850 replies to this topic

[Steve220]

Hi all,

Well finally managed to find a mini that I could class as a project! A big thanks to Wayne Wright for selling me his 2000/W reg Mini Cooper sportspack.

I was grinning all the way until it started raining heavily on the M40 and it developed a serious misfire and a strong smell of fuel. I immediately pulled over to find the coil pack was lighting up like a Christmas tree with arcing sparks all over the place including one HT lead arcing directly onto the alternator. I managed to dry it all off and get rid of a load of oil surrounding it and it seemed to clear. I got 20 miles down the road in 50mph winds and rain and it happened again but then I lost total power. Finally called the AA out and the bloke who came was great. He saw the arcing and said "we're taking you home, I usually carry a spare ht lead but how many cars these days have them!". So I ended up getting home at 0100 this morning with the car nicely tucked in the garage with what I found also to have lost electrics to the front fogs and drivers lights. Not massively impressed but glad it's home :)









New HT leads have been ordered as well as a few little things just to tidy her up :)

The plan:
Enjoy over the summer
Autumn will be a full strip down, shell reconditioned, subframes reconditioned, engine reconditioned and slow rebuild.

Edited by Steve220, 10 January 2018 - 04:53 PM.

[Minimad100]

Nice starting block there! Hopefully yours isn't as rusty as mine was!!!

[Steve220]

There's a fair bit of bubbling on the upper part of the sills and the usual parts on the front wings so I'm not expecting miracles. It will eventually all be cut out, probably a new front end and fully resprayed back with its silver roof.

[Minimad100]

There's a fair bit of bubbling on the upper part of the sills and the usual parts on the front wings so I'm not expecting miracles. It will eventually all be cut out, probably a new front end and fully resprayed back with its silver roof.

It wouldn't be an MPI without those features... Well mine was horrific even some of the bulkhead had disappeared! The scuttle, top dash and bulkhead were not attached to one another...

good luck!!!!!!

[Fast Ivan]

not the best of starts but that's minis!

good luck with the resto

[scrumpix]

The only way is up! Enjoy the summer  just drive it

[jamesquintin]

I had an issue with my MPI headlights after a respray recently. The earth for the headlights/driving lamps/wipers is behind the expansion tank. You can undo the two nuts holding the tank down and move it out of the way without draining the coolant. 

Take the earth thing apart and give it a good clean. Fixed it for me!

Q

[Steve220]

I'll give it a look! Thanks.

Just ordered a mass load from minisport, minispares and eBay. Hopefully I can get rid of the initial niggles.

[Steve220]

Not sure how - but I bet it's to do with the car drying out - the fog lights work again!

 

 

So now a little bit of work took place. Mainly cleaning up as there's overspray all over the front of the car. Stripped the headlights down to free up the headlight motor as all the screws were holding it tight against the plastic bowl. All metals were polished and put back together with new stainless screws. Got into the engine bay and found this plug, any ideas?

 

 

All the front lights were full of condensation so decided to strip them down to remove them to clear them. Annoyingly one of the screws stripped as they'd rusted (there's a surprise!) so had to drill it out.

 

 

 

Lastly all the light units sat on the warm radiator to dry out :) One thing i had noticed is that 2 of the units were upside down in their bowls, so the drain holes were at the top. Nice.

 

 

Ordered a few bits and pieces for the car today whilst I was bored at work. Hopefully I can start stripping the engine bay down for a full clean next week :)

[ibby4585]

Your not hanging about. I had my eye on this and nearly went for it before you. But the white roof and wheels put me off.

Good luck with it, keep the pics coming.

[Steve220]

Thats material at the end of the day. They can be sprayed :) the wheels will be changed in the near future and the roof will go back silver :) the headlining has a bit of mould on it but I need to look into a new one, will work out well when I have the roof sprayed as the aerial will have to come off to do it properly. You'll probably learn from this thread over time that I'm a massive perfectionist and it will need to be right or I won't be happy.

Edited by Steve220, 15 January 2015 - 07:14 PM.

[Fast Ivan]

that connector is on most mpi's, was on my copper sport, not entirely 100% sure what its for but its often said that it's for the jap spec mpi's with the air con

[Fast Ivan]

so whats the plan then Steve? back to factory spec, any tuning?

[Steve220]

If its superfluous then i'll strip it out the wiring loom along with any other random wiring that's in there. 

 

Engine wise - well i do fancy getting more power out of the unit, but mainly more top end grunt. The engine itself has got a fair bit of power low down. I did think about turbo charging as that's my background with engines, but will see! I might even contemplate supercharging it! lol

[Steve220]

As I was stood down early from work and the wife was writing an essay for her masters I thought it would be perfect opportunity to actually clean the mini!

 

The interior was a bit of a concern as it was slightly dull with a brown tinge on the nickel part. Using a bit of Autoglym interior cleaner and a 'magic sponge' I managed to get them to scrub up nicely! After gave them some leather balm to protect them.

 

Before

 

 

After

 

 

 

Really pleased with the results, especially as when the cleaner was foaming up it was brown with dirt. I also gave the dash a once over and removed some dried on glue from where some numpty has glued the centre clock in.

 

 

Gave the car a wash. Snow foamed, 2 bucket method, sheepwool mit, clayed, snow foamed again, meguiars paint restoration then Gold wax. Really pleased with the results.

 

 

 

 

 

Decided to wash the mats too, not sure i like the red ones but until i can afford some good quality black ones, i got rid of the crap on these.

 

 

 

Also - pulling the engine bay apart to clean parts up and degrease i found that the air filter has been in here some time! Full of twigs and gunk. What is the general consensus with regards to K&N replacement elements? Do they good results on minis?