At 8:02 AM 9/30/94 -0400, JWisland@aol.com wrote:
>How many non-linear people does it take to ...? ;)
Ah, time for another one of Fisher's Laws. Actually, this isn't
mine, it's been a standard in the software industry for years:
Determining Group I.Q.:
To determine the collective I.Q. of a group of people -- for example,
the people working on a hopelessly shot old British sports car -- you
find the lowest individual I.Q. in the group, then divide by the
number of people present. This is why a group possessing advanced
degrees and comprising recognized authorities on various esoteric
branches of computer science and physics can take an hour and a half to
find out that the reason the turn indicator on the dash lights up when
you step on the brake pedal is due to a bad ground connection at the tail
lights. Of course, that includes the time to determine that Duco cement
won't fix the broken Bakelite insulator that the tail lamp leads connect to,
and therefore fabricating a composite insulator using the broken halves
of the insulator and black electrical tape. I did that last part myself.
>Ah. My possible MG purchase is to replace a straight, clean, rust-free 1966
>Volvo 122S (that was "eaten" by a deer -- chomped whole front quarter,
>steering box, motor mount, et. al.) that still has a fabulous engine (Weber
>carb) & transmission.
Too bad about the carb. :-) (Though I confess I sometimes wonder what
a B18, or a B20, would do if you put a pair of Dell'Ortos on it with the
appropriate manifold. Ought to be entertaining...)
If you're fond of the 122S (and given your geographical location), you
might enjoy an MGB-GT. The level of mechanical fussiness is about
the same among the two cars, and a lot of operations are virtually
identical. The carbs are on opposite sides of their respective motors,
and a 1966 MGB-GT won't have a synchronized first gear. Key
differences will be that the B *should* feel snappier in the midrange
acceleration (due largely to having shorter wheels and therefore lower
final drive ratio) and has much sharper steering response, as well as
a lower center of gravity and less suspension travel. You'll love that
on a winding road, and be less fond of it on a bumpy one. And when
the snow falls and the wind is chill, the MGB-GT has a nice roof to
protect you from the elements.
The differences between the 1.8L pushrod four in a 122S and the 1.8L
pushrod four in an MGB are interesting, to say the least. The B18D in
my 122S is a short-stroke, oversquare motor, meaning that off-the-line
torque isn't its strong suit; combine this with the tall 15" wheels and
tires and the 122S isn't going to win many drag races across the
intersection. The B's engine is undersquare, meaning the stroke is
longer than the bore, and this corresponds to greater low-end leverage
from each piston's combustion phase. The result is that for tooling
around town, the B's engine feels more responsive -- my first comment,
on learning that the 122S is rated at 85 bhp and 2300 lbs (compared to
the MGB-GT's 92 bhp and 2300 lbs) was that either Swedish pounds are
heavier than English pounds, or Swedish horses are smaller than
English horses. Yet once the 122S reaches its stride on the freeway,
it's relatively easy to rush from 65 to 85 mph in fourth gear; that's a
characteristic of oversquare engines, which get their power from
revolutions per minute rather than from low-end torque (as well as a
characteristic of taller final drive ratios). (Ah. It may also be because
the Volvo uses HS6 carbs versus the MGB's HS4s, which are 1/4"
smaller; the larger carbs, especially with individual ports to the
valves, would flow at lower velocity at lower RPM than the smaller
carbs on the MGB. Maybe. :-)
And of course, your 122S tools will fit an MGB, which is old enough to
use SAE and modern enough not to use Whitworth. The metric system
is for people who are too feeble-minded to learn the powers of two...
--Scott "Hand me that 0x0D/0x10-inch socket for my spark plugs" Fisher
Scott Fisher
Work fisher@avistar.com Home SEFisher@AOL.com
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