hot today - car made it to work and back though - however most of the coolent ended up in the expansion tank (poured it back in rad when cool). Is this normal ?, how come some minis don't have an expansion tank ? Any thoughts ?

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1977 Clubman

sean you need the proper cap to recover the liquid
makka

Speaking of Expansion Tanks (I am sorry for posing this question right in thew middle of your posting Sean) .... You can fit an expansion tank from a late model car (a little one) has anyone done this ... I desperately need one.
Cheers Gerard

didn't have them from standard, at least in the early days, mid 70's onwards may have had them

I was tuning my Cooper S with my mates exhaust analyser and the guage nearly got up to 2/3's after I ran it for a couple of minutes at about 4000rpm in his workshop!!

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did I tell you that I won a trophy?

Could you explain "proper cap" should it be a special type - the tank is not a leyland one thats for sure - it's a white plastic general one I think

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1977 Clubman

i've got a 2 litre coke bottle resting on my clutch cover doing the job for me

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ahhhhh ok then different storie cant help sorry
makka

So is the coolent suppose to escape into it when it's hot ? - how does it get back in the rad, or is that my job ?

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1977 Clubman

yeah should be about 2 cm below the base were the rad cap sits
makka

On this thread - how do other peoples cars go when it gets to 37 degrees - see i have only owned minis in Uk before this one so heat was never a prob' wet plugs and anti freeze were the main issues there.

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1977 Clubman

well you need to make sure the rad is clean flush and reverse flush flush the block .....
also get the metal fan not the 4 blade type toss the plastic ones not much chop
mine gets up to round 180 190 on days like that sometimes close to 200 if in heavey traffic
makka

A good clean system the temp gauge stays the same if its a 27C or 37C day!

Thermo fans help though

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Too many cars, and too little time.

The "El-Cheapo" plastic late model/accssessory type ones are just """OverFlow Bottles"""" & don`t recover the lost water that well at all. ( IF at all in most cases)

The original BMC """Expansion Tank""" was originally Metal (altho they did make a plastic one along the way too) & were fitted to all sorts of BMC/Mrris/Austin/Leylands & were a "pressure tank"

Austin 1800
Morris1500
Moke
Triumph
Jag
Daimler
Kimberly/Tasman
Marina
Etc Etc Etc

& are a dam good thing to have fitted

"""FLAT""" cap goes on the radiator & the "Pressure" cap goes on the """EXpansion"""tank

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No offence intended here but--> anyone writing a book about minis 30 years ago may not have experienced such worn or stuffed-with components as we are finding these days.

You should put your heart & soul into everything you do.

mine was hanging around 80-90 the other day when it was 37-ish

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Just pulled my engine apart after ten years of great running, no overheating or bad vices (even though seven of those years were in Darwin) and the odd trip to the race track to find that I had mistakenly had a 4 blade crap pump fitted by the fellow who built the engine. They're not all that bad in my book. A good clean system helps a lot.

If you can find a nice metal overflow tank, it sits just perfectly underneath the passenger wheel arch, and Morris/Leyland have been nice enough to allow a hole big enough to run the hose through the inner guard to the radiator.

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SooperDooperMiniCooperExpertEngineering

All garage work involves equal measures of enthusiasm, ingenuity and a fair degree of irresponsibility.