Mg Midget 1275 suspension & wheels

Mg Midget 1275 suspension & wheels

Author
Discussion

pablouk79

Original Poster:

11 posts

231 months

Thursday 25th August 2005
quotequote all
I have a 1973 1275 Mg Midget which is a great car and a joy to drive.
Ive been looking into ways of improving the performance and feel that before doing this I should uprate the suspension and wheels.

Any suggestions ?

Thank you

ajy102

11 posts

235 months

Thursday 25th August 2005
quotequote all
I have heard about the Spax suspension upgrade that replaces your shocks on the front and the leaf springs on the rear but am unsure about prices or amount of work required. well worth going for though, good luck.

Liteweight

55 posts

245 months

Thursday 25th August 2005
quotequote all
Have to admit funds have stopped me trying most of the suspension upgrades out there but i have looked into the pros and cons of most. The main problems with the midget suspension are front end stability and rear end lateral movement both combined with bad damping. The front lever arm dampers comprise of a single arm that flexes heavily under even normal driving conditions which is to the detriment of steering and braking. There are several options including the addition of a bracing bar to triangulate the lever arm (usually used if historic racing regs are being followed) and the replecement of the original dampers with modern telescopic dampers. Frontline Spridget do such a kit which incorporates 2 degrees of negative camber and progressive rebound and bound dampers. From all accounts it's an excellent system that simply bolts onto the car (No cutting etc is always good). At the rear there are various telescopic damper conversions any of which will improve on the original system. If your engine is standard then anti tramp bars or frontlines RTL system are not really needed but are still worth considering if future engine upgrades are on the cards.

As for wheels i'm currently running a set of frontline 14in minilite style wheels. However I have found they limit the amount you can lower the car and the fact that they have such big rubber (185's on a 60hp midget!) that the car has lost some of it's original charm and character. If doing it again I would go for a 13in wheel running 165 tyres unless huge power upgrades were being planned.

Hope this helps

boredpilot

478 posts

245 months

Thursday 25th August 2005
quotequote all
OK ill scratch my head and give you some answers

Ok rear suspension

Hear is the cheap way of doing this

OK rather than buying a spax kit at 200 or what ever the price has got to now if you look at under the car at the rear you can affix one end of the shock to the bottom plate that holds your U bolts and axle on it. All you need to do is turn the plate upside down and hey presto you have a mounting nut on the side you need (Dont forget you will have taken the old damper unit off) and bolt the top end of the shock to where the damper was at the top (Again you will just use the plate the damper was on) The actual spax conversion uses a plate very similar to the one that holds the U bolts. Exception it that that was it has a welded bolt in the hole.
Again it has a custom plate at the top (Looking very similar to the plate that the old damper was on, starting to catch my drift on charging you money for stuff you actually have)

Wheels, well mine are standard wire weels. Tyres are 155 R70 so that little bit wider but not too much that the backend is stearing.

Then you could go mad and turbo charge it see link
http://turbocharged-midget.tripod.com/index.html
Ive included pics of mine and the others mad enough. Also some 3d max images of the plenum chamber, pipework, carb, fuel regulator, turbo and boost valve so that you wouldnt get lost on the pluming.

There are even the dimensions to the custom plenum chamber I made so that I could keep my original bonnet and not give away the fact it wasnt standard.

If yours is a standard 73 then you might want to consider improving the gearbox if you was to increase its performance since the 4 speed is a little on the breakable side

pablouk79

Original Poster:

11 posts

231 months

Saturday 27th August 2005
quotequote all
Sorry it took me a few days to reply, Ive been away. Ive definitely got some ideas now so thank you for your feedback!!