Morris Minor Owners Club

After all the scare stories in the press a few years ago during the exemption debate, I was wondering if there are any statistics which suggest that badly maintained Classics are indeed causing more accidents than hitherto ? Can't find anything after a quick Google. I imagine it's very difficult to ...

It's not that uncommon for a little bit of oil leakage from these plugs - not just in Minors but in many cars of that period.

Pottering around, 50 miles , all in one go or lots of short trips? John ;-) Good point. Also Andy states that some water was spilled into the engine during head removal. Could be just burning this off. Hopefully will disappear after some more miles. Edit: just realised another poster already made t...

Clockwise looking up from bottom. Before adjusting, check that choke is fully off and that the air cleaner is not partially blocked.

Monty-4 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 28, 2021 2:06 pm Yeah, I think it would be unlikely that you burnt a valve on both cylinders simultaneously or two pistons failed at the same time. Most likely is head gasket failure.

If it's gasket failure it's obviously worth checking why; eg. head slightly distorted.

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/thr ... cy.856031/

Bring back the oil bath filter

I have often wondered about overdrive on a Minor and if anyone ever fitted it. Laycock de Normanville did make a unit for engines under 1500cc but as far as I know a conversion was never offered for a Minor. It would only have to work on top gear. As a matter of interest overdrive was an option on ...

Stating the obvious, but is the heater valve fully open?

...... you can't legislate for stupid, and Smart Motorways imply the road-users have an equal level of intelligence which is sadly not the case. Agreed. Quote from Highway Code para 126 : "Drive at a speed that will allow you to stop well within the distance you can see to be clear". If e...

In my view, unlucky. I've never broken any in 35 years and I dont know anyone else with a rear wheel classic that has either. In my case, in 50 years I've never broken a Minor one. I've broken one in a 1952 Sunbeam Talbot, and one in an 1962 MG Midget. In both cases the cars had been through multip...

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mi-tests ... gon/#mmGal

Praised for excellent performance in 1954 American road test !!

The earlier sidevalve is gutless, but robust. Interesting comments. Perceptions of gutlessness change over the years. 50 years ago I toured France in my heavily-laden 1950 side valve, basically the pre-war Morris Eight engine. I never felt aware of being particularly slow, there were plenty of vehi...

The bottom end seems to have gained a bit of a reputation. When they were just cheap old bangers they were a popular buy, I owned a couple as did various friends over the years. I don't remember the engines being particularly noted for bearing failure. I also remember them as smooth-running, but cer...

philthehill wrote: ↑Thu Feb 18, 2021 11:54 am It is easier to bring the rack out of the drivers side as you have sight of the pinion where it goes through the floor.
Having that sight means it is easier to control the extraction of the pinion and whole rack.

Good point. That settles it, right side it is. Many thanks

Probably a silly question. I need to remove rack from my 1968 saloon. My garage is quite narrow. Is it easier to pull out the rack from any particular side ?

There's not a lot that can be done to prevent sticking clutches Wedging the clutch pedal down with a length of two by four up against the driver's seat? You could, but I'd be concerned about the effect long-term on the pressure plate spring strength. But maybe I'm overthinking it! I used to be conc...

"Spark" plugs is an Americanism. They were "Sparking" plugs when I was a lad

Assuming you've plumbed-in the petrol feed, it's supposed to stop clicking anyway once the float chamber is full.

Radiator mufflers were in common winter use when most cars didn't have thermostats. An engine which was designed to be adequately cooled by thermo-syphon in high summer would tend to run too cool in winter. A diligent driver would manually fine tune the amount of muffler by keeping a close eye on th...