Full circle into a Marina again. My 73 Morris Marina Coupe

I tried using a socket on clamps, but it seems there are no standards and the hex is always some random size. I'm a man of little patience 

Yeah the Marina could have benefited from better front suspension, and they did eventually factory fit telescopic shocks to the front on the Ital, but at the end of the day its really no worse than any other rubbish old 70s car in terms of comfort. The worst part is that a lot of people didnt tend to keep up with maintenance so things wore out quickly.

Somewhere in South Africa (I have to admit, I don't know my way around the place) they did sell the Marina in both CKD form, and then built them for a couple of years using the old tooling from the Aus Leyland Marina.

The UK cars, as mentioned above, were available with the 1275 A series engine, from day one, right to the end as the A+ in the Ital in the mid 80s. I do sometimes wish mine was A or B series powered, as parts in both stock and modified form for the E series are almost unobtainable, but there is something charming about the old OHC E series.

I had an Ital estate in the early 90s that had a 1275cc A+ providing the go. It was adequate, and I used to load it to the roof. Pound for pound, in the UK at that time, I don’t think you could get a better car for less money than a one owner Marina or Ital. I paid £400 for that estate, and that was the dearest and the newest one of many. I just wish I’d bought and kept the mint 1.8 tc estate I was offered for £250 a few years later.

Blinking fantastic ! 😀 small wins can can a lot of time but love your approach to getting proper long term fixes in place.
Remind us has this been for a WOF yet or is there still some to do on that ?
James

In a couple of weeks, I would have owned the Marina for a year. That's a reasonably long time for me to own a car, so I needed something to mark that milestone.


I had a goal. I had some time booked off work for the end of Jan, which was meant to be set aside to get the Marina ready for British Car Day. Since the show was canned this year due to a stupid pandemic that just keeps lingering like a bad smell, motivation to do work on the Marina has been low.


All the time the Tomcat has been taking up hasn't helped either. For a car that I had intended to only have short stays in the garage for servicing and minor repairs, that thing sure has wasted a lot of time and money.


Regardless, it was time to show the Marina some love. Heck, Project Marina wasn't even on the main page of TLP anymore, that's how long it's been sitting.


I last touched the car when I moved the Tomcat into the garage back in November. With my time off coming to an end, and only the Tomcat getting attention, I quickly pivoted and set myself a goal; for my Birthday, I wanted to drive the Marina. Not just back it up the drive again, but actually drive it, around the block.


Before I could do that I had to get the car a bit more roadworthy. The first port of call was to sort out the rear lights. I got them going a while back but the electrics were as flaky as anything, the indicators weren't working, and the lenses were full of rubbish.


I picked up a spare LH a while back, which turned out to be in better condition than the one on the car, so refurbished that and the old one was used as spares.


You can see just how dirty the inside of the lenses are. Unfortunately there are a few cracks too



After removing all the screws in the back of the housing and careful prying with a plastic trim tool, the lenses slowly popped off one by one.


Revealing the horrors within


Interesting to note Lucas painted the reflectors silver, not chrome or polish them


The lights have a plastic surround, that used to be silver coated on the inside but had worn away. This was also filthy.


The housing after a quick clean. I used a citrus-based household cleaner, a bucket of water and my old toothbrush.


I took this opportunity to knock some of the mounting studs out of the spare light unit and replace a couple of broken off ones in this housing. Someone had replaced one with a screw they had glued into place (and since broken free). The studs are pressed into a square cutout.


A cleaned lens on the left compared to the filthy one on the right. I'll need to replace that corner lens as it's been glued back together many years ago.


The plastic frame cleaned up well too. The missing bits were later glued back into place.


The standard bulb holders ground by touching the body of the light unit. If the surface they touch is dirty, you get a bad connection. I cleaned all the holes up with a file and sandpaper


After all the components were thoroughly cleaned and dried, the lights were reassembled.


A little useless fact; the orange corner lens on these is useless, it provides no light. The housing is marked but not drilled for an additional bulb in that location but none is fitted.


This bulb is fitted on some lights, but only in the US market on the Austin Marina, where it is used with a red corner lens, as a running lamp.



Some have drilled that hole out, fit a bulb holder and used it with the orange lens as an extra indicator, which I will probably do at some point in the future.


In order to make them a bit more future-proof, I ran a #10-32 tap through all the nuts and a die over all the studs. This cleaned them up nicely, removing years of rust and crud from the threads.



The next job was to actually fit them to the car. Using a combination of the large washers the lights came with, and some smaller ones that fit the space, the lights were mounted with the best gaskets I had.



Now I needed to look into the wiring


Ages ago, I did some research into grounded bulb holders and found that some Triumph 2500s use a three terminal, dual filament bulb holder of the same size and style the Marina uses (but standard only has two terminals). The three terminal holders have a dedicated ground terminal, so although they can ground through the housing like the Marina ones, a ground wire on that third terminal ensures perfect grounding to the bulb holder. I managed to pick a couple of these holders up, in good used condition.

Example photo, not my hand...
To use these bulb holders properly, I needed a dedicated ground. To do this I drilled out an existing hole on the boot catch support


And after removing a little paint around the hole, installed a rivnut into it


This allowed me to make up a couple of wires which would terminate at this screw


After a lot of testing with my test light, and reading of the wiring diagrams, I managed to get a tail light working


Which resulted in this lovely lit up lens


I carried that same work over to the other side too, and managed to get both tail and brake lights working.


Tail and plate lamp (lighting up the towbar)


And brake lights


It doesn't look it in the photos, but the brake lights are significantly brighter.


Next was to fix the indicators. These have a dual filament bulb standard, as one side is used for the indicator and the other for the reverse lights. Once again, after much prodding and probing, I had power but I couldn't get the bulb to flash. It turns out the previous owner had modified the wiring and instead of having one of the terminals to light up the reverse lights, he had changed that wiring to being a dedicated ground... but still using the two terminal dual filament bulb holders, which cant ground through that terminal.


I substituted a pair of single filament bulb holders instead. These ground through the second terminal only, not through the body of the lamp. This got the indicators working a treat. They still flash a bit fast, but I will look into the flasher unit later. Better fast than not at all.




Next on the list was to finally assemble and fit the cluster. This had been just sitting on place with no surround attached and the feed wire for the tacho running around the door jam into the engine bay, where it was clipped onto the coil with a crocodile clip.


I started by running this feed wire properly, using the proper coloured wire (white with black trace). I crimped a terminal on and attached it to the coil


And then tracing the path of the loom, ran it into the cabin


I also fed the speedo cable into the cabin. Turns out this needs to be on the LH side of the reinforcement in the dash with the three dial cluster, as it moves the speedo to the left.


Unfortuantely, I had an epic battle trying to fit the speedo cable to the cluster, until I realised that something was wrong. It just didn't go into the cluster far enough.


This is the speedo end of the cable. That grey section should be within the silver metal section...


So I thought, maybe the gearbox end wasn't seated properly, pushing the cable up at the other end.


I rolled under the car, undid the cable and tried to pull the cable inner down a smidge. Well, I pulled the cable down alright, down into my hand.


The square end on the left should be in the speedo drive in the gearbox, the other end should be a long cable that goes into the speedo dial. Damn. It had jammed and twisted completely off.


Thankfully a while back I saw a NOS speedo cable pop up on Trademe, so grabbed it as a spare


I tore that packet open good and proper


Mmmm fresh new cable. The instructions state to grease the cable lightly before fitting, so I pulled the inner cable out and ran a bunch of synthetic oil down the outer and wiped the inner liberally with it.


Feeding this through the car and securing it into the gearbox allowed me to try and fit the cluster again. This time it was a lot easier. With the cable on the left, I could reach in through the grille opening in the dash and screw it into the cluster that way.


For the first time since I got the car, and for the first time ever, it finally had a gauge cluster, and a triple dial one fitted, at that. I'm still waiting on some machine screws to arrive to screw it in, but that's secure enough for now.


Finally, I needed to fit the exterior mirrors. These haven't been on the car since even before I got it. The RH side mirror was cracked, so I had a local glass company cut and fit a fresh new piece of mirrored glass. These need a polish up, but they are a gorgeous period-correct accessory. The LH one is mostly useless, but looks so cool out there on the wing.





One final check revealed one other issue. I had noticed the past couple of times I had run the car that there was a noise coming from somewhere a the front of the engine. I had bad thoughts that it might be a failing waterpump or alternator. Nope, turns out the drive belt was loose. Why? The adjustment bolt on the bottom of the alternator was missing. I popped a new bolt in, tensioned the belt, and it's been quiet since. To test this I had to start the car for the first time in months.


I reconnected the battery (which has been sitting disconnected but not on a charger). The fuel filter was dry, so it took a few turns, but cranked nicely and fired straight into life and settled into a nice fast idle at partial choke. Sorting the engine grounds has worked wonders, I never could have started it without jump packs and a fully charged battery before. With the filter full, it starts on the button, every time now.


So, there was nothing left to do but clear the car off, and get ready to take the car for its first drive in about 27 years.




Getting back, my wife said she hasn't seen me smile like that for a long time.


There was a bit of clutch shudder leaving the garage, but that seemed to go away with some more use and the bite was nice and progressive and at a good point. Otherwise, the car performed perfectly. The steering is well weighted, if a little off center (needs an alignment), but tracked straight and the suspension felt great; No vagueness, no wandering and no bouncing. The engine pulled down low, but felt a bit flat up top (I haven't touched the carb tune). The gearbox went through all the gears nicely, with only a couple of minor crunches when downshifting, to be expected for synchros that have been dry for 27 odd years. No grinding or hard shifts. The blowing exhaust does make a racket though.


Although I haven't had a chance to bed the brakes in since the work I did on them, they pulled up nice and straight and didn't require as much force as I was expecting for an unboosted system. The pedal feel is very good.


All the gauges were working, including the speedo with its new cable. You'll also note in the video, if you look closely, that the indicators, front and rear, and the brake lights are working as expected.


Words can't express how happy I am with how it drove. I expected it should've been fairly good on the road after all the work, but it blew me away with how good it was.


I'm hoping this is the push I need to do the serious work on it; the cutting and welding. With the Tomcat finally vacating the garage, there are no more excuses.



She's a keeper

I tried an adjustable one a while back, but i think because of the issues I had in the system it actually burnt out the flasher unit. The one currently in there is just a cheapie mechanical one I picked up, but i think I bought a better one, just need to find it.

The time has finally come. I couldn't put it off anymore. I needed to cut out the rust.


I have really been procrastinating on this work, as I have never really done bodywork like this before. The closest was fixing the rust on the Corolla, which was minor compared to the scope of this work.


The main goal was to cut out and replace the steel on any rust that could cause an issue come WOF time. There will still be some more bodywork to do down the track, but once the car is on the road that will be easier to do.


So that means I need to cut out the rust in the two front floor pans, the LH B pillar and LH outer sill. When you consider the car has been off the road for 26 odd years, and most of that stored outside, that's not bad!


The front floor pans had been badly patched years ago by a previous owner, using rivets, sealant and some tin.


The B pillar has a hole in it, behind the window seal, which means that the quarter window needs to come out.


And the outer sill is perforated the whole way along, especially toward the rear.


I started with the floor pans, as in theory, it should've been the easiest place to start and then build up to the harder sections.


The first job was to grab a hammer, screwdriver and chisel, tear off the patches that had been riveted on and see what they were hiding.


This big one on the RH side was the first to go. Instead of drilling the rivets out, I used the chisel to just cut through them




So, it was covering a patch of very thin metal, with a drain hole that has rusted out. The circle hole is meant to be there, as it is used during the manufacturing process but usually has a steel "paint tin lid" plugging it. Obviously, the hole rusted out, the plug fell out, and it was covered over from there.


There is also a recess pressed into the steel, which just acted as a rust trap over the years


There are a lot of other small holes and thin metal on this side, so I originally marked it out to cut the whole lot out, but I'm a bit hesitant as finding the spot welds is proving hard due to the rusty metal (and it's spot welded to a couple of different reinforcers under the car).


The LH side was a similar deal. A few patches... This one up against the inner sill gave me some concern as it has a big bead of sealant running down along the sill.



Sure enough, the steel under the plate is ruined, as is the section of the inner sill where it met the floor.


Another rusty drain hole, as well as a couple of screwdriver sized holes next to it (which had their own patch)


Toward the tunnel, there was a large patch made up of a couple of smaller ones, which was shaped to fit the indent in the floor panel



That one was bad. Big hole under it, and lots of holes poked in thin metal with a screwdriver. There are also a couple of other smaller holes I undercovered.


Out came the paint pen, highlighting the extent of the damage.


The only thing to do next was to grab the grinder and cutting disc


This little brace for the gearbox support was a bit of a surprise. It was also full of rusty chunks from the floor disintegrating.


The inner sill needed to be cut out too as that was barely holding together and was full of sealant. To access this better, I cut a hole in the outer sill (which is stuffed anyway)


It was pretty ugly in there


I carefully removed the inner sill section and peeled it off the jacking point brace


Now, a warning. I'm not a professional, heck, I'm barely a beginner at bodywork. I know the basics thanks to a course I took a couple of years ago, but that only covered the basics of welding, not cutting out rust, making patch panels and working with less than perfect steel. I am winging this.


I have a semi-decent welder, but had previously been using flux-cored wire, which I swore after welding the Corolla, I would not bother with again (it did the job, and it has a place, but it's just more work for the same result). This time I converted the welder to take a standard 0.6mm (as recommended to me for bodywork) solid wire, and shielding gas.


Anyway, so I bought the steel that was recommended to me for this sort of work, which turned out to be thicker than I really should be using; 1.2mm. The original steel is about 0.8 to 1mm. I figure the thicker steel cant hurt in the floor and sill areas, and I will use some thinner steel for other panelwork as needed.


The first patch I needed to make up was for the inner sill, as everything attaches to this. I did some CAD (Cardboard Aided Design) and cut the panel out so it was a reasonable fit. I left the bottom a bit longer, as that will get trimmed later when I do the outer sill.


I'm embarrassed to show these initial welds, but it's all part of the process. I had been having serious issues with my wire feed, which I fixed after this section was done. I went over this a couple of times to make sure it had penetration and then ended up welding both sides. It needed to be strong.


I know, I know, I needed to clean the surrounding metal better. The other issue I had was my gas regulator was DOA and the flow meter didn't work, so I just turned the gas up a bit and ran with it. The welding on the inside was marginally better.


I plug welded the brace to the new inner sill section, but also later went around and welded the edges right onto the panel too.


The front section of the inner sill is where I started to work out the issues with my machine, and more importantly, technique. There are some better welds here, but far from perfect. Due to the weird shape, I chose to lap weld this patch instead of butt welding it in.


Once the inner sill section was in place, the first floor section went down. More CAD, but this took a couple of tries to get a nice tight fit. This has a 90 degree bend on the side to meet the sill.



The welding is still a bit ugly, but it's strong and has decent penetration.


As the saying goes, "A grinder and paint make me the welder I ain't"


I carried on again today, and really started to get into the swing of things. The first patch was to join the previous one, up toward the rear of the car. This is a weird one, as it has to start off flat but curve swiftly up to join the existing floor.


I made this section slightly oversize with CAD, bent the flange on the side and then notched it


The notches allowed me to gently bend the panel in the vice. Once I was happy with the curve, it got welded in place. The next patch, the one that joins on next to it, was a real pain to make. This had to match the curve of the new patch I just welded in, but also match the curve of the existing floor both on the other side and above it. The easiest way to shape this was to make the biggest bends in the vice and then using a hammer and dolly, fine tune it into place. Some additional finessing was done once the panel was tacked in.


This welded in a lot better. I'm reasonably happy with it.


There is a small patch welded on next to these, which is just covering the small hole I cut out.


Finally, I made a large patch to start filling the area above the exhaust and torsion bar. This is plug welded to that gearbox brace, and then butt welded all around the edges. Unfortunately my poor cordless grinder ran out of batteries as I was cleaning up the welds on this patch, but some weld through zinc primer and that was me done for the day too.


I still have that one hole to fill, and then I'll move onto the RH side. I've learned a lot doing this side, so hopefully it will go a bit smoother, and quicker.


A second grinder will be added to the collection soon, as using the one grinder for everything is just a real pain in the bum and it's chewing through the batteries. Having a corded one at the workbench for just cutting will help immensely.


Having dialled the welder in a bit better, and ironing out some of my issues with that and my own technique, my welds are getting better. That last patch needed minimal cleanup with the grinder. Once that floor is completely welded I'll scuff the whole thing up, seam seal the welds and coat it in a zinc rich epoxy. Everything will be covered by carpet eventually. It will need undersealing under the car again too, but that will come once I have both sides done and can jack the car up to get under it.

trying to think of advice that 2022 me would give to 2007 me, if 2007 me was on my hands and knees getting welds like your early patches (which 2007 me was) what i would advise 2007 me in order to fast track all the trial and error and dismay.

i would advise 2007 me that if i am welding two bits of overlapping 2mm together, i need to turn the power up to 3-4mm settings. (but 2mm setting is ok if butt welding two bits of 2mm) I would advise 2007 me that the filler metal is piling up quite high on the surface, it indicates the power isnt high enough or i'm moving the torch too quick. 2007 me would decry but when i go up a power up level or move the torch slower it just blows holes and end up with hedgehog on the back of the metal. Then i would advise 2007 me that i gave up doing continuous seam welds on butt welded thin steel as it blows holes all the time and gets a hedgehog on the back of the metal. I'd advise 2007 me that the only time i remember doing continuous seam welds was on some 4mm plate and thicker which can take the extra heat of continuous welds. I would advise 2007 me to turn the power up slightly, but do overlapping spot welds, zap a spot, then zap the next spot half overlapping the previous spot, just as its cooling below cherry red. Id say to 2007 me that previous spot is much thicker than the parent metals and helps the parent metal take the heat of the next spot and penetrate the two bits of steel.

i would advise 2007 me that this definately wont be a quick fix one off job, so stop using the hand held fixed shield that came with my clarke welder, and buy a self dimming head mounted visor. Then i would advise 2007 me that it doesn't look like there's enough shielding gas being used which is causing the scorched effect round the welds, and that if i did use enough shielding gas its completely normal for a disposable bottle to run out in 3 or 4 minutes. Then i'd say to 2007 me to buy a bigger bottle and a proper regulator with a guage on it, because in 5 years time 2012 you will have a land rover which is rotten as a barrel of apples, i'd tell 2007 me not to buy that land rover, then i would say sorry for wasting 2007 me's time with advise he now doesnt need

personally i think "patchwork quilt" has got a bad name because its usually associated with being applied over the top of rust/holes. youve been super thorough going back to the super structure.

i think you are right that half the battle is learning why stuff is happening with the welder. I also believe once that info stored in the brain tank the settings on the rig become less critical. not saying it will defy physics, but just mean you can actually account for allot of variation with the actual application rather than leaning over for the power/wire speed all the time.

Oh hello again, it's been a while. No one likes sagging, so let's fix it.


No, it's not work that anyone would have expected as my first update in months, but it's something I needed to do, especially whilst the car is in this orientation and I have good access (the car will soon be turned around to do the sill).


Since I got the car it has suffered from the very common saggy door issue, where the hinge pins wear out and cause excessive movement. This mainly shows itself as a door that is hard to open or close, and thumps up and down when lifted. This will not pass a WOF.


The easiest way to fix this is to find a good pair of hinges without wear and swap them in, and stick to regularly lubricating them. This will last a good while but it's getting harder to find good hinges as it was such a common issue.


Fixing the issue in the first place is the better option, and in this instance, I've done it to one hinge, out of necessity rather than choice.


There are two ways to fix it. One, is to get a steel tube that has a slightly larger internal diameter than the outside diameter of the pin and weld it between the two ears on the bracket, like so,


I didn't have a tube handy, so went with the other, easier option; weld two nuts to the ears.


Thanks to the relevant Marina Club members for the above photos, and the inspiration to fix instead of bin.


Before I could get onto the welding bit, I had to get the hinges off the car, which meant removing the door. Thankfully it's on the side that has no door card, so that was easy. Three nuts to remove on each hinge (as well as a washer on each stud and a spreader plate), and the door shell can be removed. I used a jack to support the back of the door until all the nuts were removed.


Much room for activities. Yes, there is still a hole in the floor; I'll get to that at some point. Hopefully during the next burst of motivation.


The bottom hinge was easy to remove from the A pillar, as all three nuts are visible, so off that came.


The upper hinge was proving to be a real pain though. I couldn't see it until I removed it, but the studs were slightly longer which meant my socket was blocked from completely sliding on the nuts, thus they were rounding when I tried to remove them.


In the end, I grabbed a drill and drilled the heads off the studs and used a punch to push them into the car, nuts and all.


Thankfully the forward nut came off easily, so I only had to do the rearward two. To get a clear shot at those I disassembled the hinge on the car, by hammering the pin out


The top hinge was the worst one as this takes most of the weight of the door, and clearly had not been lubricated since it left the factory.


The pin should be a snug fit in the hole


And that's before you even get to the wear on the actual pin


Thankfully I had sourced a good top hinge, in the correct colour, so all I needed to do, after freeing the seized hinge, was to thoroughly lubricate it and fit it.


The lower hinge wasn't so lucky. I did get a replacement but for some reason, it's completely different (two bolts instead of three and a completely different design). This forced my hand into fixing the hinge I had.


I knocked out the pin to separate the halves


There is some wear on the pin, but it's minor


The holes were slightly slogged out. This was nowhere near as bad as the upper hinge, but still had enough play that I couldn't just refit it.


I found a couple of nuts that were just slightly too small to fit over the pin and drilled the hole out a little bigger, until they slipped on the pin with minimal play.


I cleaned the surface up with a flap disc on the grinder and then zapped the nuts into place with the welder turned to 11.


It's not pretty, but it ain't going anywhere


A quick coat of black zinc should protect it for a while


Once mostly dry, the nuts were packed with grease and reassembled. The pin was rotated backwards to how it was previously fitted, so the wear was on the opposite side of the pin.


The nuts have two functions here. First, they support the pin along a larger surface area, instead of just the small area that wears away, which should hopefully mean the pin lasts longer and the current wear no longer matters. Secondly, it centers the pin again and stops it from moving in the worn-out holes. The tube would do the same thing, just along a longer surface.


This fix works for both hinges as they are of similar construction, the only difference is that the upper hinge has the detent roller and spring to get in the way.


With the hinge reassembled it was time to refit the hinges. They were easy enough to refit, trying to line them up with the existing dirt/witness marks. Interestingly, there are no gaskets to stop water from coming in behind the hinges, just hopes and dreams. If the doors come off again in the future I will make some gaskets, but in the meantime, I used heavy grease behind the hinges as a water repellent (and to reduce the chances of rust buildup behind the hinges; it was clean behind them with minor surface rust, but little to no paint).


Refitting the door was about as hard as removing it, just remembering to support the back end of the door with the jack and wiggling it onto the hinges far enough to get the spreader plates on and start a couple of nuts.


Aligning the door took a few tries, and it's probably still not perfect, but it is a BL product after all...


The difference with the new hinges was obvious immediately. The door swings so much easier now, and the detent works correctly; it previously sagged so much that the detent roller didn't touch the spring. The door also opens and closes easier now too. It doesn't need a slam to close and doesn't thump into place before catching. There is zero play in the hinges.


It's not amazing progress; it's still not finishing the rust work that I keep putting off, but it's progress nonetheless. Hopefully another burst of motivation will hit me soon and more will happen.