MGB Diving in: time to pull the parts car engine

[Rut]

Drew,
Good job! Now, don’t sit back and rest on your laurels...keep working and get the engine installed! Sometime I look up and what I thought was last week was actually 6 months ago. Keep us posted on your progress.
Rut

 

[AngliaGT]

I was wondering why it's necessary to drain the engine oil?

 

[YakkoWarner]

I have only done this one once recently (on a 1970 B) but everything about freezer bags and labelling is spot on advice. The only thing I'd add is GO SLOW. This thing weighs a lot more than I expected and even moving slowly it has the potential to injure you or damage the car, so plan out every lift and move beforehand. The workshop manual said to unbolt the transmission crossmember from the underside of the car with a jack under the transmission, then lower it slowly until the transmission was resting on the fixxed welded-in crosssmember to remove the transmission crossmember from the transmission. That worked and ensured you weren't directly under the thing while it was supported only by a jack.

If you are lifting the engine/transmission together, the balance point is pretty much right at the engine backplate. I used 2 6000 pound rated slings, one right in the gap between the pan and backplate and the other under the front of the pan. The front one doesn't really end up with a lot of strain on it, because the back one ends up taking the whole load. The transmission weighs less than the engine, but is a lot longer which is why the balance ends up where it does. I don't know what actual weight of the engine/transmission combo is, but I know I didn't want to have it land on anything other than the castor pallet it was supposed to end up on, and in
a controlled fashion at that.

 

[DrEntropy]

My "order" is to disconnect systems one at a a time: electrics first, hydraulics (clutch slave can be tied off to be out of the way) next, mechanical last. Been doing this since 1969. Done dozens since, if not hundreds. It's worth having a machine shop fab up the BMC-referenced engine lifting tool or making one yourself. With that piece you can change the angle with little effort using an engine crane or fixed overhead hook by pushing the chassis as you lift the unit. My mother was my helper to pull the engine/trans to change out a clutch on my wedding day back in 1970. 45 minutes had the unit on the floor. Whole job done in under two hours.

I should write that episode up as an article for the forum.

 

[drooartz]

Parts car body shell left on Sunday -- back to the folks I bought the car from. They wanted some of the suspension bits, so we loaded the car onto their trailer and off it went. I pulled what I needed, so was happy to let someone else deal with the final things and cutting it up for scrap. Gives me my shop space back, so I'm ready to start working on getting the old motor out of my B.