don cook1

Park Lane door cards MK111 GT6, to fit the speakers in the door I had to 'adjust to suit'!

What's the matter with having the car in gear with the footbrake on?

They look quite good!

I have a Huco to fit to my GT6. I'm mounting it on the bulkhead somewhere using a couple of Mini exhaust bobbins.

How do these brackets and pins work then...photos??

If I remember correctly its not obvious how the cold start valve fits. It was a while back but I fitted mine wrongly and mine wouldn't start. Its all to do with getting the myriad of slots in the correct position.

You have a GT6 and need heated seats????

Good to hear that a relatively cheap repair has got you back on the road.

Very expensive to wrap, mine started to rot after 4000 or so miles. When I rebuilt the engine I painted the 6-2-1 stainless manifold  with heat retarding black paint but don't expect it to stay black or even to stay on!

I bought a perfect fit loom from Rarebits in Calne!

I think you have to swop over the front engine plate...or cut off the mounts.

Now then Andy, don't you start doing a VR. I'm all out of being sarky.

Yeah...what on earth was I thinking of???

I've been using the Stena Harwich - Hoek Van Holland route this year. Arrive Harwich late evening, couple of beers and superb night's sleep. Awake at the Hoek, disembark 8am. Outward night crossing would be too late for Aachen start. Or, the day crossing. Fares are given for Sept 2015: 2 people and a car return day crossings £147, add £43 each way for cabin/night crossing. 150 miles from Aachen and 2hr 45mins away. As Harwich is 15 mins from me I think I'll do that crossing. VR is it worth speaking to them?

Pram...Roger...a pram????

Cheers Nick. That will be just the leads then.

Embarrassed to admit this but my recently re-assembled GT6 engine has the distributor drive 180deg out. What's the answer to this...can I just put the dizzy in the original position and swop the leads around or will something more drastic be required. Its a Lucas dizzy (Vitesse). Had the engine running and managed to get about 8deg BTDC, no more room to advance as dizzy up against the engine block. Be kind please.

Martin Randle/David Lidbury/Hank Hall   Mk2 2000 Tim Bancroft/Dave Kent                      MK1 2.5 Pi (SU) Mike & Anne Weaver                          Dolomite Sprint Clive  & Gill Senior                            Spitfire 1800 (it must be finished by then!) Colin Wake + 1                                 Perhaps a TR again....... Dave Jones + someone willing to fix the Mk1 2000 at the last moment for him Mike /JaneCharlton                          Spitfire mk3 Philip Charlton/Wayne Coates           MK1 2000/V8 Steve Thompson/Gaz Seddon          GT6 MK3 (mobile bar) Howard Pryor/Tim Hunt                   TR4 Mike Banks & Tristan Banks               Spitfire Mk3 Richard Warr +1 (hopefully)              Stag Nick Jones + 1                               Vitesse 2L (maybe even with new engine......) Ellis Stokes / Keith Compton-Bishop / Darren Hartman  - Mk1 2500 Steve Pratt/Richard Pratt.                  Stag Steve Radley/Ashley Mills/Darren Sharp  Mk1 2.5Pi......or Gertie. Don Cook/John Talbot                      GT6 Mk111

Tony from MGBreakers provides the following:- AccuSpark ™ Help Coils One of the most misunderstood and misinformed questions with ignition is Do I have a ballast ignition ? And how to test for it ? First a quick explanation of how a ballast system works When a car is first started, the oil is thick and the engine is cold and hard to turn, so the starter will draw a large amount of current. Whilst cranking, you may notice the lights dim as the engine turns, this also means that the coil is robbed of current which in turn causes a reduced spark that will make the car hard to start. Often you will find the car starts at the very moment you let go of the key as this is the point it full voltage returns. To overcome this the ballast ignition was developed. The car is fitted with a coil that runs on a reduced voltage. The coil is then fed through a ballast resistor or wire that reduces the current to the correct voltage for the coil. Now the clever bit. When the engine is cranking the starter solenoid feeds the coil directly with 12 volts, bypassing the resistor. Although the car is cranking and all the voltage is reduced throughout the electrical system, the coil is receiving more volts than it requires which compensates for the voltage drop, thus giving a full spark. How to test Most people will tell you to test the feed for the coil. This tells you nothing - it will always show around 12 Volts because there is no load on the system, the resistor has nothing to resist ! ( unless the points are closed ) If there is no ballast resistor visible you may have a ballast wire inside the loom. To test for it proceed as follows: Check voltage of battery with volt meter Remove the wires from the negative side of the coil ( negative earth cars ) Connect a temporary wire from the negative terminal of the coil to earth Turn ignition on ( nothing else switched on ) Now check the voltage on the coil, put red probe on + side of coil and the - probe to earth If the reading is less than 80% of battery voltage there is portably a resistor in the system. If it is more than 80% you probably have a standard system Remove the temporary wire and reconnect wires . If your reading is less than 80% you should use a ballast coil , AccuSpark Blue 
If you reading is more than 80% you should use a non ballast coil , AccuSpark Red As a final note :
A standard 12 volt will only have a single 12 Volt feed to coil 
A ballast system should have 2 feeds. One resisted feed and a second full 12 volt feed when the starter is engaged Do I have the correct coil ? Testing your coil To test coil set voltmeter to Ohms, test between -and + terminals. A reading of around 3 is a standard coil, a reading of around 1.5 is a ballast coil. Removing Ballast resistor What do do if you wish to remove the ballast system and go with a standard 12 Volt system ? 
If you have a visible resistor you just need to remove the resistor and join all the wires. 

If you have a ballast wire in the system proceed as follows: 
Remove the 2 feeds into the coil and tape up 
You can run a new wire from the coil to the back of the ignition key 
You can also take a feed from the fuse box. This must be switched by the key and be on the live side not the fuse side. To test, it should still work with the fuse removed Any feedback if this was helpful would be appreciated tony@mgbreakers.com

You might be able to pick up a single damaged seat from ebay?

In the case of the GT6 the seat holes almost line up. Flatten the front of the MX5 runners and elongate the hole to line up with floor holes. At the rear I drilled out the two big rivets holding the back lugs on and fitted extension lugs to reach the rear floor holes... or drill new holes but use strengthening washers/plates. If you google the subject you will find several sites that show how to do it. I thought the article in the Mag was a bit long winded. The seats don't lift up but they tilt forward for rear access. They're very comfortable and look period...well, almost. Don't bother with the headrest speakers, very tinny and you can't hear them on the move.

When ever I have messed about with the distributor and not sure where I'm at, I do this, and pretty much as John described: take out No.1 plug and turn engine until compression felt by  thumb over hole (push it in 4th gear), that's the compression stroke. I back off to 10deg BTDC and get the rotor arm pointing to No.1 lead. With the ignition on and, with plug in the lead and earthed,. I then turn the distributor until I can see the spark plug spark, tighten up. That has always been good enough to start and doesn't need the rocker cover being removed, finish off with strobe..

I don't think you get the rear loading platform from Newton...I didn't.

I'll await details of the route but looking forward to a good run out again.

Engine now all re-assembled. Opted for new rockers. The inlet valves produced a nice healthy pop when pulled from the guides. Crankshaft end float sorted as was the oil pump end float, this has to be fettled as the distributor gear wouldn't drop into the pump drive. Timing gear on the crank looked like new so I kept it, the larger one was replaced as was the chain and tensioner. Very pleased with how it all went together and thanks to my mate John...a superb mechanic. Now, gearbox. This is the Type 9 and has been well documented elsewhere. However, with the box out I measured the relationship between the outer bell housing face and the nose of the Type 9 input shaft, this sits back approx. 1/4". With the rear engine plate fitted it was startling as there is no way that the short input shaft nose wouldn't get anywhere near the spigot bush. As John suggested "it must have been flapping about like a knob in a top hat". A long nose input shaft is currently being extricated from another Type 9 gearbox (Thanks Nick Jones). So I hope that, what I thought was clutch judder, will now be cured. I should have looked at this properly when I did the conversion...5 or 6 years ago. We will do a final check when the gearbox is re-assembled with the long nose input shaft/spigot bush, then it can all come home with me for fitting back into my GT6. After three years I expect it will be out and about again around Xmas time.