• Hi Guest!
    You can help ensure that British Car Forum (BCF) continues to provide a great place to engage in the British car hobby! If you find BCF a beneficial community, please consider supporting our efforts with a subscription.
    There are some perks with a member upgrade!
    **Upgrade Now**
    (PS: Subscribers don't see this gawd-aweful banner
Tips
Tips

Rear crossmember

Share this page

PAUL161

PAUL161

Great Pumpkin
Silver
Country flag
Offline
I just found out why MG went out of business! They ran out of money paying the guys to install the rear engine mounts on the Bs. But there is hope. I heard of someone who cut slots in the crossmember mounts, to allow raising the crossmember into place with the rubber mounts in place. Unbolt the center yoke,( or what ever you call it),from the crossmember and attach it and the rubber mounts to the transmission. Then raise the crossmember in place. It works! From the original holes, mesure up aprox one inch and drill a 5/16 hole. Cut the metal out between the holes. Make sure the slot is the same size as the holes by sliding a 5/16 bolt down it. It's a pain when you have to crawl out from under the car and file the slots again. That's the voice of experience speaking. The only modification that I made was, I sighted a line from the original mount hole down to the crossmember and drilled out a one inch hole on each side. This allows a socket and extension to go through the hole to tighten the lower rubber mount nut. It makes it so easy you'll want to do it twice just for the heck of it! Just think, if MG thought of this they might still be in business. PJ
 
Drilling a second mounting hole and a one inch hole in a 2 1/2 inch frame member opposite a rear engine mount on the 30 year old car is asking for big trouble, IMHO...sorry, but I would not recommend that to my worst enemy...Just my 2 cents as a word to the wise.

Bruce
 
Well, to ease your mind,all you have to do is add a stiffiner brace inside the member and your worries are over. To further ease your mind, we placed the member under the back of 1500 series chevy truck and jacked it off the ground. It didn't bend the cross member! I have a half a dozen of the critters, so I wasn't worried about ruining it during the test. It didn't ruin it. The crossmember is a little stronger than you think.
 
PS; the 1 inch hole is in the bottom cross frame work and not the engine mount! It's an access hole for an extension and socket to get up to the mount bolt.
 
I've heard of guys cutting up the crossmember too. But for me, I use a 1 foot extention on my socket with a wobble on the end. Seems to work just fine.
 
John, I tried that course of action, but my 72 has overdrive and you can not even get a 1/4 inch drive socket on a wobble extension on the passenger side rear bolt. The casting on the OD unit is in the way. With the standard transmission I'm sure it would work. Thanks for your input.
 
Back
Top