MG-Cars.info

Welcome to our Site for MG, Triumph and Austin-Healey Car Information.

Parts

MG parts spares and accessories are available for MG T Series (TA, MG TB, MG TC, MG TD, MG TF), Magnette, MGA, Twin cam, MGB, MGBGT, MGC, MGC GT, MG Midget, Sprite and other MG models from British car spares company LBCarCo.

MG MG Y Type - Guarantee Plate Mystery

Dear friends,

I have removed the Guarantee Plate of my 1951 YA in order to inspect it more closely for authenticity. I have scanned it at a high resolution and posted it here: http://www.vaq.qc.ca/vaq/001.jpg

In reality, it is not dark. It is a very shiny chrome plate. The darkness is an illusion created by the scanner. I have scraped it with a file and it is brass underneath.

Every letter and inscription is embossed. There are no raised letters or lines.

There remains absolutely no black paint in the embossed letters. In fact, if ever there was some at one point, a close examination of the plate seems to suggest that it was lightly re-plated at least 20 years ago. There is some very light surface pitting of the chrome.

The serial numbers are not neatly stamped in a very symetrical fashion.

My question is: In your opinions, is this likely a real 1951 Guarantee Plate or a later reproduction?

In your deliberations, please do not be distracted by the odd 4 digit engine serial number. Focus on the look of the plate and it's texture.
Gilles Bachand

Looks OK - my YB has one and its chrome has worn through in places like yours.
D MULLEN

On page 225 of "Let there be Y's" this plate is identified as "Type 3". And it looks very authentic to me. As there are 3 types of plates I think it is very unlikely for someone to reproduce this type of plate.
The stamped (XPAG f.i.) letters are also in exactly the correct typeface; there is NO chance to get that exactly right in a reproduction?
Willem vd Veer

How interesting, Gilles.... without my copy of "Let there be Y's" to hand, I can only agree with Willem that the plate looks authentic. But there is one thing that caught my attention: the chassis and engine numbers don't appear to match - in the sense that they probably weren't issued together at the time of manufacture.

While we all know, from John Lawson's work, that the chassis and engine numbers didn't move exactly in step with each other during production, I can tell you that my car, Y6814, built in April 1951 (we know this from the Lucas parts dating), had as its original engine number XPAG/SC/16696. So I would expect your car, built a month or two earlier than mine, to have an engine number at least somewhere in the high 15000s or low 16000s. (Engine number 3325 would have been issued sometime in 1948 or 1949, following this logic - I can't recall how or indeed whether the numbers for XPAG/TC and TD combined with the series for XPAG/SC).

An engine this early would have the early design of oil pump and pipework, so should be easy to spot - but I defer to other experts in our community here? Perhaps your guarantee plate was changed to reflect a later change of engine? Maybe the car carries other clues to its history?
Tim Griggs

Tim,
I have just returned from Ireland with Y6641, the car requires full restoration and has no guarantee plate, however the engine number is 16608. So it is probably the original engine by your reckoning. The car was originally a CNK(complete knocked down car) sent to Ireland in boxes to be built there under licence in 1951. The strange thing is that the chassis is stamped with chassis no 6641 in the correct place but has no Y stamped adjacent.

Does anyone have any knowledge of other cars with no Y stamped adjacent chassis number.

Kind regards Chris
Chris Pick

All right then. Here is why I wished to ascertain if my Guarantee Plate was original and dated from 1951. A few months ago, I sent all the information Paul requested for his databank. He immediately spotted the odd serial number on my car as not being in the proper range of numbers which would have been used on the Y assembly line around the time my car would have been assembled (my Y was commisioned on 15/02/1951).

He then called upon Neil Cairns to give his opinion. Mr Cairns said: «I suspect the engine went into an early Y on the production line, blew up and was returned to Morris Motors for rebuild. Some of them blew up-re built- up to three times before they eventually went out of the factory, (look at the ledger records). Also, it could have gone out OK but come back in under warranty. A new engine would be put into that car. Then the engine rebuilt and put back into the production line as 'new' MG was a business, they would not waste a good engine. If, under the inspection process a cylinder bore was found faulty, it would be re-bored and a 'new engine' would go out with +20 thou pistons; same with crankshafts. All car manufacturers did this.»

I then undertook to locate my engine's serial number disk (see attached photograph). It clearly shows that the original type was «XPAG-TD» but that the «TD» was subsequently stamped over with the letters «SC».

If my Guarantee Plate is original, this would corroborate the possibility that this engine was originally destined to be installed in a TD in the fall of 1950, but was taken out of that assembly line to be refurbished and then re-routed to the Y assembly line a couple of months later.

This would not only prove the practice explained by Mr Cairns, but would even suggest that refurbished engines could be put back in another assembly line which used the very same engine type. All this would legitimate my engine as an original installation at the factory, rather than at some later stage someone simply re-engined my car with a TD engine.

Gilles Bachand

Gilles..
Try and scrape the paint off the block just above the brass disc. The serial number of the engine was stamped into the block itself.
Sandy
ss sanders

Re Chris Pick's comment about the proximity of the Y on the chassis front dumb iron, Chris these were stamped by hand at the factory when the chassis was fabricated. This was not an especially skilled operation and was not done with the fine precision of modern laser equipment. Sometimes the number is the right way up, sometimes upside down. Sometimes the Y is close ... sometimes I wonder if the guy had just come back from a break and sniffed the air outside the paint booth in rectification as it isnt even close or in the same orientation! The actual area of the stamp wanders about in absolute position from one chassis to another so although there was a general "landing zone" it was pretty hit and miss if it got there.

Enjoy your car though.

Paul
Paul Barrow

Sandy, I scraped the paint right above the disk and the number is effectively the same: 3325
Gilles Bachand

Hi

On looking at Gille's photograph, I realised the raised portion of the casdting (probably at the r/h front section of the engine block. To me this seems to be a "modern type" block with the new type oil-pump. My YT and early TD, both have these brass tags fitted to the l/h rear section of the block - just in front of the bell housing. What you all think .....

Kind regards
Anton
Anton Piller


Friends

Am I right with my assumption, regarding the two different possitions used, for fastening th engine identification plate?

Anton
Anton Piller

my car is a 1 owner form new and not 1 of the numbers are following
chassis yb 1381
engine 18295
body 1204
nuffield no 12592
i hope this of some help
roy
r m dockery

This thread was discussed between 12/12/2010 and 08/04/2011

MG MG Y Type index

This thread is from the archives. Join the live MG MG Y Type BBS now