Treated myself to some easy time in the garage today. I had a grub through a few boxes and made a pile of parts which are not going back on – water pump, distributor, oil cooler and hoses. I haven’t decided whether to hoard these in the long term or just toss them. I think once I have rebuilt the MG I will cart them off to the recycling centre. It helped to thin out the piles a bit. I also sorted a few of the boxes a bit better – all the heater components in one place, that sort of thing because it didn’t all come off at the same time. I can then concentrate on one system at a time when I rebuild, that’s the idea.

I did take a couple of steps forward though. I trial fitted the starter motor which goes back in place very easily and I fitted the new water pump in its place, together with its new gasket. I realised in doing this, that I needed to get the pulley off the old water pump (I presume it comes off). The pulley appeared to be held in place with four bolts, which I did manage to get off, but they were extremely tight. As it was a 7/8 fitting, I was using my mini-socket set, which is great but it doesn’t get much leverage. I did manage to get them all off without rounding them off or snapping them, so maybe I am learning something here. However, this effort was not rewarded with the pulley separating from the water pump, so I will need to investigate further or consider buying new.

I also trial fitted the rev counter, speedometer and choke knob to the dashboard just for fun. First I dug out the dashboard cowl (a plastic item on this MGB) which needed a good clean and then treatment with an Autoglym trim product which feeds the plastic and makes it all black and shiny. I fixed the cowl back in place with the original screws which I HAD CAREFULLY stored when I removed it. It amused me that the cowl had been such a pig to remove when I had done this in the summer with the dash in place, so needing me to feed my hands through behind the dash. What a muppet I was attempting that, anyway, lesson learned and that all part of the fun. The grazes to the back of my hands have healed up anyway so no harm done!

So that’s it, barely an hour’s work in total, but it was nice to just take my time and the rebuild is all about putting back new, or at least cleaned up stuff, rather than the strip down which was about penetrating years of grime. Working for the rest of the week, so no progress on the MG although I’ve got some researching to do and purchases to ensure the paintshop can continue to progress.