Race Report: 2013 Monticello There Goes the Neighborhood

Race Report: 24 Hours of LeMons 2013 There Goes the Neighborhood at Monticello Motor Club in Monticello, NY, April 6 & 7, 2013

Drivers: Brandon, Ruffy, Steve, Scot, Carl
Guardian Angel and Good Luck Charm: Zouneda


A 24 Hours of Lemons race at Monticello Motor Club is a rare event; in fact this will probably be the single time it will occur in the history of the Earth so it was imperative that we race there... even if it is to be very very very cold and tractionless.

A Beautiful Course, primped and proper, not at all what endurance racers are acclimated to:



Monticello Motor Club North Course



A bit more to scale I'd say



Tech and Safety Inspection: we mostly passed, with only two warnings... I lost a quart of sweat while the officials negotiated Warning (go race) vs Fail (go home).

 

1) The Kirkely Race Seat we have is a tall back, and the seat harness comes through about a foot from the top of the seat (making a weak point) - we need to add a support bar or brace behind the top part of the seat to keep it from folding back via helmet strike. Note the support does not have to attach to seat, only stop it from folding back.

 

2) One of the roll cage 'star' connection points is weak since someone cut out a section of tube years ago; never mind that the car has been in five prior LeMons races and passed tech - I see their point!

 

Thankfully, they let us race with these two points of 'oppertunities for improvement' with a deposit of promise to fix them before the next race.

MGB GT 50 - Gormless Racing, pic courtesy of official LeMons photo gallery

 

 Last minute check of the car yielded a loose bolt - THE loose bolt - that holds the brake and clutch pedal assembly on. This is the bolt that came off during the 2012 Captiol Offense race while Scot was driving. No coincidence that it is Scot's hand in the photo tightening the bolt!



More tea, Vicar?

In the first 15 minutes of the race, our driver pulled in complaining of loud clacking in the engine. We pulled off the valve cover and sure enough valves 7 and 8 were a bit off (0.016 instead of 0.013 warm), so we adjusted them and sent him back out.
Later, one of our newer drivers got into a bit of a tangle with one of Those Annoying Volvos and smashed in the front fender - luckily the tire was there to stop the steel from bending all the way in.... er....


Ruffy the MGB GT Front Fender Bender Mender - adding airspace between razor sharp jagged steel fender and soft supple race compound tire

We had to visit The Judge twice before we had bent the fender back enough to be deemed safe to rejoin the race:







 

At the end of Day 1 after 7 hours we were in 9th place in C Class and 80th place overall out of 121 entries.

 



MGB GT 50- Gormless Racing in action, pic courtesy of official LeMons photo gallery

The remainder of the race was spent adding oil, or trying to find out where the oil was spraying from, or swabbing the oil out of the engine bay, or borrowing oil from other teams, or cleaning up oil from the paddock.


Scot checking... something, while two supervisors keep him in check.

Cardboard & Kitty Litter - yep, it's British Leyland!

MGB Head Gasket bubbling like overcooked eel pie

MGB Engine Bay - now with built in rubber glove dispenser for oil cleanup!!

We ended Sunday after 14.5 hours in 66th place overall (out of 121) and 6th in C Class (out of 16) - not too dang bad for having 3 brand new drivers and taking our sweet slow time in the pits.

Unreasonable English Engine Studs

After measuring the compression of the cylinders as 150/110/100/100 and finding water in the valve cover area it was obvious that, at a minimum, the head gasket needed replacement. Sounds simple, until the you realize the engine in question may not have ever been disassembled since 1978, and all the bolts are fuzed to the block.

Those that gave their all in attempting to remove the head from the engine block:

MGB Engine Head - Stubborn as a British Tory

Autocraft Stud Remover - only partially accurate :-(

MGB Center Head Stud - Snapped; air injection holes plugged.

Finally - after many injuries and curses - the head is removed; the head gasket looks less than optimal - perhaps we shall not reuse it:

MGB Head Gasket is less than fantastic

Well now that the head is removed.... I can't get ANY of the seven remaining head studs out of the block. You can see the center stud is a bit shorter than the others, mostly due to its upper part BEING STUCK IN THE BLOODY Autocraft Stud Remover And Snapper(TM). As we have a race in about three weeks, I shall decline to snap the remaining bolts and let a professional snap them. They will probably be quicker - took me a few days to just snap one!

Seven Angry Studs

IT LIVES!!!!!

• New head gasket installed, water was flooding cylinder #3
• Adjusted valves, 2 were way off
• Of the 2 center rockers that needed shims, one was missing and the other was folded over so twice the thickness it should have been
• Rocket cover vent was clogged

 More pics later, but for now the bottom line is:

First drive after rebuild: no oil covering windshield, fender, hood or roof!

Mystery Bolt - Can you identify?

 

While replacing the head gasket in the engine (1973) of the MGB, I had the rockers sitting on a piece of cardboard while I worked on scraping the carbon off the head, cleaning, and measuring for warp.

The next morning I start work again and notice this plug/bolt laying in the area very near the rocker assembly. I CANNOT find a location that this would go, either in the rocker assembly or the cylinder head... or the carb (webar DGV) for that matter. I poured through the MG Service manuals, and the Moss catalog as well.

Stats: 

• it is about 0.6 inches square (about the size of the Spark Plug at the threads!)
• the threads seem worn down
• it was mostly coated in nice clean oil
• it is not brass
• hex socket is for 5/16ths allen wrench
• It's not an air-injector hole plug
• It's not a rocker/valve gap adjustment bolt

Leave a comment if you have any clues to this mystery!!

Is it possible the last owner/mechanic dropped it into the engine at some point and it's been rolling around - that may account for the worn threads - maybe??