Morris Minor Owners Club

I guess I should have done this before I 'breathed' on the engine but I finally found a nice pair of Wolseley 1500 front drums and back plates complete with new cylinders and shoes It should have been a straight forward swap but I had a few set-backs that stretched the job out a little. I started on Sunday but aborted the job when I found the back plate bolts were knackered, the threads has virtually rusted away and a couple of the nuts simple kept spinning and wouldn't undo - out with the cutting disc. I pinched some bolts out of a spare king pin assemble and boxed it all back up again as it's my daily driver I needed to use it the next day.
A set of bolts for each side and a couple of flexy hoses were ordered from ESM on Monday and arrived this morning bright and early so game on again - be finished by lunch time I said to myself, yeah right Unfortunately the brake pipe connection to the offside flexy had been butchered in the past and was as round as a round thing on round day, on applying a pair of grips it simply collapsed into brass shards No problem, I though, as I didn't have any fittings I'll just nip up to the local motor factors and get a new pipe made up - unfortunately no Whitworth fitting in stock. But they didn't give up and phoned around, finally they spoke to a guy they knew who has a shed full of classics who said he could pinch some off one of his spares cars, it turns out I know him too and I came away from his unit with a pipe off a 1954 MG Magnette axle free of charge, same fittings Although the pipe was the right length I still got a new one made up using the old fittings.

Nowt wrong with the old set up



Wolseley v Morris



All buttoned up



Once I'd got everything together it was easy, the second side took about an hour
What a difference, very impressed and extremely chuffed, a lot cheaper and simpler to do than discs.

Now - how about fitting Wolseley 1500 brakes on the back to balance it all up and improve the braking even more.
They fit easily with very little effort.
I have them on the back of my Minor and they do make a difference.

Are they the same size as the fronts?

If I remember correctly they are 9" dia and similar to the minor in that they have the one cylinder/handbrake lever combo.
When fitting you have to turn the backplates through 180 degrees to bring the handbrake mechanism in front of the axle as per original Minor.
Again a nice simple conversion.

Hmmmmm, are the Riley 1.5 rears the same I wonder?

Well done with the W front brakes. MUCH easier to fit than discs - and every bit as effective. The W rears are 8" diameter - they use the 8" front drums.... And yes they make a good difference, although I have a set in stock - I haven't bothered to fit them to my Trav - it stops fine with the standard rears. But i did have them (50 years ago...) on my Rally Minor - made for great handbrake turns !

Thanks I might keep a look out for a set of rears.
For information please - due to their extra width, do you need to use the Riley 1.5 hubs if the drums are used on the front of a Minor?

No - same hubs. But the R brakes are too much - and give a v heavy pedal. The cylinders and shoes are v difficult (= expensive) to source. The W brakes are perfect...

Surprising given the width of the drums and shoes, I came across the thread comparing the Morris Wolseley and Riley types - the Riley ones are HUGE
I'll stick with my new set up I think

I originally had Riley 1.5 drum brakes on the front of my Minor and yes they are huge and the drums weigh a ton so plays havoc with the un-sprung weight.
They are good but as bmc says spares supply is poor and what is available is pricey even S/H.
With the riley front brakes a constant problem with the snail adjusters coming loose in the back-plate finally convinced me to fit Marina discs to the front so now have a Marina front / Wolseley 1.5 rear combination and it stops very well even without a servo fitted but there again my car possibly weighs about half the weight of a standard Minor.