Morris Minor Owners Club

Hmmmm ok so this is and isn't a restoration project. My car is Mot'd taxed has never been welded and is what anyone would consider a good tidy minor.However an unfortunate side effect of my previous life as a car paint mixer means I can spot a defect on a vehicle at 500 yards.
This little excursion in to doing the minor up a bit started out as fitting a set of valve springs three weeks ago and I may have got ever so slightly carried away.

The head came off valve springs were replaced but the carb was a little sad looking so that got a strip and rebuild timing chain a bit noisy so duplex kit fitted engine a bit shabby looking so ill just paint that but the floor of the engine bay has a few scabby bits so painted that. At this point the front panel was off and I glanced at the inner wings those would look so much nicer body colour so stripped to bare metal zinc primed then top coated might as well sort the suspension while the wings are off new top and bottom swivels shockers off cleaned out refilled new track rod ends and the whole lot fitted with polyurethane bushes and a couple of nice new bump stops.

Currently.i have the front bumper and grille down to bare metal those will be painted at the weekend then its door shuts sill covers and on to the back inner arches and new rear suspension.

The joy of minor ownership is ive not spent £500 yet and I basically have new everything ![frame][/frame]

Engine after[frame][/frame]

One totally unwelded 61 year old inner wing in primer.[frame][/frame][frame][/frame] and in top coat with all new greasy bits.

I am using prospray 2k ( 2 pack ) paint on the car this paint scheme uses basically the ICI ( now PPG ) mixing formulas meaning pretty much all minor paint colours are available even million lilac. I am now using an LVLP low volume low pressure gravity fed spray gun hugely expensive at £30 and it gives exceptionally good finish from the gun running off a 2hp aldi compressor.As most of you will be aware 2k paint really requires an air fed mask when applying mine was £85 on Amazon that may sound expensive but as 2k uses probably a quarter of the amount of paint compared to cellulose paint it soon pays for itself. 2k.is considerably less work to apply no need for vast numbers of coats and loads of rubbing down between them and it is considerably more hard wearing than cellulose and a heck of a lot more chip resistant. I'm intending to get the top of the car sprayed professionally as I'm no good at painting roofs.

Looking good, try a stepladder for the roof.

I worked for Hadrian car panels for years so I'm friendly with every painter in town it costs me £400 to get a car painted so ill let them do it lol.

Todays Job last time I strip a cheese grater grille.[frame][/frame][frame][/frame]

Nice work!

Great to see this car being taken to the next level!

I hope you can bring it along to our local branch meeting near Penrith, or even better to one of our mechanics days here in Cockermouth.

Good luck with the rest of restoration, keep the pictures coming!

trabant wrote:One totally unwelded 61 year old inner wing in primer.

Cumbria County Council have clearly never spent much on gritting the roads

It's led a very sheltered life down south I couldn't believe when I bought it that it had never been welded and didn't require any. I cant say I miss the endless months rebuilding door bottoms welding sills spring hangers and chassis legs on. Hence the cunning plan to strip and protect everything underneath.I paid £2000 for the car last year accidentally whilst looking for a radiator for my other car on Gumtree. I'm still sure I pretty much stole it at that price.

Work has been progressing a bit slowly due to work ( appliance engineers are always busy) anyway some nice Nexa top coat arrived the other day so this afternoon I applied the first two top coats to the bumper and grille. No filler has been used on either of these panels any pitting has been covered by multiple coats of zinc 182 primer and a lot of rubbing down. The paint used is Nexa 2k thee coats will be applied the first two will be flatted back with 1200 wet and dry before the final top coat is applied. As I hope you can see the finish is really excellent direct from the gun.

Grille[frame][/frame]

Bumper[frame][/frame]

Stripping underseal off rear inner arch its all looking rather healthy.[frame][/frame]

Looks great!

Lovely stuff. Nice colour too.

Will your grill slats be Birch Grey?