up.  These four photos show how the front end looks

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The next photos show the rear end, I decided to french in the reversing lights to give a smoother look, you can see that I got the fixing holes for the fuel filler thirty degrees out from where they should have been. The third photo gives a good view of how the EPAS fits, a simple bracket from the back of the EPAS gearbox fits to the bulkhead, although not that clear another simple bracket bolts to the original steering column mounts on the cross rail. The telescopic shaft is the original and was machined to accept a DD UJ at the bulkhead. You can also partially see the modifications to fit the evaporator and distribution box. The last photo shows the Fuel tank modified to take a VW fuel pump.

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The next three photos show the engine with all the ancillaries mounted on the front, I spent many hours trying to get this fitted as compactly as possible in the space between the engine and radiator. The last photo shows the clutch slave cylinder mounted on the bellhousing, one superfluous piece of casting was mostly ground away as was a small section where there is a core plug is fitted.

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The first phot is an overhead view of the left bank, the second is of the modified crossmember the two engine mounting brackets accept BMW mounts which are quite narrow, my previous two attempts to mount on the side rails failed simply due to lack of space and the proximity of the exhaust.

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Apart from a couple of days it has been too cold for my liking to go out to work on the GT, Ruth has just had her first cataract done and sods law says that on each of the warm dry days she has wanted me to taker her somewhere, the second one gets done in two weeks time. Today it's raining and the temperature is 6C but I decided to bite the bullet and fit the engine and gearbox, due to the limited clearances it isn't straightforward especially when working on your own. After an hour of altering engine angles  I was able to flex the engine mounting studs enough for them to pop into their holes. I have a minimum of a 1/4" at the closest points to the bulkhead but this will increase as I jack the gearbox up onto its correct position.
You can clearly see the inlet manifold is very close to the brake master cylinder, I will change to banjo fittings for more clearance and make more room  to fit a brake servo take off as well as a PCV and IAC valve. Bonnet clearance is just okay, the last phot shows the timber resting on the flange where the bonnet rubber seal attaches, at that point there is zero clearance, at the front, the manifold  sits 7/8" higher than the flange. Since the bonnet doesn't sit on the flange and with the curvature of the bonnet then it should be okay even if it is a bit tight. In front of the engine the alternator has almost three inches clearance to the radiator and the air con compressor has two inches. I need about an inch and a half clearance for a Spal fan, again it's tight but doable.