Towards the end of the 2006 season, I really started to burn oil, approximately 1 qt per 300 miles. My thought was either bad valve seals or the one piece oil control rings I had used during the rebuild three years ago.

Barney, Bill and Dennis came over the Friday before New Years and helped me pull it from the car. Thanks! When I pulled the head, I noticed that cylinder #3 was pretty carboned up, but the good news was that there was no evidence of cylinder bore damage from a broken ring.

I finally pulled the pistons and still no smoking gun. But on pistons 2,3 & 4, the ring gaps had moved close to each other! weird.

I had the head magged and bead blasted. No cracks! yay! The plan right now is to send it to Sean Brown for a P&P job and to continue to break down the engine. Have it honed, put in new gaskets and rings.

After getting my B back on the road earlier this year, I've had an incredible MGB Summer! I've driven it everywhere logging an estimated 8000 miles. (my odo quit the last two months!) The highlight was driving 14 hours from NY to Gatlinburg, TN for MG2006. That was AMAZING! I've had a great time attending many shows and meeting all sorts of MG people. That is really the highlight for me, MG people are the best.

Some shows include:

Celebration of Celts (ATA)
MG2006 (3rd Place in Class)
British Motorfest (1st Place in Class)
Ticonderoga Auto Show
Bergen County Art Museum (2nd Place Best of Show)
Edaville Cranberry Festtival Boston Area MG Club/Bay State MG Clug (Crowd Favorite, 2nd Place Best of Show, 2nd Place in Class, Best Interior, Furtherst Distance)

And countless other Cruise In's, Drives and Rally's

Now I've put her away for the winter and have a few plans in place, including finding my oil loss problem.

But WOW! What a year!

Today I installed new hubs on all four corners and new Dayton Wire Wheels!

They are beautiful and handle even better. I feel like the car is transformed. No more wiggles, shimmies, shakes or rattles. The car fells like its riding on rails and the steering is incredibly responsive.

My Daytons are DB72-145, chrome and tubeless. 14" 72 Spokes.

Woo hoo! Last night I put in the seats and belts and cleaned the wire wheels up a bit. She's insured and licened and ON THE ROAD AGAIN! The only thing left to do is install the chrome side strips, I hope to do that tonight. I'm not gonna call it finished (as you never finish a B ) but I can drive her again! I have new Daytons on the way and eventually, I would like to P&P the head and maybe Supercharge if I can save that many pennies.

I put about 50 miles on her today. She did GREAT, the only teething trouble so far has been a fluky gas gauage (tends to wander) and some deisling after I turn it off. But oh man did it feel good!

I was going to call out individuals for thanks, but I'm sure I would forget someone and feel like an ass. But I couldn't have done it with out the ongoing support of this incredible community. As Carl French once said, it's like being in a garage with all your Frat buddies, going "Do it, do it, do it"! I can't believe I listened! LOL!

UPDATES>>>
- Gas guage... bad ground.. Duh!
- Dieseling... loose vacuum hose.
- Chrome strips... done! Not so bad. I lined them up with masking tape and drilled away! Look great and really finish the car.

This is out of order but here is how I did my floor pans.

From 6/6/05

I'm making good progress. I got the heel board extensions welded in. I followed Brian's lead and took Bill K's suggestion and welded 1/4" bar stock onto the bottom of my repro floor pans for my seat bolts. Later when I fit the seat rails, I will drill and tap these steel squares. I prepped the floor pans for welding and they slid right into place! No massaging necessary! Woo hoo! I need to make one patch near the floor boards, but hopefully they will be welded in shortly. After that, power wash the bottom and paint. Then fit the doors, fenders and bonnet.

When I purchased my B, the interior was completely stripped so I had no direct point of reference as to how it was done a the factory. Originally, I sat my center console on top of the transmission tunnel carpet. But it was pointed out to me by Gary Alpern and others that the carpet should lip up around the console. Unforntuatley, my carpet from Presitige wasn't cut that way. So after looking at many photos and getting great instructions from Gerry Masterman, I took a mat knife to it and slowly cut it back and folded it under. To hold it in place I used a loop stitch.

And the Hood!

I was concerned that after a year and a half in my basement it would have shrunk or been damaged, but it did ok! I still have a bit of a gap along the middle of the header rail and I can't button up all the lift a dots yet, but it's definitely looking like an MGB again! I figure one day in the sun and all will stretch out nicely.

Fingers crossed I get my bits back from the zinc plater on wednesday as promised or I will surely stall.

Not too long now!