Morris Minor Owners Club

Today I stripped the old Purolator filter head off the 948cc block and decided to look inside the bowl and guess what - no plate or washers under the filter element so the oil filter had not been filtering the engine oil - all the engine oil was just flowing past the filter. Added to that - the old filter head to bowl seal had not been removed and an attempt to fit a replacement seal on top of the old seal had been tried but had not been successful as the replacement seal was found inside the filter bowl.

Extreme care must be taken when the old oil filter is replaced so that the plate and washers under the oil filter element are not inadvertently thrown away with the element. It is most important that the filter element is held tight against the underside of the filter head plate so that the oil has to go through the oil filter element.

The old filter head to filter bowl seal must be removed before fitting a new seal.

Happy days.

Phil

Hello Phil. PM sent Ian

I wonder how many engines met an early demise from this scenario Phil? Back in the day, Minors were often seen, and run, as 'old bangers'. Likely many didn't even get an oil change, let alone the filter changed properly! Some of my previous Morris Minors needed frequent oil top ups, probably because of this type of previous neglect (and I have to admit, I wasn't too zealous myself on really thorough servicing back in those days! )

Fitting the screw on/off oil filter conversion means that the above is eliminated.

This is just how i found my traveller 948cc when i first got it, It had been serviced by a local garage for years but the guy i got it off was about 80 and had no idea, The good news is the garage has now changed hands and the owner has nothing to do with cars now. I have changed to a 1098 engine and ribbed gear box and added some Riley 1.5 brakes so it feels much safer than the original 7" drums.