Never buy an engine from ebay and someone you don't know were the words echoing in my head as I handed over my hard earned.....
Anyway the story is BMC 1800 engine (Marina, MGB etc.) for sale on Ebay. It had an almost unbelievable spec with a Vulcan gas flowed head, Piper camshaft etc etc and had never been run since its rebuild. Of course I smelt a rat particularly as it had had a quick blow over with black paint. Anyway - I persued it and the story had a certain ring of truth. Advertised by an older, and and possibly a bit naive, guy. He had purchased it for his MGB but then found it was originally from a Marina TC and wouldn't fit. The crankshaft spigot bearing is much smaller for a Marina. So he decided to sell it on Ebay and, not suprisingly as it wouldn't easily fit an MGB, hadn't had a lot of interest. So a bit of negotiation ending up in a price that was far less than what just the head was worth and the engine was mine. He even delivered it.
Today I couldn't resist any longer and started the checking process. The plan is to dismantle and re-assemble it anyway not trusing work that someone else has done. An engine built to this spec should have certain features, double valve springs, duplex timing chain etc. And I am pleased to say it all looks good so far!
The head has clearly had a lot of work - you can see the porting through intlet and exhaust ports.
engine4 by
Robin Martin, on Flickr
engine3 by
Robin Martin, on Flickr
And it has the requisite double valve springs and duplex timing chain.
engine2 by
Robin Martin, on Flickr
engine1 by
Robin Martin, on Flickr
The next step is to get it on to the engine stand and pull it apart a bit more. But so far looking good.....
Cheers, Robin