Morris Minor Owners Club

I know this is about a M*tro and you'll decry me as a heretic for even considering posting it on here, but there is a tenuous link, I guess.

How many times have you been into a scrappy only to find that the Metro you want to cannibalise for spares has a bonnet that will not open no matter how hard you pull the release lever? [This is tenuous... get on with it]

Well, doing my regular fluid check on the fleet, I yanked on the yellow release lever only for it to make an unpleasant crunching noise - sounds rusty says I. Problem is, the bonnet release thingummy has seized solid. I can pull on the cable, but it's stuck fast.

Could anyone PM me a way of getting the bonnet open? The engine bay is fairly tightly packed and I can't see the cable emerging from beneath the car.

You guys are my last hope before I take it down to the local hostelry and attempt to befriend the scallys and joyriders.

Angle grinder.........................

Fair possibility... as is dipping the whole of the front end in a vat of Plus-Gas. Ideally I'd like to be able to get at the engine without wrecking the rest of the car, despite it being worth only the value of mixed metals. We've become rather attached to her over the last 16 years (her birthday's on May 15th) but without an opening bonnet, an MoT pass looks more doubtful than usual...

I had this on my mum's Rover metro - the plastic adjuster on the end of the cable had fallen apart (probably when it got rusty, therefore stiff).

We found out the hard way when she left her lights on
The AA merely put jump leads to the starter motor from underneath to get it going, then said she'd need to get bonnet sorted herself

I managed to get it open with one person using jiggling/shaking and yanking on the bonnet whilst the other person pulled the lever.