We had two guests at this meeting. Brian Hite who drove his Spitfire and James Robinson who is from Johnson City. Brian drops in on us occasionally and we enjoy seeing the younger crowd.

President Richard Williams greeted everyone and went right to business at this meeting as there was lots of ground to cover. The web site was discussed (see above for URL address) and the few messages on the guest book as well as the fact that the site seems to get lots of "hits" from everywhere. There is steady progress being made with that site and it is a credit to the club, thanks to Tom Buchanan who works very hard at that.

Our next meeting, on 11 March, will see us traveling to Church Hill, TN. We'll meet at Rush Street as usual, but earlier this time at 6:30 PM. We will leave Rush Street by 7:30 and travel to D&D Rod and Custom Shop. James Childress promises that this will be a real blast, so come out and see for yourself. Remember the change in the time schedule to 6:30.

President Williams noted that May 1 was the date for the Townsend car Show, an event that our club members have enjoyed in the past and asked who might be planning to go this early. There was a large show of hands. It seems like there is a lot of cabin fever going around!

The program tonight was a longish but very good video on the MGB from the "Legends of Motorsport" television series that was supplied by Bud Shinall. Beginning with EX-182, the MGA prototype, and continuing through the MGB series of cars, the program was excellent.

When the time came to design a successor to the MGA, that chassis was determined to be too limiting for the design of the new car, so a monocoque chassis/tub was chosen as the basis for the MGB design.

Some of the more interesting details from this production:
* Originally, a V-4 engine was discussed, but management opted for the 1798 cc engine already existing.
* The rear suspension was tried unsuccessfully with panhard rods, trailing arms worked well but were too expensive, so the traditional leaf springs were used as the last resort at the rear.
* The MGB engine bay was designed to accommodate a 6 cylinder engine to become the ultimate replacement for the Big Healey.

You missed a really good meeting if you didn't get there.

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