42 replies to this topic

[josh austin mini city e 82]

I will, I have a compression tester so ill stick it in and see what I get. What sort of psi should I be looking for? And is there anything I need to do before hand? Apart from disconnect the coil ;)

[Fast Ivan]

Give it a good service, include plugs and leads, air filter as well as the oil and filter. you would be supprised at what this can do. Check the tappet gaps. See how it runs after that.

[leroy26]

compression test you do not need to disconnect coil, just take all your plugs and leads off ( label them) connect tester into each cylinder and crank over your lookin for over 155psi and more importantly that all four are around the same psi

[littlemissmagic]

When I got my mini (a 998) we spent a couple hundred giving it a quick refresh and it went on to last me another 4 years with just basic maintance (checking the oil, spark plugs from time to time as it was burning oil a little), until after 110,000 miles the head gasket went. I could have just replaced head gasket and kept it for another few years but decided to get a 1275.

Bought one off here for around £300 which should have been ready to go but turned out engine had seized. Having had a lot of bad experience with buying engines that turn out to be not what they say they are we decided to rebuild it ourselves.
For parts alone + rebore new pistons etc etc it costs us £1500 (roughly) baring in mind we upgraded as much as we could and tuned it up as well. But obviously other than the machine work, we did everything ourselves so it made it alot cheaper. And we could have reused things and gone for a lower spec but we thought might as well :) even flowed the head!

Having never had anyone else rebuild my engines, I have no idea how much it would cost to get it done but on the parts cost for us alone, I would imagine for a engine to be rebuilt well it would cost a fair bit. I much prefer to have a go myself with my dads help because at least you know exactly what your getting and to what standard (but then I am not very trusting! lol)

[josh austin mini city e 82]

Just done compression test and my results were nothing like mentioned ... I got 75psi on cylinders 1,3,4 and 60 on 2 ...

[leroy26]

its done my friend sorry , it maybe just a leaking headgasket tho on a positive note

[Guess-Works.com]

did you have the throttle open ?

[josh austin mini city e 82]

Throttle was open

[Noah]

Well, one benefit of this is that they're all equal ish bar cylinder 4.

I hope for your sake its a leaky gasket, or valve seals etc.

Whip the head off, pour some petrol into the combustion chambers and wait, if it leaks out you know the head is leaking....

[josh austin mini city e 82]

Couldn't it be the valve seats? After all my valves are for ledded petrol.. They might be nackard?

[Noah]

Couldn't it be the valve seats? After all my valves are for ledded petrol.. They might be nackard?

Ahh, well thats likely to be where the leaking is coming from.

You may want to convert it to an unleaded head....

Edited by Noah, 09 February 2013 - 03:44 PM.

[josh austin mini city e 82]

I was reading up on it a while back about my valves being for ledded petrol, a few people said if should be fine for a while if I keep my eye on the valve clearances ..

[sonikk4]

You can use an additive readily available. It will be best to do a leak down test before you go any further now. At least doing that will tell you if its a simple head rebuild or a more expensive bottom end rebuild.

[jakejakejake1]

You could also try putting some oil in the bores, if the results are better with this then it indicates bore wear, and make sure your tappet gaps/ valve clearances are set correctly.
If that doesn't help then a leak down test is on the books.

[josh austin mini city e 82]

Going to do the valve clearances tomorrow I think, is it urgent that I change the rocker gasket when I take the cover off? I don't have another one handy :-S