Wocha bin doin on your MG this week then?

Having removed my seats and fitted heated pads a few weeks ago, I finally got around to wiring everything up today.

I've removed the ashtray, and 3d printed a replacement panel to hold the control switch, and I'm very happy with how it looks.

I do need to adjust the corner radius a little, but I plan to install a low coolant warning light and buzzer in this panel in due course, so I'll tweak the fit when I do that.

 

Looks great! Job well done.

A little off topic; it might be an idea to look at your handbrake adjustment. If you need to draw the leaver to that position, the callipers are not operating at their optimum.
Just an observation.
M

Looking good 

Airportable wrote:

A little off topic; it might be an idea to look at your handbrake adjustment. If you need to draw the leaver to that position, the callipers are not operating at their optimum.
Just an observation.
M

Thanks Airportable. I think it's just the angle / perspective of that photo, but I'll add some additional photos so you can let me know if you think it looks right.

The car had been laid up in my mother-in-law's garage for around two and a half years as she gave up driving in 2023. I got it back on the road a couple of months ago, and at least on of the rear calipers was a bit sticky at that point, albeit not completely seized.

I cleaned up the calipers, and adjusted the handbrake to what I think is the sweetspot. There is the tiniest amount of play when disengaged; any less and the brakes bind, any more and the handbrake warning light flickers on bumpy roads. It's three clicks of the ratchet to fully enagaged (or two if my wife is going to be driving, as otherwise I just know I'll be called outside to disengage the handbrake, lol)

Handbrake off:

 

Handbrake on:

 

You have made a really good job of the seat heater switch panel.
Where was the switchgear for that sourced from please may I ask ?

The switch was part of the kit which I purchased on aliexpress - https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006013197193.html

There are lots of similar kits with different switch options, but I felt this one best suited the TF, and also has the advantage of having five heat levels rather than the two or three that most of the other buttons offer. The dials illuminate red when they are set to any position other than "0" which fits in nicely with the factory switchgear, but the "L <seat symbol> R" bit illuminates in blue when the headlights are turned on which isn't really to my taste and doesn't match anything else in the car, so I've currently left that wire disconnected. I will probably look to replace the blue LED for an amber one in due course.

I didn't really want to start drilling holes in the centre console, and I believe the original dealer fit heated seat option had the buttons mounted down by the footwell lights which is not very convenient, so given the ashtray serves no purpose for me, this felt like the obvious place to mount the switch.

From these angles the hand brake leaver doesn't look too bad. I've a thing about the hand brake on our cars, (amongst a goodly number of other things), firstly, for a right hand drive car, it's in the wrong side & as such is less easy to flick off, if you were looking for a competitive away. "Heyday" sports cars, such as the Daimler SP25, had a fly off hand brake; apply the brake, press the button & your brake it locked on. For your swift away, you lift the leaver, let go, it drops & you're away, this whilst your competitors are still pressing buttons & dropping the leavers.
The more your brake leaver resembles an "erection", the harder it is to fully apply & the more difficult it is to release. The self adjusting mechanism in the rear callipers is complex & want to fill with grot, corrode, thus becoming less effective. Anyone who has explored the crank chamber will identify those comments & WD40 will only make the problem worse, after a short honeymoon period of an MOT pass.
My comments were not a criticism but to draw attention to an area which might have overlooked, not especially for you, but for all of us.
M

Thanks Airportable.

It wasn't taken as a criticism so no worries there, and equally if my reply sounded in any way defensive that wasn't my intention. I'm always grateful when anyone points out anything that might not look right, as with a sample of one and nothing to compare to, it can be hard to tell whether something is normal or not. A good example of this was the boot hinge wiring - I knew that if I unlocked the car with the remote, that it would re-lock automatically after 30 seconds if the doors hadn't been opened, but I didn't realise that opening the boot should also prevent the re-lock, as it didn't on ours. It was only stumbling upon mentions of the wiring being prone to breaking, and the repair howto, that prompted me to investigate, but if that hadn't happened I would probably still be oblivious to the fact that it was not behaving as it was designed to.

I'm lucky that our TF is very much unmolested, in the sense that it hasn't had multiple previous owners making modifications to things, as it is much easier to work on things from a known starting point. My mother-in-law was meticulous in maintaining the car from a servicing point of view - she was only covering 100 to 150 miles per year in the last few years before she gave up driving but was still having it serviced annually, so I suspect the oil was being replaced more frequently than the fuel tank was being refilled at that stage!, but longer term preventative modifications, such as, for example, fitting stainless steel coolant pipes, would not have been on her radar, so that is where I am focusing my efforts now.

I'm very much with you when it comes to drawing attention to things for the benefit of others who may read the posts in the future - sharing knowledge and experience, sometimes beyond the issue immediately at hand, is what makes this forum such a useful resource.

After reluctantly selling my 2001 MGF 1.6 in late 2022, today I bought it back off the gentleman I sold it to. I'm very much looking forward to collecting it and the 5 hour drive home.
 

That's cool! A nice blast on the way home.
When I bought mine my test drive was a 619 mile drive home.
I enjoyed every moment.

Its great you have bought it back again. How did that come about ?