I don’t expect many rednecks own MGB’s (well maybe!) but this project looks like something a redneck MGB owner might do. Does this make me a redneck? Anyway, I’ve been wanting better access to the underside of my MGB GT to finish scraping off 50 years of grunge and deal with some minor surface rust from around 50,000 miles of road sand.
As I don’t have a car lift and the MGB doesn’t have any front suspension I needed to come up with something to use without moving the car. Here’s what I did.
I first bolted a beam to the suspension locating holes in the engine bay. Using a combination of an engine crane and a power winch I raised the front of the car about 48 inches off the ground.
I built this wood support to slide under the MG. It’s 45 inches high which I figure will be enough to easily work in the areas I want to access. At this point the MG is supported from above with the winch and from below with the cradle.
I’ve now bolted to towing straps to the ceiling. These are supporting both the wood cradle and the suspension beam. Three supports from above give me confidence that the car isn’t going anywhere and the support below creates a very rigid platform.
Now it’s time to get to work. Here’s what the surface rust looks like. I expect it will come off easily with a wire brush and can then be primed and painted.
[…] this has changed however. Since I put my MGB GT up on its’ redneck car lift I have way better access to this area and proceeded to shove my head in closer and take a number of […]
Not a bad idea!
What is needed is a scantilly-clad pretty young gal in the photos to demonstrate the fine engineering of the lift.