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1958 Morris Minor Convertible

by John Cooper

So far, I haven’t said a great deal about the interior of XOE 886. To be brutally honest, I would have to describe it as being ‘tired’ at best, and in reality probably edging more towards tatty. The slip-on vinyl covers were generally not in bad condition though there was a large split in the drivers seat. The leather seats underneath were beyond redemption. The rear parcel shelf lacked any trim whatsoever, as did the rear wheel arches.

Split seat cover

The door panels were a different shade of red to the seats and were covered in a sticky substance. The carpet seemed to be of a reasonable quality, showed little sign of wear and was bright and clean.

Missing trim on wheel arches and tatty rear panels

You will notice that all of this is in the past tense!

During last month’s update I told you about having the seat belts fitted. One thing I neglected to mention was that whilst down at the Nottingham Minor Centre getting them fitted they had another car in which was going through a full restoration. Part of this restoration was to replace the existing red interior with a green one. The owner had sourced a replacement interior but obviously now had a full spare red interior, which incidentally was in good condition.

When dad and I discussed this interior it was one of the shortest debates we have had over the car. A couple of calls back to the Nottingham Minor Centre who were obviously liasing with the owner, and a very fair price was agreed for the full interior. Shortly afterwards, this was collected and over a couple of weeks had replaced the existing tired interior. The one exception to this really was the carpet, which, as I mentioned, was in good condition.

Mmmm, much better

It amazing just how much of a change this has made!

One other item of interest they have at the Nottingham Minor Centre is a 1300 Marina engine.

We had discussed the options of replacing the engine on a few occasions without ever really coming to any firm conclusions, and to be honest we still haven’t. We’ve been through many arguments for and against which I’ll try to articulate here, in no particular order.

The current engine runs perfectly well but isn’t unleaded. Fortunately there are 2 garages within a couple of miles which stock 4-star and we do carry a bottle of additive, but I just can’t help feeling that it would be easier if it was unleaded.

The second consideration is the performance. I must admit that I feel a little uneasy driving along significantly slower than the other traffic on the A1 for example. To be fair to the car it will ‘cruise’ quite happily at about 60mph but you know that come the first slight uphill stretch that this will drop off significantly and will require either a corresponding downhill or a good few minutes to recover the speed. It would be nice to be able to maintain a speed rather than slowing to 40mph.

A similar scenario is when you have to pull out into traffic. On these occasions, regardless of what I’m driving, I like to get up to the speed of the traffic as soon as possible. I’m a firm believer that many accidents are not caused by people going fast, but by vehicles travelling at different speeds.

I don’t really have any great desire to be able to go much faster than the 60mph it will currently manage, but it would be nicer to be able to get to this speed sooner and maintain it easier.

This leads on to another factor that warrants consideration. We’ve heard numerous times that introducing a larger (faster) engine requires that you also consider uprating the brakes. Now, I have no problem with improving the braking, but all of a sudden things seem to be starting to snowball. What started off as a simple and relatively cheap engine replacement starts to get more costly and has the car off the road longer.

Going back to my earlier arguments, if the objective of a larger engine is not to allow us to drive any faster, then do we really need improved brakes?

The final consideration, and one that I think we are both clear on and comfortable with, is the question of originality. I know that this is going to be a subject that probably offends some people, but I’m not too worried about absolute originality. I don’t see anything wrong with sympathetically modifying a classic to make it more suitable for driving in the 21st century. I’m not talking here about installing a large Rover V8 or anything like that. No, we’re talking about a later and larger A series engine which should just drop straight in. If it was a rarer car then maybe the arguments might be different, but I think there are so many original Minors around that I wouldn’t lose any sleep about doing it.

So, the jury is still out on the subject of the engine replacement, but I’ll let you know if and when we decide to do anything.

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