748 replies to this topic

[MrBounce]

High time I got back into the garage. There aren't many pics today as all I have been doing is sanding, sanding and more sanding. P40 is very hard stuff and my fingers are now bleeding. That said, I really feel I have now turned a corner. I am working on the front left hand corner of the car (as it's on its side that makes it WAY more comfortable!) and it is almost time to not sand anymore. Thank ****.

I have finally got it as smooth as I am likely to at this stage, but of course there are various pockmarks and depressions. I have finally given it its first skim of filler. Now all I need is a couple of mates and it'll be time to flip it onto the other side and do that.

[MrBounce]

I spent this afternoon sanding down the first skim of filler and I have to say I am quite pleased with what I have done. Because of all the ground-out and re-filled cracks the aesthetics aren't that great at the moment, but it feels smooth with no obvious raised lumps. I feel I am getting somewhere. It will of course need a bit more sorting out of a few dips and gouges but that will have to wait until I have some more filler. I also took the opportunity to finish off the underside of the nose as there were still a few lumpy parts and/or chunks missing.

Whilst I was waiting for all the filler to dry off last week, I painted the brake calipers in a rather fetching shade of blue, which should offset the orange colour I want to paint the car rather nicely. I then decided to get started on reconditioning them as well, which means new seals and pistons, which I already have. I say that; it appears I only have them for one side of the car. I guess I will have to get some more... I managed to get the pistons out quite easily and have removed the seals. They looked slightly past their best. Brake cleaner is useful stuff and has made things look a lot prettier. Once I have got some new bits I will finish them.

First skim sanded; are my bodywork woes soon to be over??



Blue calipers! They look SO much nicer now!



Old seals. Not pretty.

[MrBounce]

As I haven't been able to get the Midas turned over (too much social time being taken up!!) and I didn't have any more filler anyway, I thought it was time I actually finished off the calipers. As I only had one side of the car to do it was unlikely to take a huge amount of time, but I was being ultra careful because I had never done this job before. Turns I am quite good at this! Now all I have to do is wait for the second set of pistons and seals to arrive before I can do the other one.

I have also been adding to my useful parts list. I wanted a Minispares inlet manifold - they're well made, I've had one before and I wasn't sure about the one I had in the parts box. There was nothing wrong with it; it just looked like it could be a little smoother on the inside. Getting a Minispares one meant less work with the Dremel to smooth it out. Thanks to the Mini Forum, one was bought (new but not used) and one was sold. I also helped my good friend to go through his garage finding bits for his father-in-law's Moke project, and he has chucked me a couple of bits - a switch for turning on the fan automatically and a battery disconnect switch. Very helpful!

Completed caliper. Can I do the other one please?



New inlet manifold



Couple of useful bits. Cheers Mr T!

[minimat]

Looking good dave i'll give you a hand to turn it over if you like when I get a chance.

[MrBounce]

As I had the bits for doing the second caliper, I went back into the garage and messed it all up. For those that don't know, the top seal is held in place by a metal collar, and it is very easy to get this wrong when pressing it in. And of course I managed to do it when I had had no problems with the other 3 I'd already done. So having contributed vast amounts to the swearbox, I put some more seals on order, shut the garage door and left it for a week. New seals arrived, and I promptly did the same thing again. More swearing. I was then ultra careful with the final one and had no more issues. Calipers done! (Although they will need a further coat of paint...)

I have decided that as the temperatures have dropped and there is no heater in the garage, even with a "hot" mix it's not really worth doing any filler work, so I have turned my attention to some more mechanical things. I have got my hands on a KAD Quickshift (rescued from a friends garage for a decent price - he happened to have two! - but I couldn't get the lever's collar to engage on the extension. As I have a spare full selector anyway, I tried that one. No issues at all. Now what it needs is cleaning as it is not pretty. Parts washer is on standby...

Caliper finished! (Apart from more paint)



KAD Quickshift acquired (Really must pay for this...!)



It's a bit gungy in there...

[MrBounce]

Well, the weather has turned cold. Lovely. The amazing Mrs B has bought me a present though - I've now got a Propane heater in the garage - stick it on for 10 minutes and it's lovely & toastie in there now! I will interested to see how long the gas canister lasts as the guy at the shop was desperately trying to sell me a bigger one...

Just a short update today: The gear selector and a couple of other parts (carb bits & part of the thermostat housing) have gone through the parts washer and look much improved ready for fresh grease and reassembly. I will of course be modifying the selector as it's a standard Mini part; these need to be sleeved and extended by 16cm I believe to work properly. The car was not fitted with an engine when I got it, but the previous one fitted came with a remote box anyway, which of course was totally different.

I also gave the calipers another coat of paint and have painted only half of the radius arms as they're not the easiest things to hang up...

New heater - looks like a jet engine so definitely one for the boys!



Cleaner looking selector (and other bits).



More paint applied.

[MrBounce]

Had another couple of hours so popped into the man room and did a little bit more painting. Have now finished painting the radius arms and the calipers so will hopefully be able to start putting stuff together soon!! I was considering building up the rear beam and the front subframe but I will need the work bench for those so I dug out the steering column.

This was not the prettiest thing in my garage. Being sat in a damp car for 11 years had made it look a bit...rusty. The outer column had a few small pock marks on it and the inner section looked like it had been in a field for a month. That said, about 15 minutes with some wet & dry soon had both looking much more usable and ready for the coat of satin black that I don't have in the garage. Nuts...

Other side of the radius arms & calipers done.



Column apart. Not pretty.



Looking more like it. I do have new bushes for both ends.

Edited by MrBounce, 01 December 2013 - 03:44 PM.

[MrBounce]

Another quick update; not much has gone on this week: I desperately need to tidy the garage as it's in a bit of a state. Meanwhile, I managed to prime and spray the outer steering column, having rubbed it down. I masked up the ignition barrel as the shear bolts had done just that and I wasn't going to spend 3 days trying to drill them out. I also got hold of some proper 3M masking tape after the big roll I had just made me very angry; it was terrible stuff that just ripped at every given opportunity. It went straight into the bin. A bit of satin black and the column is looking nice again.

Primed...



...and now black again.

[MrBounce]

I have started to rebuild the steering column; I say started - the top bush has been greased and put in, but of course the bottom felt bush needs to be soaked in oil before using it, and ideally it should be overnight. 45 minutes is NOT enough. For everyone saying "why don't I use a plastic bush?" I am not convinced that the older columns can use them (I have read conflicting information about this) and there was a brand new felt bush that came with the car; why spend extra when for a little bit of work you already have what you need?

As I was waiting for the bush to soak, it was time to start putting some suspension bits on the front subframe. My mate Matt came over but had conveniently forgotten to bring his cone compressor. Oops. Still, we could get the lower arm pins, lower arms & tie bars fitted. Or so we thought. One side of the car was no problem at all; However as usual, the bits on this car never cease to amaze me. We were able to bolt everything up on the offside but the nuts was no tightening up. We discovered that the lower arm pin had come apart. I have never seen this before. I don't have a welder. Have to get a new one...

And whilst going through various boxes to have a sort out, I pulled out the timing cover to put with the other engine stuff, to find it's got a hole punched through it. Merry Christmas and all that.

Bush soaking. (Stop sniggering at the back!)



Nearside bolted together.



You have to be kidding me!!



Timing cover with extra ventilation. Matt thinks he's got a spare in his garage. I hope...

[MrBounce]

Another small update; I popped to the East Anglian Mini Centre and they sorted me out with a spare lower arm pin so I could finish the driver's side. A little gentle persuasion with a rubber mallet and some Copperslip so it doesn't all rust together and everything was done. Cone compressor next so the Hi-Los and doughnuts can go in along with the hubs.

I also had a wonderful struggle getting the felt bush into the steering column. It's now all together but of course I scratched the new paint so had to give it a quick blow-over. And I had forgotten to paint the bracket that goes with it. So that's now primed.

Driver's side lower pins, arms and tiebars now in.



Oops. Didn't mean to do that... Now repainted.



Bracket primed.

[domdee]

made some great progress

[MrBounce]

Well, Christmas has been and gone, and thankfully my family & friends did listen to me! A whole host of "little but useful" bits from Mini Spares along with a new tool box and a couple of tools to go in it as well ! No excuses for not getting back out into the Manroom then...

The engine has been sitting under my workbench (all wrapped up) for long enough now, so I did my World's Strongest Man impersonation (poor, I know...) and took the block outside to get it clean and ready for paint. It was not given a chemical bath when the machining was done so I have a bit more work to do. I gave it a coating of Father-in-law Steve's special degreaser (works well on bus engines!!) then set to work with an old paintbrush and a toothbrush. Much time later once it had been hosed down, I took it back inside and used my special bracket to put it on the engine stand. Works perfectly! I then gave it a coat of blue paint (same as the radius arms and calipers).

Once the paint had dried a bit, I popped out the two core plugs on the clutch end (I say popped - I really mean struggled manly for several minutes with each one) and also managed (after a hell of a fight) to remove the 4 oil gallery plugs (2 at each end of the block). I was then able to clean the oilways, using that most useful (and elusive) tool: the wire coat hanger with a bit of rag on the end. Unsurprisingly there was a load of crap in there. Several applications later it is beautifully clean. I will of course be blasting it through with an airline on numerous occasions before any engine building commences...

Christmas prezzies!



Dirty block.



Cleaner block!



Beautiful blue block!



Hmmm. This may need a bit of a clean out.



Oil gallery plugs gone.



All this was in the oilways...

[MrBounce]

More engine stuff today; some bits went well, others less so...

I knocked out the remaining three core plugs and used my trusty wire coathanger (with some rags) and some bottle brushes to spend the best part of 2 hours cleaning every last piece of crud out of the water jacket. The amount of "old flaky" that came out didn't surprise me, as I believe this engine to be about 27 years old and never been apart before. The state of the old core plugs certainly showed that. That said, the majority of the silt build up was around the 2 end core plugs so once that was clear the water jacket looked more than capable of working properly again.

The new core plugs were gently thumped into their new homes by means of a 7/8" socket, and once this was done I turned my attention to gapping my rings. That is I would have done, but my feeler gauges hadn't been used for 10 years or so. They were a little bit (read VERY) rusty. I got some new ones from the local Machine Mart. Then the gas for the heater ran out. Welcome to 2014...

Rusty old core plugs. Nice.



The crud that came out. Yum.



Much cleaner water jacket area with new plugs ready to go in.



Block looks prettier already. Does this count as "new bling"??



One of the reasons I am not gapping my rings today...

Edited by MrBounce, 05 January 2014 - 11:17 PM.

[MrBounce]

I have decided that I don't like Mondays. My piston rings have now been gapped correctly. As I was midway through doing the last piston (which happened to be number 3 - just the way they came off the bench!!) and putting the second ring back on to the piston, it snapped. And of course nobody in the world wants to sell a single piston ring. Off I trotted to various engineering shops, met mostly with a shake of the head. That was until I dropped into P Seager in Ipswich. They had a set of +020" rings -  whilst they weren't the correct type for my piston, the second ring was identical. Of course I had to buy the whole set, but it was significantly cheaper than ordering a new set.

I gapped this one without incident then hot-footed it out of the garage before I was tempted to set fire to it.

Mondays. Thing like this happen. You don't want this to happen. It's expensive.



Then great people like P Seager Engineering have these kicking about in the depths of their workshops.



Crank unwrapped. Where's the assembly paste??

[1984mini25]

I did a similar thing to my rings when I was putting together a pocketed 998, were the rings had a tendency to jump into the pocket rather than down the bore. luckily though minisport sell there rings in piston sets, rather than engine sets, witch made it a little cheaper.