Slotted or Phillips

[C. Knight]

Chip Old wrote:

> The photos show TCs and Ys being *assembled* side by side. For both > models the bodies were built elsewhere in the Nuffield empire and were > shipped in partly trimmed condition to Abingdon for installation onto the > chassis. I don't remember where the bodies were built, but I'm pretty > sure the TC and Y bodies didn't come from the same plant.

MG Sports Cars by Malcolm Geen has an excellent picture of the "ladies" fitting the trim to the Y type at Abingdon, and you can actually see an air powered screwdriver being used to fit the Phillips screws to a front door trim. The all steel Y body shell was probably assembled at the Snuffled Bodies Plant in Birmingham along side the Morris 8 with which it shared the main panels. TC bodies were supplied from Morris Motors Body Branch in Coventry. Regards Cliff

[C. Knight]

"C. Knight" wrote:

>The all steel Y body shell was probably assembled at the > Snuffled Bodies Plant in Birmingham

What a great typo. I must remember it. Given some of the awful bodies that were produced there it seems an appropriate name. It should of course have been "Nuffield" Cliff

[Chip Old]

On Fri, 9 Feb 2001, C. Knight wrote:

> MG Sports Cars by Malcolm Geen has an excellent picture of the > "ladies" fitting the trim to the Y type at Abingdon, and you can > actually see an air powered screwdriver being used to fit the Phillips > screws to a front door trim. The all steel Y body shell was probably > assembled at the Snuffled Bodies Plant in Birmingham along side the > Morris 8 with which it shared the main panels. TC bodies were supplied > from Morris Motors Body Branch in Coventry.

I don'y have that book, so can't take a look. Is that photo dated? I ask because there is some evidence that at least early Ys had no Phillips screws. Matter of fact, can you actually see that they are Phillips head screws? The use of power screwdrivers in industry predates the invention of the Phillips head screw by a good many years. The advent of the Phillips head screw just made power drivers a lot easier to use. -- Chip Old 1948 M.G. TC TC6710 XPAG7430 NEMGTR #2271 Cub Hill, Maryland 1962 Triumph TR4 CT3154LO CT3479E fold@bcpl.net

[C. Knight]

Chip Old wrote:

> I don'y have that book, so can't take a look. Is that photo dated?

Unfortunately not, but the Y's are the early versions with offset battery boxes. Re early Ys not having Phillips screws I can only say that my oldest, Y 1700, from July 1948 had Phillips screws.

> Matter of fact, can you actually see that they are Phillips head screws?

The printing is very good, but not quite that good! It is perhaps worth mentioning that most of the Phillips screws are of the self tapping type as the Y is all steel. Regards Cliff