I'm SO CLOSE! She's finally back on her wheels, all major components are installed, and I'm ready for an ignition test. I would have on Sunday, but I ran out of daylight: Engine is all put together, minus the wiring for my accessories (driving lights and tach, which I want to re-sort and tidy) - check out those Cooper S carbs and braided stainless lines: The cabin needs some love - after much internal debate I pulled out the padded lower dash rail to expose the painted metal lower (which I like the look of). I need to fabricate something to hide the exposed switches on the late-model switchplate, but that shouldn't be hard. I'm considering removing the padded upper dash as well. Of all the things I've done so far, the closest I came to having my spirit broken was THIS SUNDAY, trying to hook up the clutch pedal to the master clutch cylinder push bracket - ARRRGHH!! It was SO %$#@!! TIGHT IN THERE! My hand looks like hamburger... Finally got it hooked up after much cursing and gnashing of teeth, and it worked right out of the gates - woohoo!! Still to do: * Fill and bleed brakes * Prime oil pump * Re-install battery (with extinguisher on-hand, just in case a wire(s) got crossed while I was messing with everything) * TRY STARTING * Replace brake switch on pedal (somehow I broke the old one) * Purchase lower engine steady bracket and install steady * Adjust hi-los * Fix accessory electricals (tach and driving lights) * Wire up manual switch for accessory cooling fan
You don't need daylight to hear if it runs, cars run at night too - I promise! Congrats on getting it together, pull the plugs and crank it over till you get oil pressure, then put 'em back in and let her rip! Don't forget to video the big moment!
Funny that the engine is just starting in Oct 2014 with "(Fiona's 2011/2012 Service Project)" in the thread title! :devil: Good luck! :fingerscrossed:
Well, he's been thru hell and more trying to get it back together (if you read the whole thread), I'm in awe of his persistence and determination.
Yeah that was an entire engine ago. Unfortunately. When I was told "never pull the engine - you'll find a ton of extra things that need to be done" I had NO flippin' idea...
Oh. My. God. I'm *SOOOO* frustrated right now... like "I seriously give the %$#@! up!" Primed the oil pump on Saturday and was looking forward to getting the car started. Had my fire extinguisher handy as I reconnected the battery and flipped the switch on... Lights? Check. Gauges? Check. Headlights and turn signals? Check and check. No burning smells... no popped fuses. Tried starting... NOTHING. Checked the starter relay and all connections... the relay is clicking when the key is engaged, but there's no crank. Headlights don't fade when running on battery (so the battery should be good) burt they do dim a tiny amount when ke is flipped to "start", but not a lot - I don't think the starter is seized or failed (it was the same unit I pulled off my old engine and was working fine then - all I've done to it since then was paint it). Checked the hot lead on the solenoid leading to the battery - 12.5V even with the key out, so current is reaching the solenoid. Checked the wire (red/brown) on the solenoid spade terminal that leads back up to the starter relay - 12.3V with the key to "start" (so the starter circuit seems to be working). Checked the ground strap from the engine casing to the car body in case I wasn't getting a good ground - confirmed bare metal on both ends, and I can use the bare strap metal as a ground for my electrical meter so I know it's grounding. I even tried using another battery out of my new MINI just in case the battery (which has been jept on a charger all this time while I've been getting the engine sussed out) was in fact dead but was somehow reading full current. No dice; exact same thing. I dunno... I'm ready to scream. I'm usually pretty good with electrical - it's basically follow the wires and check that current is flowing in a logical order - but this one has me stumped despite something like 6 hours of effing with it. I'm so close; failing this far along with bad weather coming at any moment is MADDENING. Anyone want a really good deal on a classic with a brand new motor? I'm just about ready to throw in the towel so someone smarter than me can enjoy the *&^%$#@! thing... :incazzato:
First things first, if you put the car in 4th and roll it back and forth does the engine turn over (ie: it's not locked up somehow?) If the car rolls over easily, remove the starter - it's only two bolts, and put it on the bench. Hook your black jumper cable to the flange where the bolt goes (a good ground) then holding the starter firmly touch the red jumper cable to the starter main cable post. Did the starter run? If not, you need a starter..... If it did, something's not wired right, probably at the starter solenoid. The small wire that trips the solenoid should only be hot when the key is in the "start" position...on most cars I've seen that's the white wire with the red trace.....not red/brown.....but whatever colors - it should only light in the start position. On my solenoid there are two places that will accept a spade (push on) connector, make sure you have the white/red on the correct one - if you do, the solenoid will click loudly when you turn the key to the start position. The other place just connects to the post the other hot wires attach to......so it won't trigger the solenoid. Edit: Hang on, is your starter solenoid on the starter itself?
Yes, I have a late-model combined unit just like this one. And yes, when rolled backwards in 4th the entire engine turned and sucked oil into the oil pump, so it's not locked (thank God). Someone came by to assist and we tried touching the hot lead from the battery direct to the starter motor post and it spun the motor, so we knew the motor was working. It didn't actually crank the car when doing this though because additional current must go in via the spade terminal from the starter relay to engage the flywheel with the unit I have. And yes, the spade terminal wire (red/brown on my late-model car) was passing current only in the start position just like you said it should, yes. What's really odd is that we reconnected everything, pulled off the red/brown wire from the starter relay to test it again, and as we were futzing with it the starter suddenly began working! Now she cranks... Seven says "the solenoid is the most common electrical failure on the Mini" so maybe it's going bad... I'll think about buying a spare for eventual replacement - right now, I'm just glad SOMETHING happened. Still not running though, I'm afraid - after repeated cranking she still wouldn't start so I checked the carbs and no fuel is in them or in the line from the mechanical fuel pump. I cranked until I was losing the battery and nothing fuel-wise. I'm pretty sure I connected the pump up correctly, but it's impossible to tell with the dual-SU setup - they totally block the pump. I'll need to pull the carbs off to get to the lines and the pump, but at least she cranks now. QUESTION: does the fuel pump need to be primed somehow, like the oil pump was? When I replaced the pump a few years back she fired right up after just a few cranks... I didn't totally drain the fuel tank that time though - there would have been fuel still in the hard line from the rear of the car. Seems like it should have drawn it up to the front by NOW though... One step forward... one step back.
I'll find my spare pump later this morning and double check which line goes where, but working strictly from memory the one closer to the firewall connects to the fuel tank. It wouldn't hurt to prime it tho I've never had to in the past....I run a inexpensive electric fuel pump on mine It makes sense that the solenoid could have had some corrosion on the contacts that finally burned thru, glad you got it spinning over. Edit: I hope I know the answer to this already, and I don't mean to insult anyone's intelligence, but you wouldn't be the first to do this - you do have fuel in the tank, right? Normally, unless the front end is elevated fuel will run freely from the tank to the pump on it's own, priming the pump.
Yes, I put about 2 gallons into it just before I tried starting it. My worry is that since I had the pump connected when I filled the fuel tank, the air trapped in the line is keeping the liquid from running down into the pump. We tried cranking the engine with the main fuel line disconnected (to break a possible vacuum or blockage) but nada unfortunately, so my next plan is to unhook the fuel line from the pump and let gravity feed gas all the way into the engine bay (hopefully)...
Snake a mirror up there or shine a strong flashlight down from above and make sure you have the hoses on the right connections while you're in there. It's possible there's a blockage in the fuel line, tho unlikely..... if you have an air compressor you can wrap a shop rag around your air gun and blow into the tank - pressurizing it - that should force gas down to the engine too.....don't get carried away tho, you don't want to balloon your tank!
Didja get her going? If you just want to fire it up, you could pull the tops off the float chambers and fill them with gas, it will start and run for a few moments before it empties the float bowls again...... Assuming no gas is the problem, of course....
SHE LIVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Managed to get gas to the pump but then the pump started leaking like a sieve. ARGH!!! Rather than order a replacement and wait another week, I bought a $45 electric pump from AutoZone and hooked that up instead. Now I have plenty of fuel into the carbs. She fired up (roughly) on the 3rd crank, and started to smooth out after running for a few minutes at idle. Something was smoking pretty bad on the rear of the engine when she warmed up, but then stopped - I think it may have been an impurity or something on the exhaust header, which I painted with high-temp BBQ paint months ago. Wish me luck with that (although at this point I'm getting pretty fast at pulling the carbs off the manifold). I still need to fill and bleed the brakes but this is a HUGE MILESTONE for me - the first time the car has run since I took the head off Gawd-only-knows how many months ago... :cornut: Since I don't have a timing light or any experience with adjusting the carbs, I'm considering taking the car up to Northend Wrench (a trusted local garage that works on vintage vehicles and MINIs) for a full look-over, tune/timing, etc. My "krew" that helped with the re-install (did MOST OF the re-install if I'm honest) was made up of seasoned veterans, but God only knows how I may have effed things up since they took their hands off it. There's light at the end of the tunnel!!!
Well done Matt! Definitely get the timing set and a rough set up on the carbs - as the engine breaks in you'll want to fine tune the carbs a bit, so you may as well learn how. There are lots of articles written and YouTube vids about how to synchronize and tune the SUs, it's really not hard at all, just a bit fiddly. And you need one of these to do it right - they're not expensive and if you're going to run multiple carbs on anything, it's a really useful tool to have..... It's called a Unisyn, and you use it to make sure the airflow between the carbs is the same - I've had mine since the late 60's and still use it on my old Jag.
I found this - is this what you mean, I assume? UNI-SYN (Edelbrock) Carburetor Balancing Tool Not sure how it works though: the operating instructions say to "disconnect the throttle from all carbs except one" for the test, but my setup has only a SINGLE throttle linkage connected to a bridge that operates both throttle bodies simultaneously. Do you/can you use that tool in a setup like mine? I'm also not sure how to "adjust the idle screws to factory settings" since, well, there don't seem to be any stock settings for a setup like mine (that I can find in the Haynes book, anyway). Thanks!
Matt, I'll look around and see if I still have one. When I worked at an MG dealer in the early 70's I used it everyday to adjust SU's.
If you have some gas hose laying around you can put one end up to the carb and the other end to your ear. When you get the same note on both they are synced. It will get you very close, if not dead on, till you have the tool. I use to do this on Alfas with Webers.
I found this video on Youtube showing the carb setup and adjustment procedure on an MG (I assume it's the same for Mini) - the good stuff starts at 17:30: [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ush9Zc-hNIA"]Dylan's 544 #3: Setting those SU Carbs! - YouTube[/ame] Reading the instructions was very frustrating since I had no idea where the various set screws were located, but watching the video it looks pretty easy, now that I can see where everything is. I really like the adjustment meter he's using in the video (different from the one mentioned earlier) - does anyone know what unit that is? I'll still probably have a proper garage set everything initially just to make sure I reassembled the engine correctly, but it's good to know how to KEEP it running in proper tune once it's set, absolutely. Thanks, guys!
The Unisyn you posted is exactly what I have and have used since the 60's - while you can use a piece of hose and listen (my ears aren't that good) the Unisyn gives you a visual indication of whether they are flowing the same amount of air Bear in mind, you need the points, timing and valves all adjusted perfectly first, carbs are the last thing you do. You loosen the link between the carbs, so they can be adjusted independently of each other. Then you set the air volume using the Unisyn, once you have that correct you adjust the mixture, Sometimes when you do that the idle will climb too high, so when you set it down again use the Unisyn again to make sure they're still the same, then adjust the mix again for best idle. Once that's done, re-hook the center link and make sure both carbs open the same when you move the accelerator cable, you don't want one opening ahead of the other. See? Fiddly, but not hard. While the car will idle and run with the carbs not sync'd I've found that it's much smoother, more responsive and gets better fuel mileage if they are. Don't forget to put some oil in the tops of the carbs (under the black cap) I use ATF - tho the books say to use 20wt, I've always found ATF to work better, especially in the large changes of temps we get. If you don't do this the engine will cough and possible backfire on acceleration. The tool he's using is a "snail style" synchronizer.....should be readily available. I usually see those used on vertical carbs like on a VW tho they work fine on side drafts too - Amazon has them and Unisyns both. Remember, you're working on the back of the engine, there may not be room for the snail style to fit in there.
WOOOOOOHOOOOOO!!!!!! Still needs timed and tuned, but Fiona officially can move under her own steam! Thanks everyone!! --M