My Dad uses the saying '...got more money than brains...' quite frequently. You would think it would have sunk in. After roaming around Australia for a while, I came home and got another engineering job. I was living at home and pulling in a pretty decent wage. Thanks Mom and Dad for not charging me rent! The MG ran well, and cornered well with those tires, but it needed some more power. I decided to spend some of my hard earned money on a motor rebuild.
I removed the motor from the car with the help of my brother. We took the head off, drained the oil and managed to lift it out of the car with muscle power alone. Once it was out, we took it in to the mechanic. I had the motor rebuilt in Calgary by Auto-Mann. They bored it out to a 2.0l, put in a high lift cam, converted it to twin SU carbs and a few other treats including a header. It took a few weeks to have it all done, and once it was finished they called me to pick it up.
Malcolm gave me pretty strict instructions to not try starting the motor once it was back in the car. He wanted to make sure that all their hard work was not going to go to waste. My Dad and I dropped the motor back in the car and joined it with the transmission once again. Now just to get it back to Auto-mann for start up.
I had a friend who owned a car hauler. He offered to haul the car back to Auto-mann for the finishing work. We loaded up the car up ready for transport when my friend asked me, 'do you want to drive it?'
'Huh?' I replied, 'what do you mean?'
'Hop in the back, you can ride in the car into town. You probably miss driving it, so this is an opportunity for you.'
Well, I couldn't resist, I hoped in the drivers seat and road in the car, on the car hauler, back to Auto-Mann. That must have been quite the sight for passing motorists.
Correction: we made one stop along the way, A charity car washing event. After getting the car nicely polished, we took it to Auto-mann and unloaded it from the car hauler.
