Moss Motors, Ltd

Bought this lovely little car for my wife in 1998. Took it down to pieces on the garage floor. New wood frame, stainless bolts,exhaust the works. We moved to Maui in 2002. In 2005 the clutch plate froze to the flywheel. Real bummer. I had an Australian friend here that worked on airplanes. We decided at that time to rebuild engine. It was the only thing I hadnt done in 98-99. Well a little man on the east side of Maui ( 81) had worked for MG in the 40-50's. He wanted to do the engine machining as his son had a machine shop. 1 year later the engine was fully machined and needed to be put back together. Well, my friend Bobby put the crank, pistons, cam etc together and about 2 months after the machining guy died, My friend died. Is this car scary or what ? So now his mechanics and girl friend decide to keep the garage up and running. So I wait a year for them to put the little car back together, hmmmmmmm. Got a call in july that they want me tom come finish the car as they are out of their depth. Partly due to not being the guy that broke the car down ( which we all understand makes it real hard )and partly cause they know I can put the dang thing together in my sleep. Well I assumed ( idiot ) that the engine stuff was in order and put the new 5 speed trany on the motor and put it in the car. Just finished rebulding the carbs and getting all the linkage , drive shaft , starter, fuel lines, you know all the stuff put back on , only to find out the engine doesnt turn over. CRAP   It is then the mechaninc tells me he put in longer bolts than the original on the pressure plate So I take the whole freakin thing apart again. I pulled the engine this afternoon. Unbelieveable, the engine does not crank no matter what I do. so here is where i sit ( frustrated beyond belief cause i aint a young man anymore and its not like I like doing this like I once did ( 58 now ). So here is my question to anyone that would care to respond. I have confidence in the machinist, confindence in the first mechanic, 0 confindence  from that point forward. The second mechanic swear this thing turned over 5 months ago. The engine sat on a stand for what i think was about 18 months. Will pull fly wheel tomorrow to see if there is any reason for this thing to be jammed. Any brilliant thoughts out there as to where to start after that ? Thanks and ALoha   Jim

kemo,

It's hard to know where to begin. There are SO many opportunities to do something wrong when machining, selecting parts, and reassembling a T Series engine which would result in this kind of seizing. Your best bet is to start pulling off pieces one at a time until itr frees up, at which point you'll have found the culprit. Start by removing the sump (oil pan) so that you can remove the flywheel. If that doesn't free it up, remove or loosen the connecting rod bearings one at a time. If that doesn't do it, loosen up the main bearing caps. It may help to remove the timing cover, remove the chain, and see if the camshaft is frozen in place. Installing the cam and it's split bearings is very tricky, and I have seen otherwise very skilled mechanics mess this up. Somewhere along the line you will loosen or remove something which will cause the engine to be able to turn. When you get to that point, DON'T TURN IT! That's because you don't want to loose the relationship between the crank and cam, cam and distributor, etc. If you understand all these things, and have a manual, then go ahead and tear into it. Otherwise, let me know what you find.

The fact is, I've done a LOT of these engines, and believe me, you gotta stay in practice to get them right. There have also been wrong machining specs published for the crankshaft for many years, which would make for the connecting rod bearings fitting way too tight and locking up. Let me know, and good luck. If you'd like to contact me through the private or email options, that might provre useful.

---

Motorbill
From Lola to Land Rover, If it's British and has wheels, it's likely I've bloodied me knuckles thereupon