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[MrBounce]

I am steadily working my way through Tink's list of jobs that need to be sorted. The next on the list was something he'd noticed when playing about under the dash with wiring: the throttle cable was at a funny angle. This was completely down to me. I was certain I'd done it right but I was obviously tired and rushing at the time. The plan was simple - pull out the inner cable and re-insert it through the hole that made more sense - i.e. opposite the top on the throttle pedal, as opposed to a couple of centimetres off. At least it would have been simple. The reason it wasn't? Some idiot who shall remain nameless but bears a striking resemblance to me had put a brake limiter valve in the way of the correct hole. Now, this sounded as though it was not too bad a scenario, but the thing to remember about the Midas is that, like the Mini it is based on, it is rather small. This means that once everything is in place, it's really rather difficult to move it much more than a couple of millimetres. I took the brake limiter valve off.

 

So here's how I managed to fix it. Firstly, the throttle cable was held in place by a proper "Heath Robinson" bracket with a brazed-on guide for the cable. This had been created by a previous owner. I didn't understand why they hadn't simply drilled a hole into the fibreglass to hold the end of the outer cable's ferrule. So I did this, and put the homemade bracket "to one side". Of course, I couldn't get the drill in there without taking off the coil and the breather, so I used one of my favourite tools - the right-angled drill chuck! This is a brilliant bit of kit and worked so well. I had bought a new limiter valve some time ago which I was going to fit anyway - the one on there was secondhand, and as EVERYTHING else in the braking system is new, it was a no-brainer to fit this as well. The issue was how. The new path the cable took was exactly in the middle of the valve's body - drilling through it would be an expensive way to ruin the brakes. It had to move!

 

I looked at the design of the valve, and on the top I noticed an indentation, which looked almost perfect for the outer plastic sheath of a throttle cable to run over. I decided that this was going to be the way to do it. This meant I needed to effectively move the valve about an inch diagonally down towards the centre of the car. Only I couldn't. The bracket which held the clutch hose was in the way, and no amount of persuasion was going to work. Instead, I got creative. Out came the oscillating multi-tool, and I cut a 1/4" silver off the side of said bracket. The new valve fitted, the throttle cable went nicely over the top and I only needed to do some minor bending to the master cylinder brake pipes to ensure that everything connected together properly. Excellent. I even managed to get the spring back on to the clutch arm without swearing! I now just have the fun task of filling in the numerous holes from previous owners (and me) so it all looks a bit tidier. 

 

Talking of tidy, I also needed to sort a fuse box. I don't like fuse boxes in the engine -  I simply don't understand why they need to be subjected to heat and/or damp, when they can be inside, where it is also easier to check to see if a fuse needs to be replaced. I have never been a fan of the Mini fuse box, so we're going to have a look at using a newer blade fuse design. Both Tink and I came up with the idea of having the lid for the fuses under the bottom of the dashboard. I marked up where it needed to sit before cutting an appropriate hole using the oscillating tool. A quick bit of filing saw the fuse box fit in nicely before the holes were drilled to bolt it into place. A quick check saw the fuse box poking out nicely under the dash. Nice.

 

Cable used to go through the top hole and was at a funny angle. It needed to be passed through the hole about an inch below it. This was unhelpful... 

 

 

Brazed homemade bracket needed to go, so I put it "elsewhere"...

 

 

Brake Valve needed to move, but there wasn't room. 

 

 

There are too many holes in this bulkhead. Which one should we use?

 

 

It's this one!

 

 

However, it needed a hole enlarging to hold the ferrule, so out came this awesome bit of kit.

 

 

Much better than that silly bracket!

 

 

New valve to be fitted - but where exactly?

 

 

Goes in here quite nicely, after taking a bit of the bracket off with power tool violence and bending some pipes a bit.

 

 

A hole was cut into the dashboard shelf to accommodate the fuse box.

 

 

Fits in there really well!

 

 

Fuses are easily accessed from below.

 

[MrBounce]

Two things that I took from the last time I chatted to Tink were the following: Test the wiper motor on all settings, and to sort the wiring for the screen wash pump. As my knowledge of electrics is utterly dreadful, Tink kindly leant me his probe and advised me on step-by-step basis what I needed to do. I decided to check the switch first, as this was the only thing that hadn't been looked at. With the probe connected up to the battery, I did as Tink told me and touched the probe to the appropriate wire at the stalk. I checked the normal speed - no problem. However, when I repeated the test on the fast wipe, I got nothing, pointing to a switch issue. There's precious little that I can do at present other than maybe give the whole thing a clean, but Tink has some spares kicking about, so he'll go through what he's got first, before I order a new one.

 

Then it was time to check the washer pump. I love the way this fits - it's from a Mitsubishi, but I don't know which one - it was doubtless popular in the 70s & 80s but the chance of finding one now are pretty slim. It fits so nicely into the bulkhead. I'd already tested the motor itself, and knew it fired. I needed to figure which wire went from the stalk to the pump. I was able to establish through a process of elimination that the Light Green and Black did this job. I did check that the stalk worked using the probe. Then it was a simple matter of extending the wires. Oh yeah, that. Of course the wire in question was a bit greenish. Not black like the horn wire was, but on its way out. I trimmed a few inches off the end and got decent looking wire. I used some red wire to extend and soldered it then used heatshrink to insulate the join. I repeated this process with the Earth wire, before joining everything together. 

 

The question was, would it work? I connected the battery, turned the key to position 2 and pushed the wash button on the stalk. Nothing. Before letting out an almighty barrage of splendid swear words, I remembered that the fuse box we'd used for testing was a bit "flaky". I gave said fuse a wiggle and everything fired into life. Thankfully there's no screenwash in it, so I managed to avoid getting wet. Succes!

 

The high speed switch part of the wiper stalk doesn't do its job. Which is a pain... 

 

 

Grim wire. Not completely oxidised, but not far off.

 

 

A few inches off the end gave us much nicer copper-coloured strands.

 

 

Everything soldered, heatshrink used and chucked through the bulkhead grommet.

 

 

Washer bottle looking awesome - the test proved everything works!

 

[MrBounce]

As they are not desperately expensive, I grabbed a new wiper switch from the interwebs and fitted it, which was all straightforward - 3 bolts. The only difficult bit was getting the two plugs to line up. It took significant time due to the pins in the male part of the plug not quite lining up. Eventually, it played ball. I then decided that I would replace the temporary big fuse.

 

Tink had put in a spare from his stock (which he wanted back), and as it was only in there as a bit of borrowed equipment, he'd used a chocolate block to chuck it in. Horrible things. On removing it from the wiring loom, there was a problem. It was black. Not green and slightly flaky, but black. I hoped that it would just be a couple of inches' worth, but stripping back the wiring loom showed that it was likely that I would need to replace the whole lot. Joy.

 

I don't have any wire that thick in stock so I've ordered a couple of metres of new stuff. I've shut the garage door and walked away. I don't like wiring at the best of times, but this loom is trying my patience. Grrr.

 

New wiper switch, in a proper Prince of Darkness box...

 

 

The problematic plug that took some time line up. Pins kept moving! 

 

 

Ah. This should not be that colour....

 

 

Further investigation revealed more of the same. Garage door was shut after this.

 

[MrBounce]

Went out to the garage to deal with the not very fun job of removing the bad wire, in order to replace it with something that will actually conduct. This was fiddly - why? I had to extract it from the wiring loom which was all taped up. This ran only for a short part in the engine bay - the rest of this was under the driver's side wheelarch. After several minutes of slightly bad language and struggling, this then escalated to seriously bad language. I jacked up the car, and took the wheel off which did help a little bit. After what seemed to be about 5 hours* of it fighting me, the tape was off, and I was able to remove the offending wire. 

 

It was about a metre long, and there was a soldered join about halfway down. I decided that I would remove the insulation to see how bad it was. The other half past the joint toward the fuse box was ok. Past the join? Oh dear. I shall let the pictures do the talking. I am now waiting to see if Tink has any spare the same size, or if not, what size I should be using to replace it. Like I have said on many occasions - I am not an electrics kind of guy. Don't know if this wire is correct or what size it should be. It's at times like this I feel a bit helpless - bolting stuff together? No problem. Putting a new fuel pump on, yup, not an issue. Electrical stuff? I am totally lost. It's such a shame that Tink has so little spare time... I shall have to pick his brains over the phone.

 

* it took about 45 minutes...

 

Got the wire out and chucked it on the bench.

 

 

This is NOT copper-coloured. That ain't conducting like it should. New wire DEFINITELY needed.

 

[MrBounce]

With all the old wire thankfully binned, I moved on to sorting its replacement. Tink suggested putting 2 wires in, as it'd be useful for any additional items needed and much easier to splice in. I soldered them together, added a ring terminal and some heatshrink, then taped the two wires together. I've fed this back through the hole in the inner wing, but have yet to tape things together and properly clip the wiring in place. This will be done soon.

 

I needed to find somewhere for the fuse to go. It has two very helpful holes mounted in it. I would have used the inner wing, but the Midas has a very tight engine bay. I couldn't easily put it on the inner wing as somebody had put a big bracket with two horns there instead. I also wanted it to be easily accessible if needed. Under the horns is quite a far way from accessible! I settled on using the crossmember that the master cylinders sit on as there was a convenient space for it there. Two holes, two screws, done. I need to do some tidying to the wiring and pop on some P clips to secure it. Then that area should be finished for now. This car is SO good at making simple jobs into difficult ones...

 

New wires soldered on to ring terminal and added to fuse holder.

 

 

A convenient home was found for the fuse holder on the crossmember by the master cylinders.

 

 

And all in place (wiring still to be tidied and taped).

 

[MrBounce]

Another quick update. I did some tidying up under the wheelarch - I have re-wrapped the wiring loom with black PVC tape so it's not just a load of random wires hanging down. I was planning on not doing much else, but I was looking at the negative terminal and a couple of the ring terminals from the earth wires were crimped. 

 

"Well, this just won't do", I thought, and immediately removed them. I got some heat shrink and some new terminals, and a bit of solder. These have now been correctly attached without the space issues. There are 4 ring terminals so space is at a premium - much like everything in that engine bay. However, it all looks much tidier. I changed the bolt as well, as the original was a bit short. I am much happier with the way this now looks. Small steps, but good ones.

 

My cheapie heat gun though is rubbish - plug it in and it's now permanently on - must be a switch issue. I will have to investigate...

 

Ring terminals re-done with heat shrink.

 

 

And all bolted up. Tidy.

 

[MrBounce]

I had an hour or so the other day, so into the garage I went. The sidelights/indicators were still sitting on the top of the engine bay, so I figured it would be time to put them back where they belong, and also to tidy up the wiring and clip it all into place. This should have been straightforward. It wasn't, #becauseMidas

 

I disconnected the wiring for the 2 lights, poked the wires through the holes for the lights, and reassembled the passenger lamp and fixed it in place. Fantastic.

 

On doing the same for the driver's side, I encountered some issues. 1) The light would not sit at the correct angle. 2) The right hand bolt simply turned. Why? I took it all out again and discovered that the rivnut was turning, and the fibreglass where the rivnut was seated was cracked. This of course, would simply not do. I've beefed it up with some epoxy resin, but I am considering adding some additional strengthening behind as the material is very thin there. I shall update in due course.

 

Clipping the wiring was really straightforward thankfully - P clips, small dome head bolts and nuts, plus a drill. Except I couldn't get the drill in there. No problem! Once again the right angled drill chuck came into its own - I never thought I would ever need one, but now I have one, it's been a complete godsend. There's still a few little paint nicks where I drilled the holes which I will need to sort though. 

 

Lights in the wrong place. Needs sorting!

 

 

Passenger light has gone in well. Bumper needs a retouch though. Which idiot did that??

 

 

Crack around the rivnut hole, and very thin fibreglass. I need to sort this.

 

 

And clips for the loom. Much tidier.

 

 

Also from the front - some additional tidying needed...

 

[MrBounce]

I went back in this afternoon, mainly to do some tidying. Not of the garage, but of certain aspects of the wiring. The horn connections and those for the fan rheostat and the coil had crimped connectors on. Although they will work, and probably won't fail about 85% of the time, there's always that nagging doubt. So I cut them all off, and redid them all with soldered and heatshrunk joints. It doesn't look like I have done much, but I am not the best with wiring, so it did take me a while! Still, they're all sorted now, and look a million times better.

 

I FINALLY got a delivery of my new pot of P38 (Next Day delivery? I don't think so, not at this time of year...), so I could finally take care of the unused holes above the brake limiter valve. This of course meant removing the brake pipes to the top of the valve and then covering everything with masking tape in case of errant bits of filler or other "User Errors"... I've put a smear of P38 on it and we'll see what happens when it's dry and sanded.

 

I've also created an additional bracket to hold the power cable for the starter motor. However, this is a small piece of metal with some holes in it. You don't get pictures of that...

 

Horn wiring done properly.

 

 

And also for the coil and rheostat.

 

 

Brake pipes removed and limiter valve masked off...

 

 

...and a splooge of P38. Sanding will follow.

 

[MrBounce]

Is there time for a final entry in 2024? Of course there is. although it's a bit of a small one.

 

I have continued my war against the horror of the crimp terminal. This time it's the back of the dashboard that's being dealt with. I need Tink to help with the rev counter, so I have left that one alone. However, the voltmeter and the oil pressure gauge were full of the little blighters. I sorted and linked the earth cable for the two gauges, before also sorting out the cables for the bulbs. Once I had finished the terminals and covering them with heatshrink, the pile of dead connectors and bits of wire surprised me. The pile has gone straight into the bin. 

 

Finally I sanded down the P38 I'd used to fill in the holes above the brake limiter valve, and have put the first coat of orange on it. It'll probably need a second coat, but this can wait until 2025.

 

Nicely re-done terminals and connected cables for the additional gauges.

 

 

And the pile of junk left over - bin fodder!

 

[imack]

I hate those crimp terminals with a passion. Only things worse are scotch locks.

[MrBounce]

I hate those crimp terminals with a passion. Only things worse are scotch locks.

Well you won't be raiding my garage bin then   Best place for them. 

[MrBounce]

I don't really do New Year's resolutions, as I have usually broken them by the 2nd of January anyway... However, I had said to myself that I would drag myself in and reconstruct the driver's door. And I have started. As today was wet, but not particularly cold in my neck of the woods, I made myself head into the garage for that very reason. 

 

Originally I was going to finish off the small bit of painting above the brake limiter valve, but it was so wet outside I figured I would head to the back of the garage and get on with things. One of the bonuses of having put rubber mats down is that I have a couple of spares. These are incredibly useful for when you're dealing with panes of glass that need cleaning. They allow said glass to sit on a cushioned environment, but also have enough friction that it's not easy to knock it on to the floor. The driver's door glass was in a hideous condition - not only was it incredibly dirty from storage, but it was clear (see what I did there?!) that I hadn't cleaned it before putting it away. There was even a hint of orange overspray (no idea who could have done that), and the remains of the rubber from where it sat in the winder cradle. Out came a bottle of glass cleaner, a microfibre cloth and the king of getting crud off glass, the razor blade. The amount of dirt, paint and other assorted nastiness which came off was substantial, and it needed a couple of passes either side before it was passable as glass again. I did the same for the quarterlight, but also remembered to cut and stick the window channel in the door frame for the 45 degree angle change, otherwise the glass won't properly sit "home". I then put the glass to one side to dry.

 

I have found that there is a very specific way to rebuild the Midas doors, and it takes a bit of lateral thinking to get it right. First thing is to loosely put the frame in place with screws and then establish EXACTLY where the flocked window edge trim needs to sit (to avoid unnecessary leaks). Then you need to drill holes in the edge trim in order to fit the rivets that hold it in place. The holes for this were already drilled so I needed to mark a line where the holes were in order to drill in the correct place. Then it was on to securing this with rivets. It sounds easy, but it took a bit of time thanks to making sure it was in exactly the right position. 

 

Once this was in, I would normally be moving on to the door latch and winder mechanisms, but for now I need to make enquiries about the door locks, which I have conveniently misplaced. I need to be able to fit it before the rest of the door gubbins, so it looks like the garage is being turned upside down... In the meantime I remembered to fit the door hinges. These are not the easiest of things to fit as it's VERY tight in there. A bit of masking tape to hold a nut in place on a spanner certainly helps. These are good to go, by which time it was so wet outside, the atmosphere itself was extremely damp, which was even affecting the camera lens, so I went inside and ate a warming beef stew instead. More soon!

 

Filthy Glass!

 

Razor - excellent for cleaning off paint and other bits, but look at what else it scrapes off!

 

 

Probably a lot less germs on this now!

 

 

Cut off, then stick in this piece of window channel, otherwise the glass won't sit in the curved part of the channel.

 

 

Quarterlight glass - also a bit minging.

 

 

Prepping the flocked edge trim...

 

 

...and riveted.

 

 

Hinges going in with aid of a spanner and some masking tape

 

 

And all buttoned up.

 

[MrBounce]

Just a short update. I have found the door lock mechanism. Granted it's in "exploded" form at present, but I will hopefully getting my locksmith friend to take a look and put it together. Several years ago he cut some keys for it, so hopefully it shouldn't be too difficult to sort. 

 

I came in after finding it as it was 2 degrees in the garage, and I wanted a bit more warmth...

 

Edit: For a laugh last night, I had a look on ebay for a Mk1 Fiesta lock barrel. I found one set, and it was £100. Nope...

 

Edited by MrBounce, 07 January 2025 - 11:23 AM.

[MrBounce]

It would appear that I have established exactly which way round the shoulders (at least I *think* that is the correct terminology) sit in the tumbler. This took some doing - I had a good fiddle on the kitchen table and by eventually figured out which positions they sat in. I have kept the key in the lock as it keeps the shoulders from falling out. I am not really wanting to do all the trial and error stuff again, so it can stay there for now! Everything needs to be lubricated again; I have some lock-specific stuff to use that my friend gave me, so that will sprayed into every orifice. If it's good enough for a locksmith, it's good enough for me. 

 

Unfortunately for me, I have no specific photos from when I removed the lock from the door - I have zoomed in on an old photo to get some sort of idea, but it's going to take some figuring out. I am usually pretty diligent when it comes to photos and removing stuff. This of course was one I missed, so previous me deserves a slap. However, it was at least 8 years ago, so that would take some doing... 

 

When you figure out what goes where! 

 

Edited by MrBounce, 07 January 2025 - 03:31 PM.