Did you know...?
  The prototype TF had louvers in the bonnet. For reasons unexplained this was not carried through with production cars.
  The only wax a TF owner should use is carnuba wax. Why? A car owner wants three factors apparent in the car's paint. These are colour, depth and clarity. Of these, clarity is the most important. Without it you get hazing. Hazing is caused by
silicones, synthetic waxes and paint sealants. Carnuba wax will give the best results in all three - colour, depth and clarity.
 The dash color of the TF is never the same color as the car's exterior or interior color. I mean the color is different from either the body or interior color. Specifically, this is the dash area surrounding the instruments which includes the glove boxes. There were two colors, an orange colored red and a blue tinted green. I have an example of each and if someone has a digital camera, we could then show the actual colors.

Additionally, I seem to recall that two body colors could have either dash color depending on the interior, Black and Ivory. The color code being "A" and "P" in the VIN number. I have seen both red and green interiors with these exterior colors. Another interior color is tan which could have either red or green depending on the exterior color. I have not seen any red with tan/biscuit interior combinations originally but it's very popular today
RE: Production dates
hi there - I am probably going to have to repeat this every few months or
so, since new folk are joining all the time and others don't keep all the
old List postings, so here goes:

The only T-type records still existing from Abingdon are the production line
"build sheets", which list the chassis nos. with prefixes (e.g. HDC for a
TF) or suffixes (e.g. EXU) where appropriate, the engine fitted (which in a
few cases was changed, maybe after the test run; every  car was test-driven
around a fixed route) and the date.
NO other records, such as from the service department, exist (apart from
almost 40 years of T-Register history, now all computerised).

The good news is that all these records are owned by the M.G.C.C. and are
now safely bound into volumes and locked away.  Working copies are held by
the Club and by myself: all the TA, TB, TC & TF are in our database, the TDs
are being entered now (a mammoth task!).

Heritage at Gaydon do not have any records pre-55, but the other good news
(as mentioned here many times) is that the T-Register has reproduced the
original factory guarantee sheets on which I type the info mentioned above,
and which cost a lot less than a Heritage sheet (US $10 or GBP 6 inc.
postage)
ocTagonally   TCRoger
Furneaux, Roger  E-mail Address(es):  roger.46tc@virgin.net
 
Tuning the Head of a T type Engine
If you have the head removed from your TF engine or are contemplating such a procedure you should read/study 'Tuning the Head of a T type Engine' pages 17 - 32 in the June issue of the Sacred Octagon. This is an excellent article that answered many questions I had about head reconstruction.
 In a new publication 'North American CLASSIC MG' (issue Number 3, Summer 2001) there is an interesting article "Virgin Rear-end Conversion'. This article is a must for any TF owner who is thinking about an MGA differential conversion. It is good in that it guides you through the process step by step with great pictures which show each step.

This article is a good tie-in with Ben Prince's articles on gear ratios found under Submitted Articles on this website.
Sports Coil
Many TF owners use a ports coil in their ignition system. The use of the sports coil with 40,000 volts output gives more starting power and better performance at higher rpm.

The old Lucas coil that comes with the TF from the factory had 12,000 volt output.  Using the Lucas coil a person could check to see if a spark plug was firing by holding the spark plug wire nut a short distance from the spark plug. You know the procedure - holding the nut close to the plug you would see an arc (spark). Holding the nut farther away the engine would stumble. This indicates that there is not a problem with that cylinder.

If you try to do the preceeding test using the sports coil, you will damage parts of the ignition system. Those 40,000 volts will find a way to ground. In a friend's experience,  this procedure caused a small hole in the rotor. Sometimes this hole is difficult to see. It could also damage the plug wire. In the case of the rotor, the engine would not start.

Take care! Sports coils are stong medicine.

Safety Fast,  Art
   Dave DuBois, in the Bonnet - NWT Register publication, gives us a good tip on changing from the old DOT 4 brake fluid to silicone brake fluid. One writer told how "he purged the braking system of the old DOT 4 fluid by putting silicone fluid in the master cylinder and then proceeded to bleed each wheel cylinder (while keeping the master cylinder filled), until all of the old fluid was expunged." Dave tells us that "this method will not work with the T series brake system, since the bleeders on the T series cars only bleed the lines and not the cylinders. One has to remove the wheel cylinders and clean all of the old fluid out of them, fill them with silicone fluid and then reattach them. Any of the old fluid left in the system will not combine with the silicone fluid, but will coexist peacefully with it. The problem with this is that the old fluid will continue to absorb moisture and that will somewhat offset the advantage of the silicones fluid's keeping corrosion at bay."
What is a "Heritage Certificate"?
This is a certificate of authenticity that you can get from the British Motor Heritage Center in Gaydon, England. They have most of the original production records for the British sportscars of old and for $50.00 (can do it on-line) they will issue a Certificate for your car listing the build date, date of shipment, where or who it was shipped to, all of the original vehicle numbers, colors, trim, and accessories.... It's just a neat thing to have for your car. Sometimes it is very surprising to find some of the information...for instance it may have been shipped new to someone in France originally, etc. Just enter something like www.heritage.org.uk and you will find it. Quite easy!
     Contributed by Richard Pilczuk
There is an excellent TF story in the November 2002 issue of Road & Track. You can find the story on pages 122-125.