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It would make sense, as I'm fairly sure the 1970 model Mk3 Spitfire had the same wheel as the Mk4.

There are three lugs on the wheel, which hold the nave plate, and are slightly raised from the rest of the circle. That difference is what you have to work with (you operate the removal tool, whether Colin's one or the OE lever, just to one side of one of the lugs). I've found the OE lever from the toolkit in the boot to be fairly good at not damaging the wheel paint, but a bit of rubber or heatshrink sleeving over the bend would make it even better. The paint that will be removed is right on the lug, where the nave plate itself scratches it off during fitting and removal. That's hidden, though, so a bit of non-setting mastic or similar will keep rust at bay.

Surely that's the only way to change either shocks or springs? I don't recall it being that hard when I did the Spitfire's.

It's certainly a darned sight easier with the damper off the car, and since the bolt through that bush is the hard part of removing the damper, I'd always just do so.

Not on the early ones. There should be a gauze sheet over the sump pan. Later engines lost that gauze sheet but got a pickup strainer, although that was at least MkIV, may even have only been 1500s

I also made that modification to the one I had.

Yep, what johny said, although I'd just add that some cheapskate diesel engines of around that time were actually built with only three glow plugs, so if it reliably starts on three cylinders and the fourth always kicks in after 20 secs then you could just decide to live with it.

The 12-spoke wheel was fitted to Mk1 Vitesse, with a leather cover. The same wheel but without the leather was fitted to Mk3 Spitfire (prior to the 1970 model facelift). I think the (early) Mk2 GT6 was different, although it may have been the Vitesse wheel with soft plastic covers on the spoke groups.

Is it actually necessary to be insulting just because I asked for clarification of a statment that could have been misleading to other readers who are not "73, rebuilt many an engine"?

I had to pop into the office yesterday (still primarily working from home) so with the sun being out I took the GT6

It's not so much packaging as NVH. Bowden cables require extra holes and are very good at transmitting noise. The loom is already there, so adding an extra message on the CAN bus has no NVH implications.

It takes a fair bit of tightening up, and then I've always needed to shock it. It may need more than a gentle tap.

Surely they oppose by being on the same side of the engine, so that the bearings can't move either way?

I definitely missed it when I had a Vitesse as my only car. Best upgrade I ever did. But if you only ever potter around on minor roads or in town, then you don't need it. I've had two Vitesses (both 2L Mk1s) and the only overheating I've ever had with either (apart from when there was a crack in the block and the coolant was all leaking out) was a 4 hour traffic jam on the M25 on the hottest day ever. Oh, and when I temporarily had a Herald fuel pump on it because the proper one was missing, but that was fuel vapourisation - the coolant temperature remained fine.

As you learned the hard way, never do that. A reputable builder will never ask for money in advance, only staged payment for work completed so far. My '67 Vitesse is running points, as the previous owner had taken the Lumenition off, presumably due to it failing. It's the only one of my three that is on points, and it's consistently the easiest to start and smoothest running. Go figure. Also, it's back on a mechanical fuel pump, because I had no end of trouble when running on an electric one.

I've not used the club's service but I had my Vitesse's engine worked on by Ivor Searle (they're my most local engine specialist) and had no complaints at all. Later, our local area had a tour of their facilities, including the remanufacturing line. It's very impressive. I'd very happily buy a remanufactured engine from them.

Think the other way round. Like the Lumenition page that Peter posted says "red wire can be connected to coil positive if". That's a lazy man's shortcut - the fundamental requirement is that the EI supply feed is from a good 12V source. On some applications (those without ballast and without current-sensed tacho) the coil positive is also connected to a good 12V source, so you can, under those conditions, use that. But that's the "jumped" alternative - a direct connection to the ignition switch is the fundamental requirement.

On the Spitfire (the only one I've done a body-off on myself) I didn't bother with originality. The chassis and suspension were all powder-coated in black. The chap who did the body painting masked it up so the chassis remained black. In fairness, I'd already fitted the engine and gearbox, so that was the only sensible option for him. However, your plan sounds good to me.

My understanding was that the chassis and body were mated before painting, so most of the chassis is body colour but some less accessible bits remained black.

As Pete says, the 155/80 are the correct tyres - MWS are quoting what they carry, not what you want. If the speedo is 10% under then it's likely a combination of things, because the later diff ratios are 3.89 (which is 6% out) or 3.63 (which is 13% out). It is also perfectly possible to fit a swing spring to a 6-stud (original spec) diff, just by plugging the two unused stud holes. However, Spitfire speedos were never terribly accurate. If it's steady and reads within 10% I'd say you're doing quite well.

The dial and pointer look wrong for that.

There's no need to bypass it. Electronic ignition works absolutely fine with ballasted coils, as long as you wire the EI supply to the right place. The only type that doesn't want it would be a programmed ignition with variable (closed loop) dwell, for which a quite specific coil is needed.

No thinking, just penny pinching

My '72 Mk3 has a separate ballast resistor because it's what the factory fitted.

Only on some ill-conceived (probably French) cars. Properly designed ECUs know about "Billy Throttle" or left-foot braking