Morris Minor Owners Club

Had my 71 traveller a couple of years now ,brakes O.K.but nothing special.Some time ago I noticed a split hose on vacuum pipe which I repaired with no improvment making me suspicous if servo ever worked.
On taking it out on saturday (first time since October) went about 300 yards stopped at a junction and brakes were stuck on. I jacked up RHS front wheel which was solid .Eventually got drum off and piston still had loads of pressure on it so took of brake shoes removed piston and took it home on handbrake.

To the experts out there is this just a stuck piston, or servo problem. Should I connect the two brake hoses at servo and bypass it or is this not how to do it.

Bob Reynolds

Obviously you need to check all the cylinders. And I would remove the servo -it really is a waste of space on a drum brakes car.

Did you try relieving the pressure by opening a bleed nipple? If that had done the trick, it would suggest that the problem was that the flexible hose had swollen internally. Hoof on the pedal is enough to push fluid past, but the shoe return springs aren't enough to push fluid back into the master cylinder.

If you do change the hose, chop through it and you'll see how small the bore has become. Chopping the hose also makes it possible to use ring spanners to undo the two ends. At that point, when I did my son's MGB front hose, I discovered that the new hose had such a badly-machined thread that it was unusable. Moral: check new hoses before you start the job.

Kevin