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MG MGB Technical - Engine and gear box removal

In the past I have never been happy that the white plastic cup around the bottom of the gear stick has been properly seated in the ring it engages in. I have found that this is almost impossible to see if you install the gear lever once the box is in the car.

So when I was taking the engine an box out I thought I would try to do it with the gear stick still in place. The plan was that if I could get it out that way it would go back in that way. This would enable me to see if it was fitted right first.

Anyway, I failed. Even using a proper engine crane and a leveler on full tip I could not get sufficient an angle to get the combo out without removing the gear stick. This was a great disapointment. Then a 2012 calender came full of MGB pictures. Some of them taken on the factory production line. One of the pictures showed the engine and gearbox assembly by the line waiting to go in the car. The gear stick was missing.

If the factory put the stick in afterwards I can put up with doing so as well.

Has anyone got a trick for getting the plasic cup in correctly? It has a split so you can get it over the small ball on the bottom of the stick. The snug fit in the ring it goes into would stop the split opening once installed. However, due to the free movement on the stick I suspect the plastic cup gets pushed upwards past the small ball during installation.
David Witham

Can't remember a split in the one I bought, but it was many years ago. I tried fitting the bush to the gearbox rod first but inserting the cabin lever simply pushed the bush out. So I fitted it to the ball on the cabin lever first, but that expanded it and it then wouldn't go in the gearbox rod. I had to chamfer the bottom of the bush to get it in, and it's been fine ever since which has got to be getting on for 80k.

You can certainly feel if it is in right, without the bush when in gear the cabin lever flaps about quite a bit. With the bush and in gear the cabin lever has no free play.
PaulH Solihull

I just happen to have my gearlever on the bench at the moment and there is a split in the bush.

Dave O'Neill2

I'm going way out on a limb here and guessing that the shift bushings, available today, aren't quite identical to the original ones fitted at the factory. The new ones are close to being the same size as the originals, but they almost always require some tweaking to get them to easily slide into the shifter mechanism at the top of the transmission. It's a minor inconvenience and something that we can live with. RAY
rjm RAY

The nylon bush on mine is original and looks just like the one in Dave's photo. At first I thought it was broken but on closer examination it looks like it was manufactured with a split.
Brian Shaw

This thread was discussed on 28/12/2011

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