A+ in line

[Blue Marlin]

Hi Guys,
not strictly a Maestro owner, however involved in historic motorsport and keeping classic A series on the road.

I have become the proud owner of a brand new 1300 maestro engine and gearbox, the intention is to replace the marina 1300 engine in my trials car with the maestro unit, however on seperating the VW gearbox and differential from the engine (this is brand new and will be up for sale, so if anybody is interested drop me a line (exhaust and inlet manifolds aswell)) there appear to be fundemental differences and the Marina fly wheel doesnt just bolt on, the adaptor plate is different etc. Now, knowing BL there must be an interchangeable back plate, fly wheel etc that would have allowed the engine to fit a standard in line configuration. Would the Sherpa be a starting point?

Does anybody have any idea's?

Cheers

Chris

[mgdavid]

I would ask the guys on the Midget section of the BBS here:-
http://www2.mgcars.org.uk/cgi-bin/gen5?runprog=mgbbs

[Jack]

I thought the FWD and RWD a-series engines had differnces to the block, making them unusable in the other format.

[e692wtt]

If memory serves, what Jack says about the blocks being different between transverse and longitudinal installations is also stated by David Vizard (A-Series Tuning Guru), and as you've noticed the crankshaft ends are different too.

Sadly I think you'll have your work cut out on this one unless you get custom parts made, have a friendly machine shop or meet someone with an obsession with BLMC/BMC/ARG parts who will be able to tell you where to look :( . I'd second what mgdavid said about having a look on the Midget part of the MGBBS Forum though :thumbup: .

Welcome to the Forums, by the way :) .

[Jack]

You could always recondition your current block / crankshaft and then fit all the nice new stuff from the engine you have onto / into that.

More work than you wanted perhaps?

[Simon]

The block from a Maestro 1.3 is the same basic idea as the RWD application. Metro/Mini blocks are different because of the in-sump gearbox fitted to those. I'd say that all you'd need to do is change the end plate, sump, manifolding and crank to suit your application...or I could be wrong.