Caesar the 1275 E - Diary of minor changes

[Vinay-RS]

Whoever worked on this car before had chopped the wires for the reverse light fairly close to the mass of wires that comes into the cabin through the firewall. Anyway, I stripped the ends of the wires of the switch, and checked for continuity using a multimeter, and nothing. So, this suggests the switch needs replacing and I'm hoping I can find one locally.



I stripped the ends of the two green wires coming off the loom and loosely tied them together. When I switched on the car, the reverse light came on, so that is definitely the reverse light wiring. I then soldered on some extensions of wires and fitted bullet connectors on the ends with some female bullet connectors too. I ran them under the carpet and now they are sitting next to the selector until I can get a new switch.



I was very humbled that my little E got invited to a photo-shoot for the celebration of the 60 years of Minis. It's not perfect in anyway (faded paint, dents in the floor pan and subframes, oily engine bay with rust), and far from original (all the mods I've done since getting it), so to get invited to attend was quite special for me. Some friends came through with their cars too. Including an early Pickup that has recently been restored, a Morris Cooper S, an awesome Mk1 Race car, a new MINI GP and a new 5 door MINI. Unfortunately, due to short notice, the person with a GTS and Clubman Estate was unable to join. Here are some pictures from the day.



Peet Mocke, the master photographer. Check out his work on Instagram. Some stunning photography over there!


Pair of mk1s. The Cooper S and a race built Mk1. It sounded so cool!






Kevin's early Pickup. Recently restored and stunning, inside and out.





MINI GP and MINI 5 door.


Everyone was a photographer on the day


Thought this was a neat shot I took after the shoot.

[Vinay-RS]

I've been trying to not buy car parts, but then these two sets of parts came up for sale and I couldn't resist. Original pod speakers for the rear parcel shelf from an 80s Mini and a set of Lucas LR8s that were also a factory option on the 1275 E. They even have the covers, which look awesome!




I also have a Sanyo radio, which I was hoping to use, so these go quite well with that.




Going to make some brackets like Tim suggested and get these fitted. Then to figure out the wiring.

[The_confused_clubman_25]

No ways thats properly retro! , could imagne its hard to come by the original optional extras.

[Vinay-RS]

No ways thats properly retro! , could imagne its hard to come by the original optional extras.

Thank you I think it was a case of right place right time with these. I'm really happy to have found them as I've been keen to get some period optional extras for the car.

[Vinay-RS]

Haven't done much to the car in the past few weeks. It broke down on Wednesday and I thought the mechanical pump had failed. Turned out to be stuck needle valves in the carb float bowl lids. The car doesn't have a fuel filter anywhere in the system and I'm guessing this is a bad thing. Anyway, bought some fuel line and fuel hose and I'll change the lines in the engine bay, cut the rear fuel line under the subframe and fit a fuel filter there. I don't suppose there is a need to fit a second one under the bonnet between the pump and the carbs?

I also, finally sorted out the annoying knocking sound from the rear. I had changed the passenger side shock a few weeks back and I decided to change the driver side one too and did that yesterday evening. Turns out both lower rubber bushes were worn and that was causing the annoying knocking sound. It's nice that it's gone now.

[Vinay-RS]

I forgot to update this thread last week. Haven't spent much time working on the car lately. The Mini has been having some fuelling issues, cleaned out the flexible lines in the engine bay side with some compressed air and then cut the rear flexible line (covering myself in fuel... yay ) and then fitted a fuel filter. The issues seem to have stopped (fingers crossed).

Joined a classic car run/meet to Somerset West. Lots of lovely cars attended including a beautiful E34 M5, a Peugeot 304 Coupe, and a little Fiat Uno Turbo.
Here are some of the pictures.

[Vinay-RS]

Haven't updated this thread in quite a while, but there really hasn't been much progress on the Mini either.

Had a bit of a stuff up in early December, reversed into a tree stump and dinged the rear bumper, so for the end of year car show, the Mini was bumperless and not looking great :\

The Mini was soon after parked up as I went home for the holidays.


I had picked up a secondhand rear bumper that was straight and usable. Cleaned it up and then gave it a good polish and it turned out alright I think.



The Mini is currently parked up as the top and bottom engine steadies are completely stuffed. The bolt has rusted to the sleeve of the top one and I can't get that loose to replace it, while the nut is seized onto the lower steady and the bush is also completely worn. I have the bushes to replace these parts but don't currently have the skill to get the bolts off. I think a hacksaw is needed or perhaps an angle grinder.

[Vinay-RS]

I realised that I didn't update this thread for quite a while. This year I decided to give the Mini a break and not drive it to campus everyday. We also weren't great at organising any Mini meets/runs in the early part of the year. We did have a short run to a friend's estate for a Mini meet in late February. It was a lovely summer day and it was a relaxing drive out to his homestead.







Soon after that, lockdown arrived and the car pretty much sat for 3 months. I did remove the battery and left it plugged into a trickle charger in the house. I figured I'd use the time to do some jobs that I wanted to tackle. First up was the wheel refurbishing. I had seen that original D1s had a machined finish on the lips and webs, rather than the shiny diamond cut finish on the repros. So, I decided to try and replicate this. I worked on two wheels at a time. First the front two and then the rears. Bought a set of Dunlop R7s too, since the old tyres were really old and needed to be retired. Got some new centre caps for the two ones that were damaged too.





And with the new tyres.




During the lockdown, I also did a quick service. The Mini was running quite badly and I figured it was old fuel or perhaps blocked/unbalanced carbs. Drove it for a bit and couldn't pinpoint the source of the problem. Turned out to be a dead plug. Swapped it out and then rebalanced the carbs and the Mini was running well again.

Swapped out the bushes on one of the lower engine steadies with poly ones and then we bled the clutch this weekend. A couple of pics of my friend's Cooper and Cooper S because they are cool


Still to do, need to replace one engine steady bolt and the bush and then need to sort out a damaged bracket on the top steady firewall that needs replacing.

But the Mini is running well again and I am happy

[Vinay-RS]

Minor update. I have been keen to try and sort out at least one of the oil leaks from the car (the one at the rod selector seal). I borrowed a set of ramps from a friend and they successfully fitted inside the Mini with the passenger seat removed.


Gave me enough height to get under the car and make a start at removing the roll pins and the collar.



I was an idiot and snapped the new reverse light switch inside the selector housing... :\ will sort this out later.

In the meantime, I really struggled to get the roll pins out. In the end, we decided to cut off the collar with an angle grinder. Extreme, I know, but I had the quick release kit thing from Minispares and got that fitted afterwards.

I had picked up the anti-leak kit from Minispares too. When we pulled out the seal from the gearbox, we noticed that it already had the metal sleeve inside. I'm not sure how to pull that out, so we greased up and fitted the new seal for now. Unfortunately, it looks like there is still a leak from the same place. I also fitted the selector bias barrel. I messed up the position of this on Sunday and thus I was really struggling to find gears on our first Mini meet/run since February. It was a good turnout and the Mini did run smoothly.


I've adjusted the position of the bias barrel now and the selector does feel a lot tighter.

[Vinay-RS]

Drove the Mini a bit this week and the selector does feel good with the bias barrel fitted.

I was trying to work out if the issue with the reverse light was because of the switch, the wiring or the light. Did a bit of debugging and worked out everything was fine, including the old switch. Dropped out the selector this afternoon, removed the snapped reverse light switch and fitted the old unit back. Now the Mini has a working reverse light!


Next up, find the correct diameter breather hose and plumb the pipe for the crankcase breather into the carbs. And then hack off the seat brackets to fit the extender brackets to the passenger seat.