SUCHAK wrote:
> In my humble opinion, I prefer the Spit... I just like the idea of a
> real frame versus unibody. It's a purely emotional thing I'm sure, and
> I have no doubts that there are plenty of people who will weigh in on
> the unibody side (Trevor???)
If the cars are in new or frame up restored shape, it doesn't really
matter.
However, when the cars start to be less than brand new, a few
things start to make the unibody construction favourable.
It seems to take a lot less rusting to make a framed LBC dangerously
weak than a unibodied one. This is greatly aided by the fact that
a lot of early unibodies (such as my 58 Magnette) are HORRIBLY
overbuilt. Bs fall into that category as well, I've seen shells where
much more metal was missing than was present, and the car
was still together and driving.
Another factor is that older framed LBCs tend to suffer from the
"bucket of bolts" sound when you hit potholes. There are a whole lot
of panels on a framed car that are connected with bolts and buffered
with rubber, neither of which survive well. With unibody cars, all
the metal is connected so there is much less to work it's way
loose.
> Also, spits are amazingly cheap, I've bought *nice* parts cars for just
> a couple of hundred dollars
I think you have to give this one to the B, simply because of
volume. A half million Bs were made and the survival rate seems
higher than spits. This means more usable B parts cars in junkyards,
and more incentive for vendors to remanufacturer rarer bits.
It's a tough call on which to restore though.
--
Trevor Boicey, Ottawa, Canada.
tboicey@brit.ca, http://www.brit.ca/~tboicey/
[ Seeking some miscellaneous MG parts, see the list on the web page... ]
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