Morris Minor Owners Club

Although i bought this lovely classic for the shear fum of driving an old car, i would like to know the saftey side of things are there i.e. brakes etc.

i've no idea what will fit etc but i would like to uprate the brakes to discs and also change the seat belts ti the reel one (interia i think they are called)

again all bits of help would be great!!

Cheers
Chris

Static three-point seat belts are safe as long as you take the time to adjust them. The only real advantage of inertia reel is convenience - you don't need to manually adjust them and you can lean forward without undoing them.

There is a much easier way to upgrade the brakes (regular readers are all groaning now) - chase up a set of the bigger 9" front brakes from a Wolseley 1500 - these just bolt straight on and give fantastic braking power!! No need for a servo, or any fiddling with the master cylinder, or drilling out holes in the suspension uprights - or worrying about maybe needing remote brake fluid reservoir etc etc. Just - remove the old brake drum and the hub, undo the flexi brake pipe, remove 4 bolts and pull off the old brakes, push on the new bigger brakes and re-fit the 4 bolts/hub/brake drum/ flexi pipe - bleed the brakes and that's one side done. It's an hour tops per side.

great!!, will get hold of a set of those! cheers

search on ebay there are some on there now

Ssshhh - don't tell everyone !!

The ones on e-bay are from a riley, do these not need different flexible hoses? I think I've found a pair locally so should be joining the elite 'big drum' club soon

Yes -the Riley ones are very different - they do indeed need a different flexi hose, replacement cylinders and shoes are very expensive too - and I am told they give a very heavy pedal - because of cylinder sizes V even larger shoes. The Wolseley ones are 'just right'.

I've got a set of Wolseley one ready to go on Sophie to repace the standard early 7 inch ones I've just taken off. Now that will make a real difference.

Look out, be carefull, any moment now we will be raided by the disc brake thought police!

I have to declare an interest so hope this is allowed

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... %3AIT&rd=1

Dave

I didn't see those, I saw the riley ones though. I wouldn't even consider discs as its not a 'period' mod. A heavy pedal shouldn't be problem and should deter the girlfriend from driving it!

Is it easy enough to convert to minor wheel cylinders?

Easy to convert the Wolseley to Minor cylinders - the Riley is completely different. Many a Minor was fitted with Spridget discs in the old days - I just couldn't afford it, and Wolseley brakes came along free!

Nice one. I'll see how cheap i can get the riley drums and if they need any attention. If its not viable I'll keep an eye out for wolsey drums.

My Land Rover has 10" drums!! Who'd have though anyone needed more than 9" ;-)

I upgraded my SWB Landy to 11" twin leading shoe front drums. Never suffered from fade under any circumstances, but the lack of servo meant I needed to really stamp on the pedal to stop quickly, like when idiots used to pull out right in front of me on a 60MPH road - "oh it's only a Land Rover - they don't go fast."

Carefull you'll have the servo thought police posting!!!

Tch tch - my Landy never had a servo and it stopped just fine !

Must have been converted to Riley drums ehhh!!!

Noooo - far too small for a Landy.

bmcecosse wrote:Tch tch - my Landy never had a servo and it stopped just fine !

I didn't say it couldn't stop quickly in an emergency, just that you had to give it some serious welly. Then after you've got used to driving a Landy, you get into a modern car and nearly throw yourself through the windscreen the first time you try to slow down for a junction