Morris Minor Owners Club

I've got the head on, valve gaps set. Starting to move ancillary over ready to get the old block out the car.

I've just posted about the broken spring on the starter motor another post.

Is the oil pump different on the later 1098 block fitted to a sprite?!
I don't think the old oil pump is going to transfer over. Fml

So the new block needs a spade type drive. These are obviously available online but I need one today or tomorrow at the latest.

For information:-
The spade drive is not a standard 1098cc oil pump drive. The drive would be pin drive with the oil pump drive shaft having a slot in it to fit around the drive pin.
Most camshaft (new and re-ground) supplied today are now spade drive.
I have in the past swopped the drive shaft to suit the engine/camshaft and oil pump drive shaft.
There have been various adapters produced over the years to allow for the swopping around of oil pumps and oil pump drives.
Most oil pump providers now supply spade drive oil pumps suitable for the shorter 948cc/1098cc blocks.
The spade drive oil pump was originally fitted to the longer block 1275cc engine. If you fit a 1275cc spade drive oil pump to a 948cc/1098cc there is a good chance that you will need a oil pump spacer and a revised oil pump cover.
If you do swop the drive shaft to suit the application try and get hold of a drive shaft and gears with a Woodruff key as cold oil can cause the gears to move on the shaft if without the holding Woodruff key. A lot of gears are now just pressed onto the drive shaft without any means of locking them in place.

I picked up an oil pump from Somerford mini in Calne today. It went on and I could use the 3 original bolts (even though everyone told me I'd need to drill and tap a new hole)

The guy in the workshop there advised I open it up and give it a clean as they're full of swarf from the factory. He was right! I had to "modify" the pump housing slightly to fit the original backplate/cover back on but that was easy enough. The engine and box are now back in. Tomorrow I'll hopefully connect up all the ancillaries and have a crack at firing it up.
So there will soon be a running/driving traveller for sale or a non running traveller for sale. Place your bets.

Looking at the last two photos it's difficult for me to understand what exactly will turn the oil pump, I can't see how the camshaft and oil pump mate together.

I think it's pretty poor form for a manufacturer not to sell the pumps in a clean condition. Unless it's a marketing strategy to allow them to fail early and sell more units?

But I bet you're excited to finally get the replacement lump in and fired up. I am sure it'll go fine. Is it best to put the ancillaries on before the engine goes in or after though?

The last photo I posted was the oil pump with the cover removed. The other side has a small 'spade' drive shaft that slots into the back end of the camshaft.

I put the engine and box in with a couple of ancillaries on that are a bit trickier to reach in the engine bay just to make life easier later. As long as they don't get in the way of the lifting straps it doesn't matter if they're on or not.