1981 Midas Coupe - Project Zippy.

Well I haven't updated this for a bit because of three factors: 1) Time (I haven't had much); 2) Weddings (we've been invited to SEVEN this year) and 3) Heat. Anything over about 22 degrees and the Manroom turns into an oven. I think I accidentally gave myself heatstroke the other weekend as a result...

Anyway, Mrs Bounce gave up half an hour of her time by wielding a screwdriver, thus allowing me to fix the front to rear brake line with new P clips. The old factory fitted clips really were (for want of a better word) atrocious, so there was no way I was going to re-use them. I still need to do the fuel line, but I am sure I can grab an assistant from somewhere.

This morning I had a couple of hours so I did some little jobs (which of course take a bit of time). I resprayed the areas of the bulkhead which had been affected by overspray, as well as removing the brake valve, master cylinder & bracket as they too had been affected by the dreaded "orange fleck". I masked these and gave them a fresh coat of satin black.Whilst this was drying I popped in the bolts for the top of the front shock mounts. It's a really small job, but something that makes me feel good - another small bit is on the car. Finally I have started work on fabricating a small bracket to allow a more standard looking battery clamp. The previous one was bolted to the bulkhead "buttress" and looked dreadful. More to follow.

Bulkhead looking tidier.



Upper shock mount bolts finally in



New cap-head bolts on fuel line side awaiting new P clips underneath



Not-so-black bits now black again!



Bracketing under construction

It's got a bespoke rear beam axle, Mini radius arms and the coilover shocks had to be made specially. Luckily Dave at Dampertech has made some before so has the patterns.

Some more progress has been made - there's been a small step back but that's hopefully sorted.

When I chucked the pedalbox in, I of course didn't check where the pedals were sitting. Due to the spring, they were sitting somewhere up near the dash shelf. And because of the design of the bulkhead, I couldn't get them back down without removing them. So I did just that, removing the homemade captive bolt plate, re-positioning the pedals, before holding them in place with something heavy (in this case my bowling ball in its bag - and even that struggled). I nipped up the nuts on the captive bolts and they sit where they should now.

The next issue was the master cylinder bracket. This was the original item on the car, which ran a single-line master cylinder. The main seal is significantly larger on the dual-line master cylinder (9mm difference in diameter!), so it won't fit properly in the bracket. The pedalbox is not an issue because the seal tapers - at least that's what I am hoping... So first thing was to cut a bigger hole in the bracket - no problem I thought - I have hole saws in my set of drills. The only trouble was, this was a cheap set of drill bits (it was a present), and all the hole saw did was make a small mark, get very blunt and cause the wood underneath the bracket to smoke wildly. However, I am nothing if not resourceful. Using the hole saw mark, I cut several slots in the metalwork, bent them out with pliers and then cut them off with the Dremel before giving the whole thing a tickle with the grinder and tidying up with the grinding stone. Granted it's not particularly professional, but now there's lots of clearance and nothing catches. Just needs a coat of paint and all should be fine.

The other day Shaun came over and despite him having a horrible week at work, I put him to work holding the screwdriver whilst I sorted the P clips underneath holding the fuel line. It still needs a couple of more accessible clips in the engine bay doing (and holes drilling for them!) but the awkward bit is done. Whilst I was underneath, I also sorted the remaining heatshield for the exhaust. Again, it's not perfect, but the only person seeing this will hopefully be the MOT tester, and the majority of it will be hidden behind a subframe, a gear selector and an exhaust so I am not too bothered about how it looks - it's for stopping the bulkhead catching fire, not looking good. This of course left me the wonderful task of the steering rack. Anyone who's done one on a Mini will know that they're utter bar stewards when the subframe is on, so I was glad to put it on now, without that large lump of metal being there. It's still awkward when you're doing it on your own, but a carefully placed piece of wood allowed me to pop the U-bolts through (no I didn't forget the little plastic anti-friction strips). I nipped up the bolts to hold it there, although it does need a small amount of adjustment which can wait until next time. Finally, I popped the freshly repainted brake valve back on the bulkhead. This took significantly longer than expected due to the inaccessibility of the nut, but some careful use of a small socket and believe it or not, some cable ties sorted the situation. More soon!

Pedals now where they should be.



Hole saw a bit rubbish? No problem - use a bit of back-street engineering!



A tickle with the grinder and it looks acceptable. It won't be seen anyway...



Fuel line now held in place - cheers Shaun!



Heatshield now fitted up to the selector area



Rack now loosely in place.



And brake valve fitted to the bulkhead.

Just skimmed through your thread on the Mini forum, wow, that's been a lot of work. Love the Midas, although it's a Mk3 Coupe I really want, but really need to put my wife's Mini back together first. One of these came down to the East Coast Retros meet a few months ago (I'll try and find the pictures), we meet every month down at Shotley Gate at the Shipwreck pub by the marina. Give me a shout if you fancy coming down?

If I'm not working on the Midas that sounds like it could be an idea. If I'm not on holiday of course!

And a tow-bar on a Decathlon?! What the hell??!!! 

I don't like Mini braking systems. Mainly because over the years they've been messed about with BL / Austin Rover / whatever they were called that week penny-pinching numptiness. The plan was, as my single-line Cooper S Master Cylinder was kippered, to convert to a dual-line system using a yellow-tag MC and limiter valve on the bulkhead as I also wasn't keen on using the rear valve (VERY rusty). To date I have acquired brand new brake lines all round, an FAM7821 valve (Secondhand) and have rebuilt the s/h yellow tag MC. All new front to rear brake line is fitted. Excellent I thought - I will connect everything up.



Problem 1: The thread to the rear brakes on the valve is knackered. Tightens up so far and then spins on itself. And as it's a blind hole I can't re-cut the thread. New valve then - that's £87 I don't have.



Problem 2: My yellow tag MC and brand new clutch MC do not fit together on the same base plate. There's precious little clearance between them, but add a couple of pipes and they simply don't fit. I am either doing something drastically wrong or fitting a yellow tag is simply out of the question. To put it back to the way it was, a new Cooper S single line MC is £72 I don't have, plus I would need the regulator valve at the back (another £73 - and it's out of stock).


I have closed the garage door and walked away before I pick up something dangerous like a blow torch and some petrol.



This is junk...







...and these two bar stewards don't fit together.

Oh, sorry, I have no advice! People always say, Oh Mini's they're soooo easy to work on! My ! Stripping ours down was bad enough, I'm dreading putting it back together

I'm going to use that style of master cylinder on my Scamp but I have got the clutch master cylinder with the metal reservoir on it.
One way round the clash of parts would be to fit banjo fittings on the brake master cylinder but you would need to make sure the face the O rings seal against are at right angles to the threads and had a suitable smooth surface. I've seen people do this when fitting braided aeroquip hoses.

When I plumbed my Mini brakes I removed the limiter and plumbed in the front brakes to the smaller bore of the master cylinder. The rear ones were then done from the larger one and I fitted a old style limiter valve that was made adjustable inside the car.

This is the Mini.



I also remembered that there are various different sizes of pipe fitting for the master cylinder.

I was going to suggest banjo fittings for the M/C pipework too, if the alternative cylinders won't allow normal ones.

Keep at it; it's these challenges that make a man of you!