Milwaukee Midget

[crew chief]

crew chief checking in. hows the weather in Milwaukee?

[Glen]

Crew Chief for who? what vehicle, where do you live and how about some back ground on your racing.
Oh ! BTW, welcome to the Landracing web site.
The weather in Southern Utah is nice, sunny and 60 degrees F.

[crew chief]

Just checking up on this near-do-well son of mine in Beerhaven.

[Milwaukee Midget]

Well, it’s moving forward.  Still in parts acquisition mode.  Mel down at C&S is doing a little digging on con rods for me.  Carrillos are my fall-back position, and while I’m certain of their quality, I’m having a tough time justifying the cost.  Initially, the thought was to custom make a set with a narrower Honda type bearing, but that would require a ground-up redesign for my application, and the standard bearing size has proven itself sound in over 58 years of racing the A-block. 

The block’s been cleaned up and bored, and when the crank main bolts come in, they’ll align hone it with the new center cap and strap.

Rody has the billet on order, and I’ll need to have the final dimensions to Greg once the con-rods are finalized.
 
Ordered up the ring packs and the pistons will be ordered, again, once the connecting rods are sorted out.

And the final vestiges of the Prince of Darkness have been, finally, exorcised and banished to the dust bin, where they should have been put to rest years ago.  Incoming will be the Edi2 Electromotive computer controlled ignition box, the crank trigger sensor, and a Gustafson gear reduction starter.  I already own the trigger wheel and bracketing for the system.  There’s a knock sensor input on this brain box, along with the trigger sensor.  I’ll probably go ahead and tap the block for that – cheap insurance, I suspect.

I’ll post pics when the parts arrive.

Off topic for sure, but -

While I’m not a big professional football fan, you’ve gotta like this match up in the Superbowl tomorrow.  The Steelers are solid, but I’ve gotta give a shout out to my neighbors to the north in Green Bay.  Dumping Favre and putting Rodgers in the driver’s seat has proven to be a combination that looking pretty darned wise.  Go Pack, Go!

[Tman]

I'll root for Rogers and the cheddarheads!

[Milwaukee Midget]

The hi-tech tractor motor development continues.

This just in:



Combination of new and used pieces.  Downloaded the software - this will be interesting.  I've never programmed an ignition plot before.

Decided to go with Saenz rods on the recommendation of my machine guy.  That order has been placed.
 
And I sold my 1275 short block this weekend.  It’ll be going into a very cool ’60 Bugeye.  Dan was the fellow’s name, an ex-marine (although I’ve been told there’s no such thing), who has been buying and trading some pretty cool pieces over the years.  He’s currently working on a Nash Metropolitan – a car I’ve always wanted to own.  Maybe down the road a piece.

[Milwaukee Midget]

I took great interest in Gary Hart and Mike Collison’s straight eight Buick build.  If you haven't had a chance to look at it, here's a link –

http://www.landracing.com/forum/index.php/topic,4974.0.html

Many of the issues they had to contend with were related to the shared intake ports on the Buick.
 
To that end, I'm fortunate in that my engine choice, though a 58 year old design, has had a lot of development work done on it both by the factory (BMC/British Leyland), and by numerous tuners over the years.
 
Back in the 1980’s, David Vizard and Dave Anton at APT started a program of cam development for the A-block, worked with both Kent and Crane cams, and eventually developed what they refer to as a “scatter pattern” cam for the A-Block. 

It sets up different timing events for the 1 and 4 cylinders than the 2 and 3 cylinders to minimize cylinder robbing between the 1-2, and 3-4 intakes, maximize the charge and take better advantage of the shared exhaust port on the 2-3 cylinders and individual exhaust ports on the 1 and 4 cylinders.

I'm glad they did the work, because it was all I could do to try to put it in a sentence.
   
Dave Anton is still at APT, and we talked our way through it – He's a class act.  The SPVP5 Cam specs out like this -

306 duration (nominal), .324 lift intake, .321 exhaust (1.5 rocker ratio)
 
Timing for cylinders 1 and 4 are as follows –
47.5 - 72.5 - 72.5 - 42.5   103.75 LCA

For 2 and 3 –
44.5 - 75.5 - 75.5 - 44.5   105.5 LCA

Something occurred to me after I ordered it.  Unlike a “regular” engine, where you check valve to piston clearance on just one cylinder, I’ll need to check both the 1 and the 2 chamber for valve to piston clearance, as the events are not the same.

Pics when the new toys arrive.

[Milwaukee Midget]

I’m waiting on engine parts, but there’s still plenty to do.

One of the issues I had last year was ingress-egress.  Part of the solution will be a removable steering wheel and hub, both of which I scored off of eBay.  I’ll miss the wooden wonder, but I suspect it will find a new home in my MGB this summer.




Of course when you change one thing, other things must follow.  The new wheel sits closer to the dash, and my ham hands would interfere with the tach if it remained located on the steering column.  I would have liked to have put it in the dash to keep it neat, but the roll cage interferes, so an alternate location needed to be figured out.

The former home of the rear view mirror offered a secure mounting point.




I’ll be pulling the coil, starter solenoid and voltage regulator, and Tim and I will redo the electrical under the dash to accommodate the new brain box for the crank trigger.  The new starter has the solenoid built into it.



I’m searching out an explosion proof fitting for the shielded trigger sensor to further neaten up the wiring in the engine bay.  I think Switchcraft makes one for military microphone and audio applications that would work pretty well.

[Milwaukee Midget]

Pulled a Barney Fife. 

Cut the steering shaft, fitted the new spline collar, drug the welder up the stairs and out the door to the garage and . . .

I'd left the gas on for the welder last time I used it.  Tank was emptier than my head.

  

 

[grumm441]

Don't you hate that
I was at the sandblasters/ceramic coaters the other day
I watched him check the tap on the gas bottle about six times in five minutes
I'm glad it's not only me
G

[Milwaukee Midget]

You know, Grummy (I'm dropping all titles until I get a proper handle on them), I've been putting off this stupid little weld job for six weeks.  I don't weld very well, and I need to work up the sack.

So today, I left work early, cut the shaft, dressed the metal, and carried a cart with 80 lbs of copper transformer and what turned out to be an empty tank up stairs, rolled it out to the garage, plugged it in, and tried to turn the knob, only to find out I had already done that around Christmas time.

I've been planning on trading the welder for a torch kit.  Now I've got to sink $30.00 into a tank of gas for a 2 minute weld job that was to be my last tango with the wire feed.

Racing is expensive enough without adding dumb to the equation.

All I wanted to do was get one, simple, stupid little item checked off of the clipboard.  It'll be Thursday before I get the opportunity to change out the tank, and Saturday before I'll have the time to do the weld.

Get well, G.  You've got a trip in a few weeks.

Chris

[Dr Goggles]

Can you get the disposable tanks there?? I've never really considered them until recently ....I rarely need to weld aluminium anymore but every now and then I think "I wish I had some argon I'd just whizz that up.....without having to pay annual rental on a big bottle....

However , your experience is why I double check the fitting of the gas lines on the mig, I left mine on this week for about 6 days, good practice has you turning it on after the power and off before the power...that way you don't forget......a noisy welder doesn't hurt for this reason.....there is something about the background noise of them , the hum and the fan that gets under my skin.... so I tend to turn it on and off pretty regularly

[38flattie]

Looking good!

Too bad about the wooden wheel- cool wheel with a cool story behind it!

[floydjer]

Hey Doc.....Do you know why welders hum??? Because they don`t know the words !!!!

[nickleone]

Here is something to look at the next time your snowed in.
From Ecomodder
 MG MIDGET + GEO METRO 3CYL ENGINE = MGEO

User Nimblemotors wants to get some better mileage out of his 1971 MG Midget and decided to put it on an extreme diet and swap in a 993cc 3-cylinder Geo Metro engine.  Follow his detailed build progress.
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php?t=15091


Nick