Morris Minor Owners Club

Hi there. Fin recently (May) ordered a new loom for Mog. I ordered it from the marvelous firm Autosparks, with whom I have absolutely no beef and will entirely refrain from criticizing, I swear (not sarcastic!). But I must have left out somewhere that a) it's from 1959 and is a Series II or b) it's an export model or c) Mog is just bodged up, because the new wire harness didn't fit in various essential ways.

I discovered this when I went to fit the loom yesterday. I got the voltage regulator, my first item, wired up with no trouble; everything matched, right down to the color and shade, length, and gauge of the wires. Then I went to the indicator circuit and everything fell apart, mostly in that there was no wiring for the eight-way relay that Mog uses.

So these are the characteristics of Mog's indicator system as I understand them.
1) There's a lovely indicator stalk coming off the steering column, with a little flashing light at the end. When you flick the stalk up...
2) Electricity is allowed to pass through the signal switch to the flasher unit, which flicks the current on and off with a nice click. The electricity passes to the eight-way relay...
3) And the relay allows the flashing to happen on the right side of the car, while still allowing the second filament in the taillamp bulb to light up in the event of current from the stop-light switch, and/or allowing the second filament in the sidelamp bulb to light up if the light circuit is switched on.

In 1962, I think, at the major design changeover, the taillamps and sidelamps were converted to having separate amber sections for the indicators, and the relay was no longer needed.

So I emailed Autosparks, who are kindly assisting me, and they thought Mog was supposed to have trafficators. Mog doesn't have trafficators, but it has the apertures for them (with little covers in), so I wonder if Mog at one time had trafficators. In any case, Autosparks had made the loom for a car having trafficators and the later-style red/amber taillights and white/amber sidelights, and they kindly added some wiring for to use ESM's hazard-light-capable flasher unit (though now I wonder if that's even usable with the relay).

In addition, the loom was missing the wires for Mog's second Windtone horn -- both horns are mounted on the rear of the radiator cowl -- but I'm starting to think the second horn may have been a dealer mod.

So...what should I do? Obviously I can't wire Mog in if it hasn't got the correct wiring for the indicator circuit. I retain the tattered remnants of the old loom, and I told Autosparks I'd give them as much information as I could from that. But I really want the correct loom. Can the loom they sent me be modified by somebody who's new to wiring?

i have sent you a link, because yes i seem to recall that export cars had different looms..

You should be able to add the additional wires, the trouble is it is not going to look very nice, but at least it will all be hidden in the dash..

Autosparks supplied me with a wiring loom which included extra wires requested, revesing and rear fog lights, combined trafficators and indicators, twin horns, heavy duty headlamp/spotlamp cables etc. The only incorrect part was that the rear section was in two sections which was correct for a Series 2 not an MM. The 1st Heritage Certificate sent to me from Gaydon was for a Series 2 and I had to get them to send me the correct Series MM certificate. It would appear that Gaydon never corrected their records and when Autosparks researched the car it still showed as a Series 2.
The point is that you have to know exacly what is original, what is export and what is a later addition and the best method is to study the workshop manual wiring diagrams and find the one for your car and then check for any differences between your car and the diagram.

I think you would need a loom from a slightly later car, the 8 way relay wasnt used except for export cars like yours until the end of 1961/62. I think if you had this one it would fit straight in. 1959 cars here still used trafficators even though they were well out of date! Perhaps not what you want to hear but it may be easier in the long run to order another loom rather than trying to modify the exsisting one.

I had a new loom made to order with East Sussex Minors for my s11 traveller to include wires for indicators and had a couple of emails and phone calls to confirm my spec before they actually made it up.

It really would be better to return that loom - and get the right one for the 8 way relay. Yes - there are ways to bodge around it - but that's not what you want with a 'new' loom! The second horn is nothing to worry about - but your car obviously has flashing indicators with brake light interruption - which had been long eliminated in UK cars by 1959. Did you explain to the supplier that your car was an export model - left hand drive - with interrupter flashers?

I tried to explain, yes, but prior to ordering the loom I didn't know the differences in export and 'home' cars. I did say it was Americanized, so that would lend itself to meaning 'export' and 'left-hand drive'. But no, I didn't mention the relay -- because I thought it was normal for a Minor its age! But Autosparks and I have been communicating, and they really are very helpful; they believe there is either a whole new loom, or a sub-loom they can supply that will correct the problem. I absolutely agree with BMC that, it being new, it'd be a shame to cut and splice in! But I do appreciate your PM, Charlie.

Hi Fin,
You are correct, that loom is not correct for your spec. Mona is actually the mirror of what you have.

She is a 63 4 door so should be one of the first cars with orange indicators (I think) but there was a change over period where they used flashing side and tails like you have.
In the end I tracked down a US loom and used that because it got me the 8 way relay and an extra horn!
Ill have a look and see if I can find it in a catalogue

Nah, Ive had a quick look and cant figure it out from the listings, from memory, mine was from Bull motif I remember specifying that I had the flashing side and tails when I ordered.
I noticed while I was on their site, that they offer looms with additional circuits in them, like alternator etc

I have also fitted an Autosparks wiring loom for an alternator with no control box plus accessories to my Traveller. The surplus blocked oil filter warning light cable was used for the trailer indicator warning light. The Traveller loom was a lot easier to fit as it did not have all the control box wiring.

I haven't the courage to go near my wiring loom. Nothing on it is original. It took me 5yrs to work out how the indicaters work in conjunction with the semaphores! Unfortunitly, it has various wires for the rear light/indic/brake cluster, But all of them are red! The previous owner/restorer had done it. All works though.
One day!

The wiring diagram for indicators with semaphores is on http://seriesmm.mmoc.org.uk Technical Info

Well, apparently originally Morris just fitted a small group of extra wires to the normal loom, and that made the export loom. So Autosparks is going to send me, for a small fee, the sub-loom. I'll be back for wiring help!

Sounds like a plan!