Steering wheel colours?

[oliver-morrisminor]

Did the Series MM have a Grey/blue marble pattern coloured steering wheel?

If so is there a name or colour code for these colours as we are restoring a
wheel for my friends 1955 series II 4 door and I know us series MM guys are
pretty good wit the right answer.

thanks, Oli

[mike.perry]

[frame][/frame][frame][/frame]
The Series MM/II was available with two colours of steering wheel, mottled blue/grey and mottled brown. I don't know if the customer had a choice, I expect that the car was fitted with whichever colour the fitter picked up.
The flat wheels are not interchangeable with the later black dished wheels as they have a woodruff key fitting and not the later splines

[brucek]

Mike probably knows best but I think the grey/black cars were fitted with a grey/blue steering wheel and the green/brown cars were fitted with the brown/pink one.

[mike.perry]

That could be, but my green car was fitted with a grey steering wheel, the wheel shown in the photo. I changed it for the brown wheel shown in the car! I do not think that there are any published lists and I have not carried out a study. Any comments are welcome

[ASL642]

We have a green mottled one which was originally fitted in in our '56 green 4 dr.

[mike.perry]

Photo please?

[smithskids]

Hi, my black tourer has a mottled browny pink coloured one.

[IaininTenbury]

I'd got the feeling that it was age related - the older cars had a brown mottled steerilg wheel and later cars (by which I mean late MM and Series 2s) tended towards grey mottled. May not be anything in that (though my 49 and 50 lowlight5s have brown wheels and my '53 S2 has a grey one) probably just whatever mix bakelite Blumels used on the batch....

[Boomlander]

1949 to 1954 cars - Mottled Brown Steering Wheel.
1955 to 1956 cars - Mottled Brown, Grey or Blue Steering Wheel.
October 1956 Onwards - Black Steering Wheel.
Not unusual to find any of the three mottled colours on Series MM and Series Two.
My 1953 car has the Mottled Grey.
This information listed in Lindsay Porter's Minor Restoration Guide Book. [frame][/frame]

[mike.perry]

That is a publication which I have not got. I wonder where the author sourced his information.
My '52 Empire Green Series MM had a grey steering wheel later changed to brown.
So is it age related, colour related or random?

[Boomlander]

Mr Porter's information was supplied by the Morris Minor Centre in Avon and reproduced in his restoration manual for reference.
I do believe however that some cars were possibly fitted with whatever colour wheel was available at the time of assembly if the allocated colour was not currently in supply.

[sparesman]

All the MMs I have had in last 30+ years have had brown or mottled brown wheels with dark brown painted centres ( although one recently had a green tinge to it) and the Series 11s (late 53 on) have all had mottled grey wheels with gold painted centres

[sparesman]

All the MMs I have had in last 30+ years have had brown or mottled brown wheels with dark brown painted centres ( although one recently had a green tinge to it) and the Series 11s (late 53 on) have all had mottled grey wheels with gold painted centres

[JOWETTJAVELIN]

I expect it was entirely random and you got what you were given. Iain probably has it with whatever was prepared on the day.

Looking at the historical perspective new cars in post-war Britain were very hard to come by and the sort of fads we see now, epitomised by the Vauxhall/Opel 'Adam', where the prospective purchaser can customise his interior to the nth degree, was unheard - or unthought of - in those days.

For record my late S.II is black, red interior with the pink/brown wheel.

[MarkyB]

JOWETTJAVELIN is spot on I'm sure.
Exports were the main concern for many years after the war, and the cars were put together by blokes in a factory, not purists!