People have fun with Lucas, but in my experience they were no worse than any of the French, Italian, American or German electrical systems in their days.....they all were crap! Plus too and also, we're talking a 46 year old car here! One thing I noticed, the fuse holders are made of considerably stouter metal than those on my English Minis. I used a soft brass wire brush in a drill to clean the holders, then took the fuses to my bench grinder that has a very fine wire wheel on it and cleaned the ends - that should fix that.
Truth be told, on the Brit cars I owned that had not been fixed by some dolt, the Lucas wiring & components were fine. But oh man some folks just murder things with their lame attempts at repairs. Same goes for SU carburetors.
Back in the mid 80’s we had more than one car towed to our shop from some gas station that said they worked on foreign cars. The typical one was they would try to rewire the car to get the radiator fan to run all the time. The had no clue!
More wiring woes.....I'll put up pics later but I can assure you this is not factory wiring - but more roger the bodger at play! Bottom line I'm going to have to make up two complete new harnesses for the headlights, turn signals and side lights. It also doesn't help that there's a thick layer of under coating on the inner fenders. Every where I look it's scotchlocks and crimped connectors taped over.....The t/s socket is so corroded I'm surprised it even works. Plus too and also, I think they used the low wattage park light element for the turn signals rather than the high wattage element, that would explain why the T/S worked so slowly - less amperage draw, slower blinks.
I'm just gonna build a new front harness complete....the other side was just as bad. Next weekend it's going into the body shop to get prettied up and get the interior installed.....
I agree 100% on making your own front harness as that’s what I would do. That is a wiring nightmare, with your own harness you will know your wires are new and not cut or tapped any where in the run.
I went ahead and stripped out the lights and other exterior bitsas to get it ready to go to the body shop, while it's gone I'll be working on the motor and transmission.....I'll let them pull the glass and such.
You do have my address? I am not sure how long it will take you to get it here to Memphis. But I will be waiting!
Ha! took the Inno to Tulsa today, where we quickly stripped it down. He found one small patch to do, and a few places where the paint was flaky or peeling, so he's started work today.
Fast work, extra holes for the antenna and wipers welded up, almost ready for primer. The body is in very good shape, no rust at all, but the single stage paint was badly faded ( when compared to areas that were hidden under the arches and inside) and flaky in a few spots. all he works on are classic Minis, so he knows where all the hidden bad spots can be....
The Inno didn't need much, just some small bits - and of course it was faded. Should look really shiny and pretty when done!
Shell is done, of course will need to be sanded and buffed when hard, still has to do the doors, bonnet and boot lid.
IT'S..... A……. LIVE! Innocenti engine hasn't run in 10-15 years. Good oil pressure, nothing's leaking, and it sounds very good....no smoking, knocking or other nasty noises either. I haven't run this carb on anything before so it may not have the right needle for this engine. I also haven't set the timing, that's why it tries to run on on shutdown.
Yep! Plus too and also, you should have heard it without the muffler! Sounded bad to the bone! Can't decide whether to go ahead and tear it down, put the unleaded seats in the head, reseal everything, change the final drive or just clean, paint and put it back in the car.
I hate to make more work for you, but if it was mine I'd tear it down & replace all the bits that need it. Been a while since I've had an A series lump apart, but my memory says they weren't too hard to do. Heck it's already out of the car.