Discussion - //oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/38275-thminimans-1977-leyland-mini/#entry1077598
Body is a 1977 mini Leyland LE, it was originally purchased from the daughter of a deceased elderly lady, who’d purchased it brand new, when she bought it, she had the shell completely fisholened, to prevent rust, which was a fantastic thing for me as when I purchased it, the only rust was the bonnet and door skins, this was easily fixed and the paint job went on without a problem. It was used as a daily car until I decided I wanted a bit more go to do the fun handling some justice.
Brakes:
The original drum brakes where hardly up to the task of stopping the car, even with the relatively slow standard 1000cc engine, so I had always planned on upgrading the brakes when I upgraded the engine. So, after a fair amount of research into conversions, and weighing up cost’s, I had decided on what I wanted until something popped up for a price very near to what I would have spent on a much lesser quality and condition set I’d have to build up myself, So I grabbed them.
-alloy billet four pot calipers -grooved/vented rotors -EBC green pads -1275GT brake hubs, -ball joints -CV's -braided lines -all brand new
Only due to the 8.4” disc diameter, and the calliper over the top, they don’t fit under 10” wheels, which I was never all that worried about as im using 12” wheels. Some revolution 4 spokes in Black. Cool
Suspension:
The suspension is fully adjustable, from camber, to ride height, to dampening, to castor.
The height is easily adjusted with the use of the high-low replacement cone’s available:
The dampening is adjustable thanks to Gaz shocks with 28 different points of adjustment, they are about 1” shorter than standard, this is to keep the high-lows captive at a lower point.
The front has all adjustable arms, the bottom arms are adjustable for camber, and the front tie rods are adjustable for adjusting the toe. The camber will be about 1.5 degree’s positive up the front, and somewhere between 0.5 and 1 degree at the back. The back is adjustable thanks to some tricky brackets that allow you to shift the angle of the rear arm.
Carb: Is a 45 weber rebuilt by weberspecs and mounted on a 6” inlet manifold (all ported to size), with ram tubes and sock filters, there will be modifications done to the firewall, such as cutting section out, and building a stainless box to seal off, I will also be moving the speedo and other gauges to allow for the box, and will make up a custom dash to house them. The reason for the box, is because otherwise the carb will struggle to get air to it and it also takes pride of place in the cabin unless you seal it out.
Exhaust:
I then got into the mechanical parts, and purchased these very nice extractors, they are a 3-2-1 setup, with a 1 7/8”outlet that goes to a straight though exhaust with one coby muffler so it should sound extremely nice.
Gearbox: fully rebuilt with new bearings and layshaft, best second hand synchro's we could find out of about 3 gearbox's and same with gears, diff is also rebuilt with new spider gears, hardened(competition) diff pin, new brass washer's for spider gears and fibre washers, meaning its nice and tight, not sloppy at all like the old one was. also has a shortshift changer kit.
Cooling:
Radiator is a brand new four core, i also have a 13 row mocal oil cooler but I'm not sure if that will have a place just yet.
Engine:
Head: head has enlarged exhaust valves, mainly due to the fact the origional seats where well worn, I am also running enlarged inlet valves (sizes I cant remember) all the ports are very well enlarged and are ground to flow a whole lot better, it’s fairly hard to explain, but there has been ALOT of metal taken out, around the valve seats, in the ports, and around the stem seals. I will be using brand new double valve springs, with a special locator washer, to stop the inner spring from rubbing on the valve stem, also original mini cast rockers will be used but they are slightly modified to stand up to hp/revs.
Headgasket: (I think) most, if not all of the mini guys in the racing scene in New Zealand use A+ mini/metro engine's, meaning that, even when they bore the cylinder's out, they can still use a standard (ish) mini metro turbo headgasket, the only mod is a brass insert around the water jackets as there is not much space between that and the cylinders. BUT, mines different, mainly because I don’t have an A+ engine, which in this part of the rebuild sucks, because the space between the cylinder's is fairly thin, meaning the aforementioned metro turbo head gasket has some slight overlap into the cylinder, this, in some, or most case might have been sweet, which means, we are going down the path of a custom made head gasket, which is basically a thin copper sheet/shim type thing, completely copper, to be honest, I’m not completely sure the principles of how it seals around the cylinders and water lines, but I’m presuming it’s simply to do with the malleability of the copper.
Block/pistons: bored to 1380, with triumph spitfire pistons. The pistons will be modified: the skirt needs about 10mm taken off, the pistons are also very top heavy, meaning some effort will be put into reducing the weight above the gudgeon pin, some may be taken off the top to reduce the compression, but this will not be known until we have a head gasket and have calculated the capacity in each cylinder. The rods will be slightly lightened and shot peened etc.
Cam: Usually, Cam is a weird little man that lives in Fielding. In this car, it's a tried and tested profile, used in all the works mini's that race at Bathurst, exact duration specs I cant remember, but I think it might actually be a little less than some others, somewhere around the 282 degree mark I think.
misc: new oil pump, new water pump, new clutch
Crank: lightened 1300 crank. It’s about 20 thou under from memory, will obviously be matched with new bearings and so on
Compression ratio: The compression ratio is estimated to be in the high 10's, somewhere between 10.5: and 10.8:1.
Discussion can be attended here:
//oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/38275-thminimans-1977-leyland-mini/
