Adoom's 1981 Mini 1000

[Adoom]

So, grape vine told me about a round nose mini shell that has rego on hold. And all the rust repairs had already been done to a high standard. It's only in primer so you can see the butt welded joins and spot welds done with a mig. It all looks really well done.

It will need minimal filling for paint.

But, there were plans to make it a racecar, so a number of holes have been filled that I probably need and the rear seat and storage pockets have been cut out.

It was also only 15 minutes down the road.

So now it's mine. It had P-Plates in the past, so no black plates.

It was only a stripped shell with doors and a boot lid. He did find me some things from his stores. Front and rear subframes and some suspension bits and glass. But I still need LOTS of bits.

I know of another rusty shell that is being turned into body cuts to fix a racecar. It's also hydrolastic and the current owner wants all the hydrolastic specific bits, like subframes and suspension bits. I've hopefully got dibs on the remaining bits. Engine/box, wiring, interior, trim, the storage pockets and seat panel.

That should see me most of the way to a complete set of mini parts. Of course everything will need to be rebuilt/repaired.

 

Discuss!

https://oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/81726-adooms-1981-mini-1000-discussion/

 

 

 

[Adoom]

Random photos of the bits I have acquired so far.

[Adoom]

It's SO light!

No problem lifting each end onto thingies by myself. Just a little bottom heavy with the pipe where it is.

Got to clean up under the floor and get it ready to chuck some epoxy on there and seam sealer.

[Adoom]

I made a cone compressor so I could finish disassembling the front subframe. It owes me $40 but there is enough rod left to make another. A bought one is $99. So... Winning?

M14X2 doesn't seem to be a common size for threaded rod, I had to get it from a proper fastener supplier.

 

[Adoom]

I've got most of the underseal off the underside.

Starting off with the heat gun and some narrow paint scrapers with the corners ground off.

Then wet it down with turps. I started off with kerosene, but it takes ages to evaporate. The turps seems to work better, it's the cheapest solvent I could find. $5 per L when you get it in 4L. It evaporates, but not as fast as thinners(which is super spendy from Mitre10).

Agitate the wet turps with a brush and steel wool to dislodge/dissolve the underseal.

Wet it down some more with the brush.

Make a big mess on the floor.

Then use a rag to wipe up all the dissolved underseal.

Change the rag when you run out of clean sections.

Repeat until no more underseal.

I decided to remove all the bent strips of metal they use to hold the brake and fuel lines, etc... down. I'll put rivnuts in and use p-clips instead.

I also did some panel beating along the bulkhead seams to tidy up the edges and make them sit flush.

The spinning death wheel uncovered some pin holes around the front end of the drives side sill. So I went exploring.

Looks like a really straightforward repair. I'll replace that section of inner sill and the little bit of floor. And I'll have to re-use the vent thingy and make a new outer sill section.

Looks like 1.2mm... I'll have to get some. The 1.6mm I have is a bit overkill.

 

The front end has kissed something once upon a time and the area below the headlight has been pushed in about 10mm. I've had a go bashing it out but it's not keen to move.

The front panel is rusty all the way across behind the bumper lip and the bonnet slam panel doesn't look so good either.

I can get the whole front panel for $300, it's not worth the effort trying to repair what's there.

The small panel below the headlight also needs replacing, but it's not available separately. Hopefully I can get it cut from another one. It's all curvy so I'd rather not have to make one.

  

 

[Adoom]

Cleaned out most of the underseal under this guard. Didn't find any rust just redy browny paint.  I need some of those rubber gloves the cow midwives use... so I don't keep getting the black all up my arms

[Adoom]

This just arrived, it is the "cheap" non-genuine front panel. Still $300 in NZ, twice what it costs in UK. I've not checked if it would have been any cheaper to import it myself.

Minor shipping damage. It was just in bubblewrap. The end of the bumper lip is bent. 

I think I'll go over the edges with a file, some of them are quite sharp.

It looks okay, the ugly spot welds are mostly covered by the grill and bumper. Hopefully it fits to the guards without too much work.

I guess I'll have to remove all the black before I can paint any of it. I'll epoxy the backside while it's off the car.

[Adoom]

So I got a CGA3DE from PickAPart. $250 with inlet manifold, sensors, injectors, fuel rail, TB, alternator. Extra $19 for the loom with all the engine side connectors. 

Carjam said it had done 140000km.

I suspected a blown headgasket because there was a little white foamy shit around the oil cap. I was already 1 hour in(when I remembered to check under the cam cover), so thought I can deal with a blown head gasket and kept going. Fucked my 14mm socket using the impact gun, with lots of 14mm bolts to go. Packed up and drove to repco, got a $15 impact socket. Back to pickapart, someone else has the crane..... 3 hours later it's in the trailer. 1 hour drive back home.

Looks like it's not had frequent oil changes. Took the sump off, oil left in there was kinda brown. There was a bit of old black oil buildup, but it's thin and should come off easy. Haven't inspected the bearings yet.

It looks like the cam chain has been changed, they used ALL the red RTV closing it back up.

Pulled the head.... NOT a closed deck like internet people suggest. But no sign that the gasket had blown anywhere....

Revisit carjam and look at the odo history.... Seems it was driven regularly up until 2015.... then stopped. 

So could all the water in the oil have been from condensation for sitting for years??? Maybe it was run briefly before it went to pickapart and that foamed up the oil.

I guess I will strip it right down to inspect and also make it easier to clean properly.

[Adoom]

Aaaaaaaaand it's a bit fucked.

After cleaning, yes it had blown the head gasket, the sealing ring on #1 had failed and it was blowing into the water jacket.

The play between all the valves and the guides is 3 times what it should be. So new valve guides, at least.

#1 cylinder has a brown mark(rust?) I can feel with my finger, and it doesn't come off. So a hone, at least.

#2 big end bearing has a big pit in it. So new big end bearings. Main bearings looked...okayish.

Full gasket set is >$400!

Head bolts are stretchy ones, so a new set is $50

The deck surfaces have oxidation that doesn't clean off. I was quoted $230 to resurface them.

I think that was it....

I'm cutting my losses on this one. I'll use it as a dummy for fitting.

I'll get a known good engine later.

[Adoom]

I realise there have been no photos for a while and people love photos.

Putting the engine back together went a lot faster with no internals, only the crank so I can have the pulley for clearance checking.

 

The throttle body on these things is crazy. They have managed to fit throttle, tps, cold start wax plunger thingy, combined idle-up and IAC solenoid( it has 5/6 pins so I thought it was a stepper, but the manual says solenoid so there are two solenoids, or one that does two thing), MAF and IAT all into one unit!

I think the 2nd plug on the TPS is for the idle switch and is only on the automatic cars.

 

I also chased some rust with the cut-off wheel.

 

[Adoom]

Filling in the hole I made.

[Adoom]

On Saturday I went on a mission to Waipukurau and collected a mini bonnet.

It had some cracks around the edges. I've already welded those up, as well as welding the corners.

The front ends of the support ribs have rusted away. There is enough left of one so I know what it should look like. The ribs will be easy to remove. As far as I can tell, the rear end of the ribs are only held on with two tack welds each.

There are also some rust holes along the front edge of the bonnet, under the chrome strip, they shouldn't be hard to fix.

 

[Adoom]

Filled in some more hole. Threw some paint at it.

Made the closing panel. But still need to make the vent thingy.... it would be so easy to have no vent. But I can't do that....

Instead of making the vent thing, I procrastinated by filling in this hole.

And removing this bracket that was squashed, so I could flatten the floor a bit and reshape the bracket.

Apparently these are not actually jacking points, they are used in the factory to hold the floor assembly to a pallet thing as it moves along the production line.   

[Adoom]

I used as little as possible of the vent shape because it was a bit thinner.

Some more paint where the spot welds aren't.

Done.

[Adoom]

But I didn't like the look of this.

Did some cutting and it was double plated. So cut it all out.

Lots of gouges from who ever was in there last.

I decided to fill them with weld because the jacking point bracket and the back is not being accessible because the box section is behind it, made patching the area not feasible.

 

[Adoom]

And then...

I know it's not really ideal to be painting over the existing surface rust. But some Zinc It has got to be better than nothing at all. I'll shoot some penetrol and cavity wax in there once it's painted.

I'm assuming epotec epoxy primer won't stick to the penetrol.... but I want to use something that will creep into all the seams (that 100% will have rust in them) before I seal over them with epoxy.

 

[Adoom]

Much better. Just got to linish the welds and trim that edge. The other side jacking point has a reinforcing square around the hole... I doubt I'll ever use that jacking hole ever, let alone enough to dent the area around it... But if I don't add the reinforcing square, it won't match the other side....

[Adoom]

Other side. And same double plating over rusty metal.

I think the sill has been replaced before. That hole at the top looks like it was caused by a chisel. And the flange on the left has been partially cut off.

Clamping a bit of copper behind the holes so I can weld them without making bigger holes.

And fixed all the cuts and nicks. I also used the vacuum and compressed air to clean out the sill and the inside of the crossmember that goes across the car.

[Adoom]

You get the idea...

[Adoom]

PBT took forever to ship the grill I bought from Blenheim.

I already have the top bit on the bonnet I bought.  It's pretty straight, just missing some rivets.

I will be able to use the grill and the bonnet to align the front panel.