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MG parts spares and accessories are available for MG T Series (TA, MG TB, MG TC, MG TD, MG TF), Magnette, MGA, Twin cam, MGB, MGBGT, MGC, MGC GT, MG Midget, Sprite and other MG models from British car spares company LBCarCo.

MG TD TF 1500 - Original TD Factory Records now available online

Just to let everyone know that the original Abingdon factory production records have finished being transcribed by our very own Roger Furneaux and that they are now available to view at:

http://www.tregister.org/factoryrecords.aspx

Enter your full chassis number and hit "Search" to display your car's record.
Some examples of the correct format in which to enter the chassis number:

TD0251
TD1234
TD/C10560

Note that a number of records were difficult to decipher (they were transcribed from a copy of the original handwritten records) so there may be a few occasions where ????? question marks are inserted.
S James

Some notes as to what the Notes field means:

===================================================================

For the TD there were two types; plain TD and TD/C, the "competition" version with bigger valves and carbs and stiffer front suspension. This latter is also called the Mark II and hence often confused with the code TD2, which formed part of the engine codes of cars produced after about chassis number 10000, and signifying a larger clutch. The TD chassis numbers are from 251 to 29915. TDs also had extra codes for export cars, EXR and EXL for RHD and LHD respectively. To this was added either "U" or , for later TDs, "LNA" for cars destined for North America.

===================================================================
S James

It appears that August 17, 1953 was the last day of production for TD's. Can anyone confirm this?
Tom Balutis

S James, I have a question for you. My car, TD20660 has one letter that I don't recognize and is not on my car. This is the letter "K" after EXR (EXRK). What is meaning of that designation?
Thank you.
Jim Merz

Jim,

The "K" means that the speedometer is calibrated in Kilometers

John
John Scragg

Wow, I had always extrapolated that my build date was 4/28/1952; now I find out that it was actually 4/24/1952. I've been celebrating the wrong date all these years!
Dave Braun

John Scragg, Merci beaucoup pour les renseignements. When I first bought the car in Nancy, it did have a speedometer calibrated in kilometers, which I still have. Now, the remaining question is why was a RHD TD in France? Maybe it was originally exported to Denmark from the factory.
Jim Merz

Wow! This confirms that my car has the original engine, as I suspected. I knew it was built in August, 1952, but did not know the exact date.

John Masters

Please pass on my heartfelt appreciation to Mr. Roger Furneaux. Truly nice to have this data saved and distributed.

I had estimated my car was built towards the end of October 1950. Information shows 1 November 1950. I now have another day to take off work for. My cars birthday.
BEC Cunha

Ahhhhh... my car was built on a Wednesday... that explains why its been such a good one!!!!
gblawson - TD#27667

Yes Gordon!

More information on the greatest day of MG production:

76 cars were produced 27610-27686. 27679 is missing.
all were EXLNA cars except 27620 and 27621. However, my car 27621 is EXLNA on the original plate.
No Mark II's were produced.

27687 was produced on 15 May 1953, no TDs were produced on the 14th?

Evan Ford - TD 27621

Great going Roger!!

Here's mine;

Chassis#: TD18213
Born on date: July 15th. 1952.
Engine#: 18508

I had also done a calculation and posted it here but cannot find it. I'd love to see if my guess if correct.

How can I seach all of my posts?
VWP Pina

Was this the post?



Posted 07 March 2005 at 19:16:29 UK time
Vinnie, NY USA, vping@optonline.net
Hello,
I purshased a 2 owner 52 TD 2 years ago & have been waiting for info pertaining to the cars history. The 2nd owner had the car starting from 1956 and after his death the car was sold by his son to me. The sellers mother is getting old & it is difficult for him at this point, to sift through her records to find the meticulous notes the father kept about the car. I will get them as soon as he can get them from his mother.
Is there any other way to find out the history of this car?
Is there anyway to find out how she left the assembly line?
I know that you cannot obtain a BH cert on it.

I will be planning a restoration once my finances get a bit better but I am doing as much reading & learning as I can for now.

Thanks
Vinnie


Posted 07 March 2005 at 20:41:23 UK time
D F Sexton, Tennessee, USA, dennisfsexton@aol.com
Vinnie, you can got to the Original MGTD website and look up the factory production numbers. This will give you the month of production and a little guess-timating will give you the approximate day of the month your car rolled out. As for actual details of your car it should be pretty easy to determine the exterior/interior. A copy of Clausangers Original MGTD should then give you the timeline for the other details on the car so you can determine any changes which may have been made.
http://www.british-cars.org.uk/kimber/mgtd/index.html
Plenty of folks here who can help with other questions on the details -- and we all, always agree.
Welcome aboard,
Dennis


Posted 08 March 2005 at 18:44:44 UK time
Vinnie, NY, vping@optonline,net
Thanks. I have been to the site before but I guess I did not look hard enough. Tons of information. I have to go home & get the number off of the car to look it up.
Still need to contact the owner & see if he has found anything.
Vinnie


Posted 08 March 2005 at 19:41:25 UK time
D.G.J. Herwegh, Netherlands
Vinnie,
Have my TD since July last year and I'm still reading and learning about it: restoration will start the moment my 1963 midget is finished. It's also made in 1952 and has the chassis number TD 19009 (engine number = XPAG/TD2/19352 and body number = 18361/92758). This was the most productive year in MG TD production with 10.838 being built. 9.009 went for export to the USA. Now if you use the production list on Chris Couper's splendid web site in an imaginative way you can quite accurately determine when your car was built. The year started with number 12578 and ended with chassis number 23644. If you divide 10838 by 264 (working days per year) you get approx. 41 cars built per day !!! If you know the chassis number of your own car its easy to figure out when it was built. With my car I came around the end of August. Definitive proof I got when I found an original label, stuck for 52 years between door panel and door frame, with the body number on it and a stamp reading "20 AUG 1952". Probably this was some label used in the upholstery department indicating that my red upholstery kit was to be placed in body number 92758. Shortly afterwards, this body was placed on a chassis on the Abingdon production line. What's also interesting is that if they made 41 cars per day this means that every fifteen minutes a TD rolled of the production line!!! (I think that a ten hour working day was normal then). Also interesting in Chris Couper's table is that between July 25th and August 11th of that year, no cars were made: the annual holliday or a shutdown of the production line for maintenance work ??
Good luck with the research on your apparently very original TD !!
Nick, 52TD/63Midget.


Posted 09 March 2005 at 00:05:27 UK time
Vinnie, NY, vping@optonline.net
The informatoin I have gathered is this. Based on the math supplied by Dennis, my car was produced on 7/16/52.
I lokked up a 1952 calendar & I used excel to help me out.

Date First Last
15th. 18156 18196
16th. 18197 18237
17th. 18238 18278
18th. 18279 18319
19th. 18320 18360
20th. 18361 18401
21st. 18402 18442
22nd. 18443 18483
23rd. 18484 18524
24th. 18525 18565
25th. 18566 18606

The company closed from Friday July 25th. to Monday August 11th. for an annual holiday. I calculated backwards.

My 1952 TD is:
Chassis number 18213
Body number - 17533/91805
Engine number - 18505

I understand this is an approximation and I believe there is somewhere in England I can contact to find out more.

Vinnie


Dallas Congleton

Wow, this is great. I was able to confirm my car still has the original engine! What a tremendous sevice you have provided Roger - many thanks.

Don Scott
TD18337
July 18, 1952
don scott

Hmm, this brings up another question.

My car has a replacement engine (and they replaced the chassis plate for the chassis which matches the engine, however the chassis rail gives me the true #).

Anyway, when I put in the chassis rail #, I get the following:

Chassis No. TD12984
Original Engine No. XPAG/TD2/LHX1346

This is kind of strange... From what I understand, usually engine #s are "about" 500 more than the chassis #. But, in this case (unless the final digit was dropped), the engine # is only 4 digits for a 5-digit car, and there is the LHX in front.

Can anyone explain this?

Thanks,
Scott
Scott

I see that LHX was sometimes put on engines destined for export. So that is one thing.

I should also state that the VIN for the car is based on the engine # (some states did that), and that the VIN for my TD is 13469. So it appears that the VIN plate on the engine is what one would expect given the numbering system that MG used, so the factory record as shown in the tregister listing is incorrect...

Scott
Scott

Yes that is the post. WOW I missed it by a day. My guess was the 16th and it turns out it was the 15th. A Tuesday.

How'd ya find that thread so fast?
VWP Pina

At last !
Finally we have some "official" information regarding the built date of our cars. Thanks Roger and the MGT Register.
But I'm wondering if the date mentioned is the actual built date or the date of despatch ?
The reason I'm asking is that I have some BMIHT production trace records for both my Midget and MGB and these give a built date of two or three days with the date of despatch usually one day later...
Did it take only one day to assemble a complete TD ?
Cheers,

Nick, 52TD/63Midget/74MGB
Nick

Good old 'assembly lines'... 40 +- a day. I would think the date is the 'sign off' date... the 'out the door' date!
gblawson - TD#27667

Is the same information available for TFs?
Ron Coates

I just noticed a typo from my old post. My engine # is 18508. Is there a way to edit old posts?
VWP Pina

Scott.

I have discovered that a number of cars in the TD12200 to 13999 seem to have only the first 4 digits of the engine number listed.

eg. Ellis Carlton's TD13442 has as engine number XPAG/TD2/LHX 1390

checking 13440 to 13499 you get 1394, 1390, 1390,1399,1399,1399,
1399,1398,1408 etc. The 14000's are OK

somehow the last digit was either a) not recorded
or b) not readable in the hand written record
or c) not transcribed in the monumental task
of recreating the record from hand notes

We can only hope some resolution is in the works


Don Harmer

Great work Roger
My car was built on Friday,hav worked in production, I dont know if this is good or bad. After this many years, who cares.
John Shoemaker

What a terrific site! Big thanks to Roger Furneaux. I've just purchased my first TD:

TD/27890
Engine # XPAGTD2/28255

And already I know that the engine is correct and the car was built on May 21, 1953.

Cheers,
Allen
Allen Bachelder

Congrats Allen...and welcome back to the wonderfull world of T series...!!!!
gblawson - TD#27667

Nice work, Roger - I'm May 26th/53. Jim M: Want to sell/swap your kilometric speedometer?

Also: It's good to have the info - now does anyone know how we can get hold of original paint info? My records start at 1966, and I think by then my car had already gone through two or three paint jobs. Is there a way to get it other than the British Heritage Trust certificate?

Jim: I'm serious about your kiometric speedo and either buying it or swapping my working MPH unit! Contact me at:

djorgensATtelusplanetDOTnet

Best,
Dave J.
Dave Jorgensen

Ron Coates,

The TC and TF data have been available since the Register site was posted since the original factory data was available.

The TD data was destroyed by fire and Roger has painfully reconstructed it from hand written notes, a major task!!!

Don Harmer

Dave J. I want to keep my original speedometer just because it was in the car as new. However, I have a suggestion for you. John Marks at Heritage Restorations in England will probably convert yours to whatever configuration you need. He has reworked both of mine over the years and does the best work I have seen. His wife Monica will probably answer your email quite quickly.
instruments@vintagerestorations.com
Jim Merz

Vinnie,
Our TD 18283 was made just 2 days after yours,,,
July 17, '52,,

SPW
Steve Wincze

Now this IS interesting... if I look up the three serial numbers of my TDs, and then work "earlier" and "later" serial numbers to find out how many cars were built on each of those three days (1 Mar 1950 for TD0844; 8 Jun 1950 for TD1951; and 22 Aug 1951 for TD9655), I find that:

TD0844 = 6th car built that day;
TD1951 = 6th car built that day;
TD9655 = 16th car built that day.

That would indicate that all were built before "lunch hour"!

JB
Jeff Brown

For those not already aware. Roger Furneaux runs a service called "Mad Metrics" a source of every nut and bolt, ever attached to a T-Series, and some not!

Included in the 'not' category, is a very useful magnetic sump plug, the only one that I know of, for the TC-TD-TF. I have one that I installed with my rebuild a few years ago, and was staggered to see what was stuck to it the first time I changed my oil! I think I paid £5 + £1 for shipping.

We can all show our appreciation to Roger by doing a little biz with him.
http://www.Roger.46TC@virgin.net.

Gord Clark
Rockburn, Qué.

Gordon A. Clark

Adding my appreciation to that of others to the T Register, I have typed in my chassis no. - TD 28584, and find to my amazement the indication that my TD, which I believe to have been in Aust. all its life, is supposedly a LHD American car! I wonder how this can be - anyone else have the same experience? It shows no signs of any conversion from L to RHD. Would it have gone to the states first, been converted from new and then sent down to Australia? I look forward to anyone's advice. Kind regards, John Hall.
John Hall

Well... 28557 was RHD and in the UK... 28063 was USA and 28625 is Canadian... Try a few numbers on each side of yours and see where they went?
gblawson - TD#27667

Gordon A. Clark I would to contact Roger Furneaux but I can not get the link to work.. thanks
MGrogan

As far as I know, Roger doesn't have a web-site. This is his e-mail addr.

Gord Clark
Rockburn, Qué.
Gordon A. Clark

Gord,

Not quite... The correct e-mail address appears to be: Roger.46TC@virgin.net

Larry
Larry Shoer

Here's a July 2005 link to parts Roger Furneaux indicates he can provide and pricing.

http://www.mgcars.org.uk/mgccy/pdf/madmetriclt.pdf

Larry
Larry Shoer

This thread was discussed between 22/02/2007 and 11/03/2007

MG TD TF 1500 index

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