Inca Yellow

I was taking the car out for what was meant to be a good 300-mile round-trip which I'd done several times before, but as I made my way down the road I knew something wasn't quite right.

Time for the MOT again ironically, things didn't go quite as smoothly as last year. I guess it's to be expected as we've done a fair few miles in the car over the past 12 months and coupled with the work we've done, we were bound to end up with some stuff working loose.

I'd noticed the top of the rear license plate holder was a bit rusty, so I decided to remove it for a clean-up and fresh coat of paint.

Late models of the B have a strange issue with a diode in the handbrake warning light circuit. When this diode fails you have the baffling occurence of the engine starting on the key in the battery position. The first time this happened we hadn't realised until we tried turning the engine off and it kept on going with the key sat in my hand! A scramble for the battery terminals followed.

Finally tracked down the starting problem to a faulty/blown condenser. With the carbs ruled out, this was my last option.

The MG's been off the road for a couple of weeks after breaking down on an afternoon run around the block.Right now we're trying to work out what's wrong.

As the temp. gauge had been sitting just at the top of the blue even when the engine was too hot to touch, we guessed that the likelihood was that the sender wasn't working.

With the MOT passed and the road tax paid we took it out for a celebratory run and it's first visit to the pumps in a while.

The factory-fitted horns are in a pretty awkward place. Sat just behind the front grill, under the cross-member, you need to remove the front bumper and grill to access them.

The brake switch on the later MGBs is in a pretty awful position behind the pedal box. We managed to test ours in-situ using a multi-meter, so we knew it worked, but we had to remove it to re-fit the wiring. Luckily a little bit of effort on the lock-nut released it without damage.

Replacing the washer pump is one of the easier jobs. There are just a couple of screws which fix the pump to the bulkhead; the two pipes were actually more difficult to remove as the rubber had perished a little.

The new alternator arrived - turned out a new one was as cheap as getting the old one repaired or a reconditioned one. MGOC Spares even sent a new connector plug, but the old one fitted just fine.

Since I've had the car the alternator warning light has always been lit up to indicate the battery is not getting charged when the engine is running.

This is the battery we took out of the MG - no idea if it's the original or not. We needed to get a replacement with as near as possible dimensions to this one as the battery bin is cramped at the best of times. UniPart luckily had a battery identical to this.

Spent most of today cleaning out the area behind the pedal box. This looks like it's where the mice had their nest, bless 'em.

As this is a later model MG it has just the one battery bin under the rear seat - you can see the black cover here. It is a really tight fit so getting the battery in and out can be a pain, especially as the positive lead is really short. With the metal seat base in close proximity you have to be careful when tightening the connector - it's given me a shock once already.

This was the main nest with a Dyson full of dust and debris, mixed bones at least one mouse skull and a couple of handfuls of larger shredded black bags. The blue cable is the accelerator going through the bodywork into the cabin

The centre console, currently known as 'stuff that probably belongs to the loose wires in the engine bay'. So far we know that the passenger-side headlights and indicator don't work, or does the heater.