MGB GT LE Wheels
If we pester him a bit he could get them out & we could have a club day out and may be have a look at the records as well. If he knows a mob of us would be turning up on a Saturday he might open up the archives for us.
hey guts, I have a 1979 mgble and am in midst of doing various things to make it correct. my number 1 concern is the wheels among other things can amyone tell me the proper grey color they used on the le wheels i know its not black due to the look. and how do you remove the laquer fininish without chemical burns should i use wet or dry paper and use a finer grade then polish the alum then clear coat the wheel or send it out to get media blasting what can i do james gelbman
Hi James...I'm 99% sure that the centres for the USLE were black and not grey ars the UK cars are. I'm sure that either Rob-USLE or Ken Smith will confirm this for you though..
Hi James,I've got two GT LE's and the wheel centres are black on one and dark grey on the other.Both original as far as I am aware.So I think you can probably get away with either.
If you can find a body shop to refurbish them well for reasonable money,that's what I'd do.I can tell you from experience that getting the lacquer off is not easy.I used sandpaper,because I didn't want to strip the centres.
thanks for the info my concern is basically removing the clear coat from the alum so i could polish the outer rim to expose the alum.finish and i then color the painted area. if i do this my wheels would be passible. what color grey should i use lames gelbman
If it's a decent thickness of laquer, the ali underneath isn't discoloured and there's no cracking or broken surfaces of laquer, there's nothing to stop you 800 gritting the whole wheel to give it a key, painting the inner parts and then spraying over the whole lot with another couple of coats of laquer. You only need to key the surface of the laquer to get paint to stick. If they are more severe in the way of damage to the laquer coat etc. then shotblasting the wheel clean and a re-spray is the only option really to get a good finish. Good luck.:)
thanks wheels are not really bad it is that they need refreshing ill try the 800 thenultra fine then alloy polish thanks for the info ill report in the future thanks again jame gelbman
The LE wheels on the US LE's were paited grey, unfortunately - to my knowledge - is the color number not noted.
Please find herewith a weblink to a serie of pictures of an US MGB-LE sold in Holland about three years ago with original 47/fourtyseven miles on the clock.
This car is documented in Ken Smith's book about the US-LE's and has been imported into Australia from California and remained in the used car dealer's shop till a few years ago. Then it was bough by a dutch collector and sold again via LexClassics the trader of this add.
The vin number is known, I also know the dutch registration number and spoke the owner about a year ago. The car had done under 200 miles at that time, unfortunately the owner is NOT interested in JULE or any knd of register.
In this serie of photo's are a lot of details of the USLE visable, like cocomats, MG radio/cassette (US branded & MG logo'd only) and
dealer installed airco and the wheels as they were originally.
http://www.classicargarage.com/nederlands/garages/lexclassics/carpages/2007/0907-08-det.htm
I'm looking to refurb my wheels as they are one thing letting the car down at the moment. The alloy seems to be pretty pitted so I think it'sa shot blasting job. The inserts though are definitely black but look as if they may have been repainted at some time. They were an indentical colour to a Stag I was parked next to recently. I'd like to get them back to the orginal colour but I suspect my refurbers would like to know what colour to do them in - is there a reccomended paint for the dark grey or do we know the orginial colour code ?
Incidentally I was at the Heritage Motor Centre a couple of weeks ago for the MGCC council meeting and went in search of the LEs . They've got a nice selection of Brit sports cars on the mezanine floor now but no LE 🙁 I asked and they are still in storage and there doesn't seem to be much impetus to get them out again.
Stag Wheel parked next to me
My Wheel
Hi Tim
Firstly there is a difference between the Stag and L.E. wheel (Don Hayter told me this at one of our register meetings) in that the edges of the spokes are slightly rounded rather than being at 90 degrees as the stags are-hence the different part no.
There has never been a paint code given for the original wheels, as far as I'm aware, so I think the best option is to get it from a good original wheel-mine are untouched but far from mint though hopefully someone out there with a low mileage GT will have a spare wheel which has never been fitted.;);)