Seat Belts and the First Sticker Shock

Did I mention that this car has no seat belts?  As it turns out, cars prior to 1960 were not required to even have the mount points to connect seat belts, and though they were offered as a factory option apparently no MGAs prior to that point were ordered with that option.  Kind of incredible. 

Not wanting to become an airborne projectile, I bought 3-point harness brackets from Clarke Spares and Restorations (CSR) ($87.50 including shipping - part number M70A).  I purchased the matching belts from JC Whitney ($89.22 including tax and shipping, part number BEACH300BLACK).  The Clarke Spares installation instructions include information at the end about options for suppliers for matching seat belts.  If you wind up doing this yourself, note that the JC Whitney part number information provided differs from what I could find on JC Whitney.  The info in the instructions is actually in the form of an old ad (appears to be 60's era?) so I imagine they've just changed their numbering since then. 

Not bad prices and cheaper than increasing my life insurance, which my enterprising wife would have insisted on. In all seriousness, though I am old enough to remember a time when it was common to ride around without seat belts, having done just a little of that in this car I can't imagine driving on any big roads around town much less commuting without them now, and the thought of taking my kids or wife around in it except on small local back roads is crazy.  Also crazy is the idea of going with just a lap belt. The three point mount is apparently a real pain because it has to be unhooked to close or open the top, but I am looking at this as a mandatory inconvenience.

Would you want these kids unrestrained in the car?

So far so good, but since these mounts require welding and this Great Experiment is not nearly far enough along for me to want to get into welding my own safety devices, I called the local British Classic Car specialist. I was lucky enough to find one 20 minutes away that I'll work with this time, but there is another an hour away that might be cheaper (based on location) and specializes in MGs that I may try out later.  Surprise #1: There will be a 2 week wait for an appointment. Modern cars can take advantage of the automobile version of the "walk-in clinic". An old classic needs to see a "specialist", and I should have assumed there would be a wait.  Surprise #2: The cheap option is the cost of 4 hours welding labor, about $400, but involves cutting massive holes in the carpet at the weld sites to avoid fires, and leaving them un-repaired: an eyesore.  The upgraded option is to pay about twice that for the extra labor to try to peel the old carpet back without ripping it to shreds, do the work, and re-glue the carpet.  The right option is 5-6 times more to rip the old carpet out, scrape out the glue, weld the mounts on, install a heat/sound barrier, and replace the whole carpet (and that maybe didn't include materials - I was sobbing too hard to fully understand the option).

For now, I've set the appointment and told him to expect the more affordable "peel the old carpet back" upgrade option but we'd talk again before the appointment for my final decision.  We've definitely realized the carpet will have to come out eventually because it really is pretty musty, but I don't want to do that before figuring out what major engine problems might be lurking.  I also didn't want to leave the car with him for 2 weeks to wait for that to be done.  It's been excruciating waiting this long to really use it.