Morris Minor Owners Club

torque steer as you described is 99.9999% sure to be a problem with the axle mounting to LH spring. (probably not a coincidence that bump stop has moved either!). Torque steer on rwd is far from impossible, but does trequire one side of the axle to be not properly secured.
A loose / broken spring mount is more likely to give unexpected scary effects when cornering hard and not much problem at all when driving straight.

Axle mounting: Looking is a good idea but as everything is under load you won't see any movement unless..
Get a crowbar (or something similar) and attempt to move the axle relative to the spring perch / axle mount.
It is possible that the axle has fitted on top of the spring location pin and it hasn't gone inside the hole in the spring perch. This would allow the axle to move under torque (it rocks on the pin as the bottom of the perch is only loose against the rubber shoe instead of sitting tight on the spring.

If the U-bolts look a couple of mm shorter on that side - this is a giveaway.

This is very common, it is either loose U-bolts or the axle has been bolted down without locating it properly against the spring so it slides about on the spring perches.

Anti roll bars do not increase understeer on vehicles with a leaf spring rear end and independent front suspension. They reduce understeer by resisting the pitching of the front of the vehicle and increasing traction.

ARB very much does increase understeer - UNLESS the increased front end stiffness is matched by increased rear end stiffness - ie 7 leaf springs. A lightly loaded Trav does tend to oversteer at times - and so an ARB may help there. By the far the best way to minimise understeer is by putting a little -ve camber on the front suspension - then an ARB could perhaps be used to balance it all out.

But the problem is that the rear is already stiffer than the front. The ARB stops the front wheel camber going increasingly +ve. Dialling in more -ve camber will help but if there's still loads of body roll it won't help much as the camber will still become increasingly +ve. Stiffening the rear of a minor is a bad idea as they are already plenty stiff enough. You would have to have a very stiff and well developed front end to counter pitching without an ARB. You clearly have not driven many Morris Minors with an ARB fitted.

chrisryder wrote:what do the wheels look like (location-wise front to rear) using the wheel arch as a reference?

i know springs usually have 3 straps/clips sort of keeping the leaves together. 2 one side of the axle and 1 the other. i can never remember which way around they're meant to be, i recall it's meant to be 2 in front and 1 behind the axle.

i doubt it makes much difference which way around they go if both sides are the same, but it could make a difference if they're opposite to each other!

this isn't really what you want to hear, but if this car is new to you, is it possible the spring hangers have been replaced at some stage, and that they're not perfectly in the right place?

This is wrong, the bolt that holds the springs together and locates the axle is not central. The side of the spring with the two straps must go towards the front of the spring. It's hard to tell if they are correct from the pictures. The ARB ends are fitted the wrong way round though and the bushes look like they need replacing.

I know this is really off-topic, but can't agree m_h, and yes I have tried an arb and rejected it. The rear of a saloon is soggy in the extreme! Until it flops onto the bump stops anyway - which is hopeless of course. I believe it doesn't matter which way round the springs go - but I would make sure they are both the same, and yes I do believe I fitted mine with the two clamps in front of the axle. If you can't find anything else - do pull the half shafts and check them.

It is off topic, but because of your original comment about the ARB. The rear springs on a Morris are only soggy if they are old and tired. New springs should be firm and more so than the front of the car. The soft front suspension makes any pitching under cornering worse and an ARB helps with this. While you may see it as a bandage cure it stabilises the car with or without a higher spring rate than standard and helps correct a characteristic of what is not a perfect suspension design. Even if it is counter-intuitive to the old adage that adding a front ARB (or a stiffer existing bar) increases understeer and a rear ARB (or stiffer existing bar) increases oversteer. This is not unique to the Morris Minor and many their cars with similar suspension benefit in the same way as they suffer the same handling flaw.

As for the rear springs, the fact is that bolt in the springs is not central and BMC specified that two clamps should go to the front. I'm not sure if this would have an affect but why chance it?

We can only agree to differ on the ARB....... I can say that my TR7 has ARBs front and rear, and I have relocated the front one to improve the anti-dive, and the car corners beautifully flat. Even though it has soft/long travel suspension. The point is - it's well balanced with ARBs at both ends........ As for the rear Minor springs - any saloons I have tried have super soggy rear suspension - even my Trav with relatively new 7 leaves is best described as 'soft' although some might say 'compliant'. Many get confused because the car quickly flops onto the bump stops and then of course the suspension is 'hard'. I'm sure the bolt IS in the middle - this has been discussed many times before, and as far as I know there is no specific BMC guidance of which way round to fit them. Can you show us a source m_h ?? But as I already said it surely makes sense to fit them both the same way round, and also (I think) to put the two clamps in front of the axle. But even if the other way round - they won't be likely to induce rear axle steer.

Well I didn't think you'd agree! I really think you should drive some minors with any of the ARB kits that have been available fitted. They all do the same thing. The bump stop is a bit of an issue, especially as they are so tall, but there should still be at least 1.5" between the bum stop and the body. Of course the difference between a new and saggy spring is night and day. Even a 4 leaf spring (three leaves removed from a traveller spring) feels firmer than a tired spring. As for the spring thing, I've also been through this a lot of times, I used to work for a Minor specialist, I can assure you BMC did comment on both the fitment and the position of the pin on 5 leaf springs, wether I can find this is another matter, I don't have the access to the materials I used to but for some reason a lot of people feel the need to argue the toss over this matter.

SORTED!
Just finished road testing - as is so often the case, it was simple!
The u-bolts were a bit loose, due to compression of the rubber pads and springs themselves I guess. Now all tightened up to a reasonable degree. One of the rear dampers was almost empty of oil, the other didn't have much. Also one of the front dampers was a little low.
It has transformed the handling!
I reckon that the next task is to remove that rather useless looking ARB.....

Thanks so much for all your help folks!

Dominic wrote:I reckon that the next task is to remove that rather useless looking ARB.....

actually i'm rather quite fond of them...[frame][/frame]

BMC

'and as far as I know there is no specific BMC guidance of which way round to fit them'

The BMC Service manual section I. 4

"The spring must be replaced with two spring clips forward of the axle..."

Taupe

Ooooooooh - thanks Taupe! That's certainly how I fitted mine -just wasn't aware of the specific advice.

An update - Seems the strange directional instability was caused by the dreadful over-wide remould tyres. The whole car would rock wildly side to side when pushed at the rear wing, indicating overly soft side walls.
I've now just fitted a new pair of Toyo tyres (kwikfit were brilliant, immediate fitting, no charge except for a donation to their coffee & biscuit fund!)
The car has now stopped wandering, and remains stable when accelerating and decelerating. Next month I'll treat it to new tyres at the front, remove the anti-roll bar and have the tracking properly set up. It should then be much more fun (though less challenging!) to drive

Great success! I use at least 30 psi on the 155 tyres.

They're at 30 right now Roy, will experiment to see what gives the best results for me.

New Toyo tyres all round, removed the anti-roll bar, and had the wheel tracking aligned properly (it was slightly toe-out) and it now handles beautifully! Drives straight & true whatever power setting. Next job is to refit bump stops and rebound pads, none on the front (nor holes for the bolts). So careful driving and avoiding bumpy roads until next weekend at least!

Does anyone have any measurements for exactly where to drill for the front bump stops please? Or is it sufficient to align the head of the stop with the slight grease mark from contact with the trunnion top?

Dom

See workshop manual page K11.
Regards
Declan

Cheers Declan

Now truly sorted!
Just spent the weekend removing the old axle, as it was leaking oil, to find the spring perch on one side was totally rotted out. Explains perfectly the strange rear wheel steering.[frame][/frame]