Hi all,
I'm a relatively new member and having just bought another mini, thought it was time to introduce myself. I want to start by thanking all the people who run and contribute to this forum. As a long time car forum user, this is one of the best ones on the planet.
Now, I wanted to start by showing you this photo of a car that was advertised here in melbourne recently. it generated some discussion on the forum with the theme of what a sad end for a once nice car!
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Well you've probably worked out that this is the car I bought and last week brought home. To tell you why I bought it and a bit about myself I need to take us all back just over 50 years to the Mini's heyday, especially around May 1969. As a fresh faced 18 year old I'd just dropped out of first year uni because I wanted to buy another Mini (my 3rd) and go racing. Neither I nor my family had any money but in the optimism of the times, I wasn't going to let that stop me. Haha, little did I know!
I came down to Melbourne from Albury and after a few days searching found the car of my dreams - a 1964 998 Mini Cooper, British Racing Green with white roof, lovely interior with a classy looking wood dash, a tacho. Most importantly though, it had clearly had had some race preparation - a lowered stance sitting on silver reverse Cooper s rims with dry weather racing tyres. Then, on lifting the bonnet a big DCOE weber dominated the engine bay and turned out to be attached to a race prepared engine - 1170cc's, westlake pistons, knife edged crank, everything balanced, fully worked head, hot cam - faster than a Cooper S and I just had to have it. I think it was $1100, a lot of money then, but I was able to get a loan as long as my older brother would guarantee it, which he did.
To cut a long story short, the next 2 years was a bit of a disaster. A loose gudgeon pin meant one partial engine rebuild and then a valve dropping through a piston caused another one. By then I was so broke I could hardly afford to drive the car but unfortunately, I did. And put a conrod through the block! The only way I could keep mobile was to put an old 850 engine I had in the shed on top of the Cooper gearbox and keep going until someone offered me enough money for it to pay out the remainder of the loan.
I completely lost contact with the car but, having owned around 100 cars since then and done some rallying, MSCA sprints, a lot of off-road racing & a wonderful Targa Tasmania in an Alpine Renault, that Mini remained the magic car for me.
So I happened to see the car in the picture advertised and as it said it was a 1964 Cooper with an 850 motor in it and originally BRG with white roof, I got intrigued. Sure enough, after finding quite a few other direct connections to "my car" - still has the same wooden dash, 850 motor still on a cooper gearbox, disc brakes, etc, leather bonnet straps, reverse Cooper s wheels, painted white (as I did). Even the same kill switch in the glovebox.
So I'm completely sure its either my old car or such a close facsimile that it doesn't matter. The young lady who subsequently bought it in 1971 unfortunately passed away in 1974 and the family has kept the car in storage ever since. Now its in my garage being pulled apart to discover all its secrets. Good news so far, with a very straight body and possibly only one small area of rust. I plan to restore it to a slightly detuned version of its 1970 specification - so mainly original but keep the wooden dash, and 1170 motor & reverse Cooper S rims.
Will take a while, I'm estimating 3 -4 years as I'll do most of it myself. Can't wait to get back to the garage and back into it! Cheers everybody,
Alby
PS, if anyone recognises the car description from the 60's and knows anything about it, I'd love to hear from you!
