Morris Minor
Hard work pays off as Matt gets his Minor in primer
I’ve made plenty of progress on the Minor of late. I ended my previous Saga with the Minor’s shell ready for primer, so on my next visit to CBR Classic Restorations, that’s exactly where I started. I removed the front suspension and boxed it up to be sent for blasting and powder coating, removed the doors, bonnet, boot lid and wings, then rolled the car into the booth before thoroughly de-greasing it. CBR’S Jon Bentley sealed all the seams in the engine bay and boot space while I mixed up some HMG high build two-pack primer, tinted with a dash of blue gloss. I then donned my breathing apparatus, flicked the booth’s heating and extracting system on and set about applying the first ‘dust’ or ‘gripper’ coat – a thin layer of primer over the whole car. Once this had tacked off, it was on with two heavier coats inside and out.
Once the primer had dried, a few imperfections became obvious. My first task was to apply a guide coat, then block the whole car using 320-grit paper to remove as many of these as possible. Then, it was back out with the filler to fill in pinholes and re-shape a couple of areas that I’d become blind to until they were all one colour. This done, I took a sponge sanding pad and ‘keyed’ the engine bay, boot space and dash. We rolled the car back into the booth and hit these with gripper coat, two thick coats then a final topcoat of HMG direct gloss with just a drop of lacquer in the final coat. Aside from my nudging the fan control knob on the gun, causing a fairly nasty run in the engine bay, all went well. The next morning, I masked along the
back of the door shuts, windows and boot aperture before carefully deploying some masking paper. I then masked the engine bay in a similar manner. Jon mixed the primer this time – again HMG high build white primer, but with a splash of the Smoke Grey top coat mixed in with it. This, Jon tells me, will allow the top coat to cover better.
I once again de-greased the shell, then used a tack rag to remove any remaining dust. A grip coat was followed by two thicker coats – and suddenly the car looked amazing. A week later I again broke out the guide coat and 320-grit for a final blocking.
Next time I head up, it’ll be time for top coats.
To the Matt cave
Back in the shed, the cylinder head has returned from machining. MAR Motorsport stainless steel valves have been fitted along with Piper double valve springs and phosphor-bronze valve guides. I once again used the DTI to zero the timing disc and painted one flywheel tooth orange and used a centre punch on the oil pump housing to confirm TDC. Then, in went the ARP head studs and on went the gasket, followed by the head itself. I elected not to use the original pushrods as they exhibited a wear ‘nipple’ on the bottom of each, and had been advised against modern replacements. I therefore purchased a set of billet pushrods, CNC machined from solid EN24 billet.
Expensive, but I’m not skimping now and damaging new followers. On went the rockers then I torqued down the head. I then re-positioned the DTI onto no.1 inlet valve and double checked then adjusted the cam timing. I then wound in the ARP manifold studs and, finally, couldn’t resist mocking up the supercharger. This presented another issue – the belt directly intersects the cam cover breather, so I’ll need to re-engineer that. The joy of modification…
matt.tomkins@practicalclassics.co.uk