Rebuilt short block?

[Moonie527]

Instaed of rebuilding the current engine in my MGB, I'm thinking of buying a rebuilt short block via the internet. I plan to use the new head and Weber from my engine on the new short block. Does anyone have any experience, good or bad, with any of the companies on the net? What is a reasonable price to pay?

 

[vping]

Can't help you there. I've seen some prices and I guess they are not bad. I'm in the process myself and have already obtained the block, crank and head. $till a way$ to go!

 

[Moonie527]

Yeah, for such a little motor they sure are expensive!

 

[Hap Waldrop]

I do this for a living , so I guess I should chime in. There's alot of crappy new parts out being sold for our engine, like aluminum bearings, lifters no where as hard as they need to be, reground cams that have not been rehardened, lots of stuff that will bite you in the gazoo in short time. I build alot of MG A and B series motors, and only use the best avialable parts, tri metal bearings, billet or nitrite hardened reground cams, chilled iron lifters, etc. a stage one engine form me parts alone is about $1200.00, thats before the head, add another couple hundred dollars for new harden seats, valve springs, valves if needed, and with head reapair cost and machine work and you easliy exceed $2k, then you got to make sure the rocker assembly does nedd attention then I get about $1500 to clean everything to the tenth tenth, and assembly, so a stage one engine is about $3500. I could easliy get ot the $2700 dollar price listed on ebay, if I bought all the cheap parts and didn't put exhaust seats in the head, maybe I could even get to the guy selling them for $1500 if I took even more short cuts. In short, you get what you pay for. there was a guy over on the MGex forum, that got one of those Northwest Engines, and couldn't get it to get oil pressure. I always tell people, it always cheaper to do it right the first time than to do it half arse twice

 

[Moonie527]

Thanks for all the info. The cheapo parts were what I was worried about. Here in the middle of Iowa I'm not realsure I can find a machine shop that will know all the ins and outs of Mg engines. I figured that there has to be someone out there selling reliable rebuilt engines. I've got a new head along with the Weber setup from the previous owner and was hoping to find a reasonably priced short block somewhere.

 

[jlaird]

Nothing special about the inards on an MG engine that a machine/engine shop can not do. He will have all the specs on his computer but will like help with parts. They are not rocket science if kept under the orginal red line. Now it will not be a Hap engine but will be just fine for funning and should last for years.