Morris Minor Owners Club

What trafficator switch are you using?

I see several different styles.
Some light - others do not
One style self cancels

Where was the switch mounted on a Tourer?

Got a picture to share?

Happy New Year

Cheers,

Vigil

On your car - it should have a little green light in the end - and self cancel.

Sorry I should have been a little clearer in my post.
I have an early 1960 Tourer. It has the old style turn indicator.
It has a Yellow light on top of the turn unit. These all work fine inside & out.
I want to add the side Semi for trafficators on a separate circuit.
I have all the parts except for the switch to activate the side units.
There are several types – The one from a MGA self cancels.
There are several other models that do not but have a light on the switch.
I have seen a couple that do not light and are very basic.
Being that the side turn signals will not be used all the time.
I am not sure if a light or self-canceling one is necessary.
Being an old guy it might be nice as a reminder I used it and was still activated.
I have seen this set up before – the switch has never been mounted in the same place.
So I was trying to see what switch others have used and where they mounted the switch.

Thank you for your response. I appreciate you trying to help.

Vigil

Rather than add an obviously non-original feature to your dash, which also carries the risk of indicating right with your flashing indicators and left with your semaphores simultaneously, have you considered a semi-concealed double pole, single throw switch in the feeds to the two semaphores? That way, you could choose whether to have flashers only, or flashers plus semaphores (assuming you never want semaphores only).

I'm not very keen on timed self-cancelling, whether the pneumatic (MGA) type or the watch-like mechanical timers. I find that modern traffic requires indicators to stay indicating for much longer than of yore.

Kevin

If you want the trafficators on a separate circuit to the indicators, take the feed directly from the ignition fuse. The best switch to use is the switch for the 2 door Series MM/11 which has a centre off and a bright red warning light in the centre. You will also need the mounting bracket to fit the switch under the glove box. The down side is that the switches can be expensive so look around.
Alternatively the trafficators and indicators can be wired to operate from one switch, see wiring diagram on Series MM website, Tech. Info, http://seriesmm.mmoc.org.uk which is a better solution as trafficators are more reliable if they are used regularly.
The requirement for trafficators is that the switch must have a timer or be self cancelling or there must be a warning light or the trafficators must be visible from the driver's seat, ie through the wing mirrors.

Your car is not 1960 if it has a switch as you describe............

bmcecosse wrote:Your car is not 1960 if it has a switch as you describe............

In October '56 the horn & trafficator control were incorporated into the steering column, replacing the switch described by Mike below. The self cancelling indicator with the green bulb at the end was introduced in March '59.

However I suspect that Vigil may have an American export model and they were subject to different lighting requirements than UK cars. He might even have a Completely Knocked Down (CKD) model, which didn't always conform to the usual factory specifications. So it's quite possible that he has an indicator switch which differs from the standard one fitted to 1960 UK Minors but still has a 1959/1960 built car.

My car is a 1960 Morris Minor export.
I verified the year of the car from the number on the firewall.
The turn signal may have been replaced in the past - It all works - so I am happy.
My car has a 1275cc motor, Transmission, disk brakes & 3.90 rear end.
The seats were replaced with Subaru bucket seats –
They are much better to sit in as far as comfort then the stock seats.
At this point it is to late to worry about originality of the parts of the car.
I use it daily - Mostly to drive Pacific Coast Hwy along the ocean.
It will travel the Freeway fine the way it is set up. I drive to San Diego at 65 MPH.
The trip is 120 miles each way. I have been slowly replacing warn out parts.
Before I replace the interior panels I wanted to have the side trafficators in place.
I have the wiring installed to the trafficators on both sides.
I ran a wire from the fuse block to a relay then through to the (LT) driver’s side.
This wire will connect power to the switch.
Terminate the wires from the trafficators on each side of the switch.
I have not tried it yet – But it goes along with what has been suggested above.
I have Oil/Water temp, Volt & Tach gages under the dash.
I like the dash the way it is with no extra holes.
After reading all the comments I have decided to use the lighted manual switch.
ESM has Semaphore Trafficator Switch (Pattern)
MMCBATH PART NO('S):SWT103A [SWT103A] £15.95

Thank you all for sharing your knowledge. You have been a lot of help on my project.

Vigil.

You do not need a relay for the trafficators, just a wire from the ign. fuse to the switch then each side to the trafficators which earth through the mounting screws to the body. Alternatively pick up the supply from the input P terminal of the flasher unit.
If you have any problems wiring the switch or getting the warning light to work, let me know.

Virgil,

The type of column switch you have does not affect whether you can add trafficators to a car fitted with flashers as standard. Also you can't just add the trafficators to the existing flasher circuit as the feed to the indicator switch comes via the flasher unit, so would make for some interesting trafficator actions! You can 'upgrade' to the later self-cancelling switch, by fitting the later steering column, switch and covers any time.

To retro-fit trafficators, there look to be 2 basic solutions:

• As suggested add a new, fused ignition-fed ciruit for the trafficators and use a separate switch to operate them. Obviously you will have the potential of indicating in two different directions at the same time!

• Do some re-wiring, which is much easier when adding flashers to a trafficator car, and create a circuit similar to the one shown on Mike's link. An alternative to this one, is to use a single flasher unit and a 2-way 5-pin relay, but both of these do involve quite a few wiring changes to the standard set-up. The existing warning light will still work with the trafficators, but you will need to add a new one for the flashers, run from the flasher unit(s) itself.

As an aside, there is a Lucas double pole indicator switch, with headlamp flasher that looks almost identical to the later Minor self-cancelling switch, and apart from needing a small enlargement of the arm cutout in the cover, it mechanically fits in exactly the same way. It is self-cancelling and has 2 independent indicator circuits, so one can be used for the flashers and one for trafficators. The warning light works from one circuit only. I bought one from an autojumble about 15 years ago when looking for a headlamp flasher version, and found the double circuits - anyone know what it would have come from? I would really like to have a spare!!