Red light on top of dashboard (driver-side) Minor '53

[dominick]

Hi,

After having a '68 beetle as my first car, a '86 2cv as my second I fell in love with a '53 minor a while back and last week decided to make it part of my life. My 'new' minor is from '53 and imported to the netherlands around 15 years ago, drove around here for about 5 years and then was stalled in a museum for about 10 years untill I purchased it.

I don't have a lot of experience with britisch cars, well none actually, so every day I face new adventures and I like it.

I purchased the haynes manual and what I could find was that the red light on my dashboard (behind the wheel) is a ignition warning light but with all the changes in the models I think they were maybe referring to newer models.
So I was wonderign if you could help me out: what is the function of the red light on top of the dashboard (near the steering wheel) do?

Greetz,
Dominick

[smithskids]

Ignition warning light, should go off when dynamo is charging, will come on when you switch the ignition on or if the fanbelt breaks and the dynamo doesn't charge. It looks as though you have a seriesMM or series 2. Is it a sidevalve engine or overhead valve engine?

[gtt1951]

Does your dash look like this?[frame][/frame]
If so, then that red light is your ignition warning light (this is on a RHD car).
I think that the Haynes manual is for Monor 1000 and onwards - the dash picture, and your car, are pre-1955.

[mike.perry]

You need a proper BMC workshop manual. The red lght is indeed an ignition light. Unlike the rest of the lights it has a 2.5 volt bulb and a thin wire coil around the light unit. Do not play around with it as it is easily damaged and replacements are expensive

[dominick]

Ignition warning light, should go off when dynamo is charging, will come on when you switch the ignition on or if the fanbelt breaks and the dynamo doesn't charge. It looks as though you have a seriesMM or series 2.

We went to a local tuning shop and they checked the dynamo and battery and according to them it was charging, battery didnt maintain the power so we had to exchange that one. But the light is still on.

Is it a sidevalve engine or overhead valve engine?

eeeuhm, not sure, I took a picture, hope you can see it from there.

Does your dash look like this?

yes, and my car is also a rhd

Yoy need a proper BMC workshop manual. The red lght is indeed an ignition light. Unlike the rest of the lights it has a 2.5 volt bulb and a thin wire coil around the light unit. Do not play around with it as it is easily damaged and replacements are expensive

Thank you, I am looking for a proper workshop manual but the one I could find took around 4-6 week to be delivered but it is soo addictive when you already have the car on the driveway

[mike.perry]

Morris Minor Series II 803 cc OHV
Found the edit button, for some reason the post runs off the edge of the screen
Yes it could be a 948 or 1098

[liammonty]

Definitely OHV, but not an 803 by the looks of it (from the heater hoses and the carb) - likely a retro-fitted mighty 948 or 1098 (I suspect 948 going by the carb and air filter). The best way to be 100% certain is the oil filter - if it screws in horizontally (i.e. sideways) to the block, then it's an 803. Otherwise, it's a 948 or 1098 for sure. 1953 could have been either a Series MM (sidevalve) or a SII (803 OHV) originally. Someone else may be able to spot some more clues from the picture!

[gtt1951]

Definitely OHV, but not an 803 by the looks of it (from the heater hoses and the carb)

How can you see the Carb, the picture ends just on the edge of the rocker cover?
Have I got a viewer problem?

[liammonty]

Definitely OHV, but not an 803 by the looks of it (from the heater hoses and the carb)

How can you see the Carb, the picture ends just on the edge of the rocker cover?
Have I got a viewer problem?

I think you must have - I can see to the edge of the air filter including the top of the carb. try scrolling the picture to the right - that's what I did!

[panky]

Never noticed that before, if I click and drag the picture up to the top of the screen then let go of the mouse button the full size picture appears

[gtt1951]

Never noticed that before, if I click and drag the picture up to the top of the screen then let go of the mouse button the full size picture appears

I've just done that and Lo & Behold a much larger, more complete image pops up - this is now using my home computer (rather than my work one) - different operating systems and different versions of IE.
Looks to be a 948cc engine with that type of saucepan air filter.

[gtt1951]

Mind you, having done the image "expand" and then gone back to the original view, I now see even less of the width of the picture, than before.
Looks like there is a problem with our website's image viewing facilties - can any "officials" look into this, like the Webmaster?

[MarkyB]

Just use a better browser than IE!
Firefox and Chrome are both good.

[liammonty]

Just use a better browser than IE!
Firefox and Chrome are both good.

Agreed! Work fine for me, and far faster than IE too

[gtt1951]

Just use a better browser than IE!
Firefox and Chrome are both good.

Agreed! Work fine for me, and far faster than IE too

Unfortunately, I can't run Chrome (or update IE8) on my home computer as I'm still running XPpro SP3 and the hardware is quite old. I have Firefox, Opera & Safari, but even these give problems.
On a website that I maintain for another group, I have to include code for image displays that copes with IE browsers.
Looks like I'll have to stop buying Moggy bits and replace my computer

[MarkyB]

XPpro SP3 here too, run fine with 4GB ram and a dual core processor.
Memory for older spec PCs is cheap as chips, 4 GB is all XP can use.

[gtt1951]

XPpro SP3 here too, run fine with 4GB ram and a dual core processor.
Memory for older spec PCs is cheap as chips, 4 GB is all XP can use.

I've only got 2GB of RAM fitted, as there is a problem with the 3rd slot (although I do have a number of spare 1GB cards).It is a single AMD Sempron 2400+ processor, running at 1.67 Ghz - it was a self-build kit many years ago to run Video Editing s/w with a hardware capture card and breakout box (Pinnacle's Studio system) for editing my video camera tape recordings and also capturing move film footage, via a vid cam trained on the projected film image.
Best stop hijacking the original thread though.

[dominick]

Definitely OHV, but not an 803 by the looks of it (from the heater hoses and the carb) - likely a retro-fitted mighty 948 or 1098 (I suspect 948 going by the carb and air filter). The best way to be 100% certain is the oil filter - if it screws in horizontally (i.e. sideways) to the block, then it's an 803. Otherwise, it's a 948 or 1098 for sure. 1953 could have been either a Series MM (sidevalve) or a SII (803 OHV) originally. Someone else may be able to spot some more clues from the picture!

Thanks for your reply,
It does not screw in horizontally.
How can we tell the difference between a 948 and a 1098?

p.s. for the ones not able to fully see the picture, here is a link to tinypic: http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=o76ru0&s=8#.VR6AP1pU2JU

[chesney]

948's have a '950' mark cast into the side of the block, under the manifold.
1098's have an '1100' tag riveted onto the block.