Morris Minor Owners Club

the position of the damper arm -- or anything to do with the damper -- can't account for the lack of spring action, Quite correct,but it indicates that there has been a collapse or misalignment of some sort. If the chassis at the point where the front torsion bar mounts has torn or disintergrated then the torsion bar can move upwards with the wieght of the car and cause the suspension to move upwards as well reducing the gap from the top of the trunnion and the bump stop.We really need to see a shot of the inside where the eye bolt comes through the chassis leg to eliminate this. Cheers and good luck with it

I'm afraid I agree with Rob - looking more closely - the car has buckled and there is a nasty 'fold' in the under bodywork - at the rear of the inner wing, just in front of the rack. The damper arm is too near the front of the 'slot' - I noticed that earlier - but assumed it was just a production tolerance thing. I suggest you hold a decent long straight edge along the bottom of the chassis leg at the front suspension and you will see what's wrong. The car has either had a hard frontal which has been bodged up - or it has been damaged with excessive serious suspension bottoming, and it has I'm afraid done some pretty serious damage to the structure. Will need a porta-power (or a steel beam and a puller!) to straighten it all up - after the chassis leg has been removed, and then a new leg welding in. I fear other problems may come to light - so survey the whole car/chassis/underframe very well before starting the repair.

Yeah, the straightedge idea had occurred to me. My thanks again to everyone (though I do wish I were reading good news ).Where would one get a new leg? BM appears to offer chassis legs, but which one would I need? Could one be made instead and be of required specs, to save on shipping?

Also, there's a graphic in the workshop manual -- R.17, or page 385 of the .pdf -- that's for checking the straightness of the frame. In your experience, is this method useful? It's difficult to know exactly how Mog should be changed at an American body shop, my mechanics tell me.

Check both sides - you may need both. They have internal bracing to carry the tube through which the lower suspension arm fits - so 'home made' while not impossible - would not be easy, or realistically worth while.

I need to get that blooming book scanned ... it has drawings for an alignment tool which you can use to check/set the front-end after a serious accident.

This book has the same title and similar looking pictures, however mine is in an A4 format http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Morris-Mono---Con ... 5002r18900

Here are three images which if you can stitch them back together will give you the tool that you need for checking that everything is in correct alignment: http://www.zen30458.zen.co.uk/mmoc/alig ... ixture.zip

Also these may be of some use:
http://www.zen30458.zen.co.uk/morris-structure1.jpg
http://www.zen30458.zen.co.uk/morris-structure2.jpg

And
http://www.zen30458.zen.co.uk/mmoc/alig ... ctions.jpg

Aha, my thanks, Alain! The 'morris-structure1.jpg' photo is exactly the diagram of which I spoke. These are for MMs -- will they still work for 1000s?

I guess so Fingolfin... there may be small differences, but there's only one way to find out and that's to start measuring. It was all done back in the day when we used proper imperial too.... Best of luck with it, fingers crossed the body shell is ok.

Hi!

I've recently become 'closely aquainted' with the sub-structure, having totally dismantled my Morrie to repaint the underside.

From looking at photo 1 it appears that the chassis rail has a serious problem... it should be one continuous straight box-section from the front end of the car back to the cross member under the seats, but it appears to have a bend in it (hard to see though). Look at the bottom suspension mount point, where the lower end bolts through the chassis leg. They often rust out in that area because there is a inner stiffner plate inside which traps dampness.

Looking closely at the loads, you will note that the engine mounts are at the front of the chassis legs, so if there is rust at the suspension mount point, the front end of the car will sag DOWN, giving exactly the problem you appear to have (the cracking of the bodywork right above the steering rack suggests this). If it's not rusted out, it may have been in a crash. Whatever the cause, there is something badly out of whack in the front, and it will most likely be at that lower suspension mount point.

The bad news is, this is serious: I would most definitely NOT want to drive a vehicle with rust in the suspension mounts. It may drive OK until you have to swerve for something, at which point it might totally collapse in the front end.

The good news is, the Morrie is a very easy car to fix. The engine and gearbox can be taken out in a couple of hours, and those chassis legs can be replaced (I have a couple of new ones on the way thanks to ESM spares - see http://www.morrisminorspares.co.uk/ ). Once the old ones are off, the rest of the front end is just made up of a few flat panels which are easily realigned - the only tricky part will be getting everything lined up correctly.

It may cost a bit, but once you get the chassis legs sorted out, you can be confident that you have a solid structure, so if someone pulls out in front of you and you have to swerve or hit the brakes, the car will do what you expect. I've heard that these little cars have a very stiff chassis when in good condition, and good predictable handling which was highly regarded in their day, although I haven't driven mine enough to have really tried it out!

Here's a picture of the chassis leg and lower suspension mount on mine (car on it's side, looking from the front backwards and up through the engine bay). Note the bolt hole for the bottom of the suspension and the large rust hole I have ground out. Mine was still straight but had some cracking and rust around that suspension mount point on both sides, so I decided to replace the front half of the chassis legs rather than try to patch it up.

http://pics.livejournal.com/bubblesthem ... 02c7y8/g51

There are various other pics there showing different angles.

Good luck!

Wonderful info, Oilypaws. (Also a good name.) Mog was in a crash two Augusts ago, and hasn't really been in use since. The collision (with the ground -- the poor thing flipped onto the side in a ditch, after fishtailing wildly on fresh gravel) was on the opposite side, so I would have expected a suspension problem to show up there rather than at the furthest point away. But physics is weird, and the collided side (the right) has been strengthened. Though of course I'll be checking the entire structure VERY well.

I've been hoping I wouldn't have to take out the engine and transmission, but oh well. Can't be helped now.

ESM offers "repair sections," along with the full-length replacement leg. Does anyone have any experience with the repair section? Is it a viable alternative, or should I go with the total replacement? There are also half-length replacement legs, as Paws used. Should I go with that instead of the full-length?

Repair section here: http://morrisminorspares.co.uk/shop/pro ... 37f69a997f
And full-length here: http://morrisminorspares.co.uk/shop/pro ... 37f69a997f and here at BM: http://www.morrisminorspares.net/shop_item.php?ID=2741
I assume I shouldn't get the 'imported' ones -- I've read bad things on here about Asian replacements.

this info would have been very helpfull at post no one

I should say that this is partly theoretical - I have found it to be relatively easy to dismantle the car, and the bare shell is so light I can turn it over by myself, making it easy to work on. However, I haven't actually replaced a chassis rail yet... hopefully it isn't too difficult. I may enlist the help of a friend who is a professional welder, though.

Sorry Kennatt -- I direct everyone to the restoration article on my car in every post, which has in-depth information about the car, so as not to repeat myself too much. I figured it was working. I'll be more careful in the future.

I think you had better go with the full length legs - and do the job properly. And - yes indeed - would have been useful to hear about the ditch run right at the beginning!

Haha, like I say, BMC, I'm sorry -- I just figured wrongly. Of course, at the outset, nobody thought it was a structural problem -- especially not me -- I'm new to all this! (I feel like this happens often on here...and I'm pretty sure it's my fault. But self-flaggelation never got anyone anywhere. )

Moving on. Immediately upon learning it could be the chassis leg, I asked BM to prepare me a quotation on a full-length UK-made replacement. (Don't want to skimp out on something so important.) The leg itself was about $135.20...and the quotation has been prepared...let's see...$220.17 with shipping and air insurance. That's not as bad as I expected. All right, once I get paid I'll order that. Let's hope I don't need two!

While we're on the topic, how does one attach this? I assume there's welding involved? My dad has a high-power arc welder that would burn right through anything except inch-thick steel, so we can't use THAT.

And does anyone suppose I ought to get a new center crossmember while I'm at it? They're actually about half as expensive as the new leg. And might I need new top and bottom front crossmembers? Perhaps there's no way to tell without photos there too.

You absolutely may well need these parts - which is why I suggest a full survey of the car before deciding what to do. And then buy the parts all in one bundle - which should optimise the shipping costs at least, and may earn you some discount from the supplier.

If one leg is bent, then the other will be too ... I'd run through the instructions on checking the alignment that I posted, that will at least give you some idea of what is out of wack ... I'll try and get the rest of the book scanned & posted to google books (they can deal with the copyright issues - although I doubt the copyright owner will be too fussed), since it has a whole mess of useful information for people in your situation (I bought the book when my first morris was in a similar condition, however I bought a different car since the price of the new one was the same as the jigging alone - nevermind all the replacement parts)

It does look to be a VERY interesting book!

In case anyone missed the other thread on this car and the accident it had been in... http://www.mmoc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=30391



Fingolfin. Do you still have the trailer that brought the car? If so, and if it is fairly rigid, you might get the car on the trailer and then level the trailer up so that it forms a nice parallel and level surface to measure from. Both sides of the car should sit at the same angles and a flat surface will help you to compare the sides without having to spend money on having it done professionally. Certainly good enought to spot the problem areas, even if not good enough to 'jig' it all straight. I'm sure someone has a copy of the side view of the car with the dimensions of the heights of various components realtive to each other. I recall seing something in one of the Minor manuals about this as a page to read before setting up the suspension ride heights. Anyone?

I'm just about to get my Lowlight shell up on the big frame for the paintjob so I will be able to take any pics or measurements you need. Should be ready in about a week.

Good luck.

Rob -- wonderful idea, but at the time we bought it, the suspension problem didn't exist, and it was perfectly driveable. So no trailer. Nonetheless, you may be on to something, and I imagine I could find a suitable trailer to check it on. Good idea.

A problem comes to mind, though: if the tire is riding on the bump-stop, how can I drive it (even a little distance) without tearing up the wing?

Very carefully! The wing looks damaged anyway - almost certainly all that area is going to need quite extensive re-construction - so I don't think you can make it any worse!