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MG Midget and Sprite Technical - Moto Lita steering wheel - early small boss on eba

14" Moto-Lita steering wheel & Boss for Mark 1 midget & Mark 2 Sprite

Ebay item number 121066001951

If anyone wants a 14" wood rim wheel this might interest you as it is the rare early small boss wheel that will take the original horn push - like the Sprite Lightning flash. If you want it but have a later car (later steering column it's possible to have the boss drilled and re-broached.
Daniel Stapleton

Cheers Daniel, I'm after a wheel for my Mk1, a spare really so I can look after the original. Am I right in saying that there are only two column spline sizes for all the Midgets? Early ones from Mk1 up to 71 ish then the later ones? Or are there other sizes?
John Payne

I have one of these in the garage loft that I obtained soon after I purchased my Midget 15 years ago. It came with a plain aluminium boss. I like the small diameter centre. When I came to fit it to my '69 car I realised the bore of the boss was smaller than the column on my car. I investigated having the bore recut which was easily achievable but I seem to remember problems associated with differences to the centre horn push arrangements and, maybe, the steering column shroud. Having decided that originality was important (or an excuse!) I gave up. How feasible is it to fit a small bore boss/wheel to a later car? I may have got over my originality concern as I think the smaller diameter wheel would make driving more comfortable and it is a period addition. I posted on here at the time but I cannot find it in the archive.
Ray Rowsell

Interesting that the seller has been a member for 7 years and yet has a feedback number of 0.
Greg H

would it fit a frogeye?
frogeye Gary

Mmm I thought there was a book with this stuff but maybe that section needs revising?

I fitted the small boss wheel to my 69 which has the later steering column. I did this by buying a small boss for a Triumph from Moto-Lita and modifying it. I had it drilled out and re-broached to the later spline. I also had it shortened by an inch because a long time ago I'd had the steering column shortened by an inch. The shroud was already modified on my car to suit the previous wheel and boss - shortened to match the column etc (this IS in the book). The horn push was a direct fit and the simplest part of the job. I do have a leather rim 13" wheel for the small boss (but no spare boss) so if someone wanted a 13" leather rim (with a very slight bend to it) I'd swap it for a the 14" wood.

The thing about the small boss wheel is that it looks period correct which the big boss wheel doesn't. The wheels do come up on ebay from time to time but not with the Midget specific boss.

I did e-mail the vendor to check the boss size and they seemed genuine and new to ebay.


Daniel Stapleton

Thanks Daniel, are you suggesting that not only do we have to buy the book but we have to read it as well?!! We can just come on here and ask you!

I see what you mean about the smaller diameter boss, it looks much better than the bigger one.

I've got form with paying a lot of money on ebay for a steering wheel so I'll probably 'steer' clear of this one.
John Payne

Daniel,

When you say 'slight bend to it' what do you mean?

I am going to go to a 13" leather rim for my MkIII Midget (it presently has a 14" larger diameter boss 'wood' wheel). This thread has prompted me to go to the effort to switch to the smaller diameter boss steering wheel when I downsize my steering wheel.

Therefore it may be worth me bidding on this ebay steering wheel to trade the wood for your leather...

Johnathan
Johnathan

This thread was discussed between 13/02/2013 and 16/02/2013

MG Midget and Sprite Technical index

This thread is from the archive. The Live MG Midget and Sprite Technical BBS is active now.