Morris Minor Owners Club

Just as the title states really , how easy is it to fit a new screen rubber to a 1954 split screen ? I seem to recall this subject being covered in the past with people stating that its a bitch of a job ..... even for the professionals !

It's rumoured to require infinite patience, two-and-a -half pairs of hands and a huge swear-box! The average windscreen fitting service are unlikely to undertake the job either. There are folks on here who've done it 'reasonably easily'. Don't lose or damage the chrome insert either... they're unavailable. Good used ones are rarer than rocking-horse doo-doo, and can fetch three-figure sums on a well-known auction site.

Ah right well the splitty I went to see this morning seem to be not such a good buy after all then the more I look / think about it !

What was it like overall?

Did mine by myself in a couple of hours. If you get stuck, tea and chocolate bikkies often works wonders in getting my assistance.

RobThomas wrote:Did mine by myself in a couple of hours. If you get stuck, tea and chocolate bikkies often works wonders in getting my assistance.

Wow that's good to know and your not too far away either !

Well to be honest in was in very good condition generally with a very good underside , not rot no welding, original coating, nicely detailed engine bay and nice sweet engine. The drivers door had a bit of play in her but I could see that there was some slight play in the pin, all the door bottoms were solid and so was the boot lid, the screen did let in a bit of water as he was washing the car as I turned up hence my query, concern's with the latter. It had a very good interior with just a small two inch tear , rot in the driver seat at the top. Its had an unleaded head conversion and a duplex chain .The oil pressure however rose to 40 psi when slightly revved but then dropped to 20 psi when idling where as my 1969 1098 model is 55 psi when slightly revved and 45 when idling.Not sure if this is the norm for a 803 engine. And the other thing that's putting me off is the price !

Oil pressure sounds pretty average for an A-Series lump. 25psi at idle (hot) is good. The brief description you give sounds like quite a good car. I would expect to pay £4K or so. My late model splitty doesn't sound quite so appealing. It was restored nearly 30 years ago and looks very original. Needs a few bits doing to it now and I paid (dealer price) much more than £4K for it last year.

When I did mine I first took it to a professional who stuffed the job up and apologised and gaffer taped it in so I could get home. Next weekend I armed myself with sashcord, soap, a new rubber and some variously sized wooden wedges. Took about two hours and much cursing,

palacebear wrote:Oil pressure sounds pretty average for an A-Series lump. 25psi at idle (hot) is good. The brief description you give sounds like quite a good car. I would expect to pay £4K or so. My late model splitty doesn't sound quite so appealing. It was restored nearly 30 years ago and looks very original. Needs a few bits doing to it now and I paid (dealer price) much more than £4K for it last year.

It is a good looking car and if he dropped it a bit lower I might be up for it but he's a dealer and wanted £6495 and will only drop to £6250 !

I think I'd be expecting near-perfect for that kind of money. You can get a pretty clean low-light saloon for only a little more than that.
Still... at prices like that there's still hope for those of us who are considering selling!

Yeh it is rather steep .Me thinks I'll give it a miss and continue my search .

Not many around at present, unless you're within easy reach of East Anglia area! Much the same here. I'm searching for a good, clean 4-door. 1964 onwards. Servo/disc brakes, seatbelts, modern front seats, alternator. Ready to use. Can't find one in my budget

Even fewer for sale up north! I've seen many that are possibles but all south of London. Don't want to buy a car I haven't inspected personally, down that road lies problems! So many cars with doubtful provenance as well. I'm also probably a bit specific in what I'm looking for but I'm looking for a long term keeper. Buy once, buy well.

TDV102 wrote:Even fewer for sale up north! I've seen many that are possibles but all south of London. Don't want to buy a car I haven't inspected personally, down that road lies problems! So many cars with doubtful provenance as well. I'm also probably a bit specific in what I'm looking for but I'm looking for a long term keeper. Buy once, buy well.

That's why I'm still very slightly undeceive about this one its just the price that's putting me off as I'd live with and sort out the slight leak in the windscreen but I can't seem to justify the price tag !

Budgie wrote:Yeh it is rather steep .Me thinks I'll give it a miss and continue my search .

I think I've just found the advert for this car. (Clarendon Grey one?). IMHO it looks to be one of the best early Series 2's currently advertised across the www. (Okay.. there are a couple better ones but they're both over £10K!). It's certainly top money, but its way ahead of others that aren't much cheaper.

Yeh it's Clareden grey in colour .If only it was lower priced and with a larger engine and not such an ar*e of a job to change the screen rubber .Although it wouldn't be used in the rain anyway. Decisions, decisions .

Did you find out exactly which engine, gearbox and rear axle it has?

yes it was a factory fitted as standard . The guy just read up from Charles Wares site and got mixed up. Like a lot of trader he just plagiarised and got mixed up and not really having much knowledge of the model.

Hmmm... I'm almost tempted myself. It's just too far away