18 Dec 2024

 18 Dec 2024

Well, to date the Count hasn't been doing much. It is actually cooling its tyres in the garage of another home. Unfortunately, it hasn't been well, so none of the planned drives have happened and won't be anytime soon. 

This is how it should look.

Let's go back a bit;

14 Nov 2024

The car has, over a few days maybe a week or so, started to make a random knocking noise from the engine. Not really sure where it is coming from or what is causing it, but it doesn't happen all the time, though it is definitely getting more frequent and louder. It seems to be deep down in the engine, so lower engine, not upper. 

The engine was a second hand item a fellow Canberra Region Morris Minor Car Club member gave to me when the original (not to the car just original to me since I had owned the car) engine self-destructed following a rebuild many, many years ago. The engine had come out of a Minor he had bought as a modifying project and so he didn't want the engine. The history of the engine wasn't known, well other than it needed a new head gasket as it was blown. So that engine was installed in The Count and a new head gasket added and this is the engine that has taken the car on almost all of its journeys up and down the east coast of Australia and right around Australia as well. It has been in the car for close to 30 years now, so it is probably due some attention and rebuilding.

I contacted a classic Mini specialist, who are relatively close to me, to get an opinion on what was happening, and what the knock could be, and their response was, "It has rear drive mate, we're not interested". Regardless of the fact it has the same engine, in the most part, they didn't want a bar of it. 

A friend in the Morris Minor Car Club of Victoria recommended a Sprite specialist in Sydney who was more than happy to offer suggestions and discuss the engine. It was decided the engine needed a rebuild.

Now before all this I had arranged to have the carby rebuilt. It too had come directly from another car, a late model classic Mini Clubman, a 1.5" SU to replace the standard Minor 1.25" SU. The Mini was going for breaking due to terminal rust, and it looked like had probably never had any work done to it since it was new. The carby was a great improvement over the original and it has been in the car for longer than this engine, without ever being rebuilt or serviced. 

The carby specialist came and removed the SU and took it away for a full strip down and rebuild, he replaced just about anything that could wear and even polished it before bringing it back to fit up to the car. Hopefully, I'll get to see how it has improved once I get the engine back...

23 November 2024

It is always fun (NOT) to have to take the front off the car to do any work on the car and this time was no exception. Lots of unbolting and a surprisingly small amount of swearing saw the front end stripped and all the bolts holding the engine in place removed. A hire company delivered an engine hoist and, again with minimal swearing (this is quite surprising for working on this Morris Minor), the engine was removed from the Morris and put into the rear of the Santa Fe for a trip to Sydney for a Spa and Rejuvenation package holiday.

To date, the engine is still off on its break, though work has commenced already so hopefully it's looking good for a return and re-install late Jan, hopefully at the latest by mid-Feb, it needs to "run-in" properly before April as we're off to Perth for a drive.