Checking cam timing on MGA MGB engines.

This is a quick way to tell if the cam timing is correct on an MGA or MGB engine, although it technically will work on any engine. It is not accurate enough to tell if the cam timing is absolutely perfect to a degree or so, such as would be important on a high performance engine, but it will tell you of the more common problem of a cam being off by a whole tooth.

We continue to see cam timing off on recently rebuilt engines here at the shop, and in some cases even engines that might have been rebuilt years earlier, but just always seemed "down on power".
In one case, we had a TR6 engine arrive that had been assembled at a machine shop and somehow they set the cam timing while the engine was at the bottom of the stroke. Needless to say, that engine would not even start once the customer installed it in his car.

I could write a book!