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MG TD TF 1500 - Hammer and nails on my TD

The first time I worked with a hammer and nails on my car. Weird feeling, but you get used to it somehow.
I had the same problem with the bonnet to cowl rubber as many of you had before - wrong shape of the round lip. In addition, it was stapled to the wood with normal length stapes (those you would find in the satper on your desk), which means it was basically held in place by friction and the bonnet when closed.
Cutting the lip to shape worked amazingly well, thanks to the collective wisdom found here I knew what to do and how to do it. Probably would not have attempted it otherwise.

Rgds, Mike


Hereīs a picture of the profile before:

Mike Fritsch

Now it is nicely fixed with black nails as described in the archives and various restauration pages.
I could not get 3/4" nails, so had to work with 14mm which is approx. 5/8", but it worked fine.
The wood is hard enough so that the nails sit tight, which gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling about the rest of the woodwork...
The delta in height between the wood and the cowl was quite big in places (over 10mm) so that the rubber is not flat on the wood rim towards the corner, but that does not seem to be a problem, at least itīs not not visible.

Rgds, Mike

Hereīs the profile after cutting


Mike Fritsch

Hi Mike,

last picture seems to be wrong?
Bela

Looks good to me Bela.

Gene
Gene Gillam

You can buy a copy of the original rubber from Brown & Gammons, looks like you have a Moss rubber. The Moss V groove rubber is a PITA to install and it will never look as original. Jan shows the original profile from B&G, which is also thinner. JMHO. PJ

Paul161

I did consider a thinner profile that happened to be on ebay, but given the height difference between wood and cowl I suspected I would have to fill that up with another flat strip. So I tried first if cutting to shape worked -it did- then did a fitting test. The profile strength worked well for the gap, so I decided to go with it. Put it on the central heating for a few hrs before fitting, that helped.
Rgds Mike

Mike Fritsch

Mike points out that some of the steps between the cowl and rubber are different and the B&G would be too thin for my car too.

I wonder if this might be why Al Moss made the original one so deep and angled?

And yes, it's a PITA and a two person job.
Christopher Couper

I guess I was fortunate that the one from B&G fit perfectly on my car. I bought one with the V grove from Moss first and couldn't get it to lay right, of course I didn't nail it down but put it back in the bag and ordered one form B&G. That was a good move, as it laid down without any force and looks nice. I could see if the outer wood strip is slightly higher or lower on the scuttle it could make a big difference in fit. PJ
Paul161

This thread was discussed between 29/03/2016 and 02/04/2016

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