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#1 | ||
65 Galaxie Hardtop
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Brisbane QLD
Posts: 3,751
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My boss is keen on one. He checked it out at the weekend and it's been restored and by all accounts sounds like a good 'un. Goes like the clappers (mild 1100 in it) and handles like a go-kart as all Minis should.
Two concerns: 1. Brakes are a bit iffy. Needs a good shove to stop. Has drums all 'round, but was apparently a little frightening, especially considering that it's had everything replaced recently (wheel cylinders, pads, master cylinder...). He's used to driving modern cars, though... 2. Gear lever has a HUGE amount of slack in it. Doesn't jump out of gear. Again, compared with a modern I'd expect there to be a lot of slack by comparison. The Mini's a 1977 model. My take on point 1 is that if everything has been replaced and it's still doing it, something's not right and it'll need fixing. Point 2 I assume would be worn/poorly adjusted linkages, which ought to be an easy fix. The fact that it's easy to engage when you actually have the lever in the right spot is a plus. It's just finding the right spot that's troublseome. I haven't driven it myself, so if anyone knows anything about these little go-karts, please share your thoughts here.
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Red on red 65 Galaxie 390FE C6 9" ![]() |
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#2 | |||
Grinder+Welder = Race car
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Briz-Vegas
Posts: 3,937
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Quote:
From memorey theres 2 types of shifter for minis ("Magic wand" and remote?), ones better than the other, but yeah, i'd suspect worn bushes.
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"No, it will never have enough power until I can spin the wheels at the end of the straightaway in high gear" - Too much power is never enough....Mark Donohue on the Can Am Porsche 917. |
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#3 | ||
Ute Forum Moderator
![]() Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Melb
Posts: 7,227
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Unboosted 4 wheel drums are a huge culture shock after coming from "normal" brakes. Gear lever should respond as you say. The most important thing though is to ensure the bodyshell is solid!
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#4 | ||
FF.Com.Au Hardcore
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Shoalhaven
Posts: 3,161
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At nearly 30 years old there's going to be a bit of looseness even though underneath they were very very tough little cars. As a Clubman (I presume) it is going to have the remote shifter. Look at the linkages. The Mini's drum brakes were good at the time considering it is a small light car. Also had a pressure limiting valve on the rear brakes to prevent lock-up (something Aussie cars waited a long time to get - remember Holdens and Falcons ran on drum brakes then, they just didn't stop!!!). A disc setup might be better if he's planning on driving it like a Mini! There's plenty who do but he should remember he's moving into the 'vintage' car world which means handle with a bit more care than a new car. Suggest he connect up with one of the very active Mini clubs and there's also an excellent local magazine out every 3 months (The Mini Experience). Do a bit of research and enquiry first rather than jump at the first one he sees.
There's a guy at Brookvale who rebuilds them virtually to new but they cost about $15 grand, but if your mate wants something that's going to do what the one in my avatar does he'll need to pay for it to be that sound. I was lucky enough to own a couple when they were newer, also worked on the production line building them in the 1960s. There's nothing like them before or since. My last wish is to drive one again before I die! Strange though it might seem, one thing that attracted me to my present Ford Territory was that it reminded me of the Mini in its handling, relatively speaking. The Territory is to today's SUVs what the Mini was to small cars - a dynamic revolution.
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#5 | |||
FF.Com.Au Hardcore
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Shoalhaven
Posts: 3,161
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Quote:
As someone who started off in the smaller BMC cars (where such things as boosted discs and rack and pinion steering were standard on the Coopers, 1100 and 1800 from the early 1960s and later the P76 of course) I can tell you it was a culture shock to me stepping into Falcons and Holdens in the 1970s! They were terrifying cars to drive, no steering, no brakes. When I was living in Melbourne a flatmate's boyfriend wanted to impress me and let me have a drive in his luxury version Ford (Galaxy or Fairlane, I can't quite recall). I started fanging round the corners in it like I did in my car but with lots of nice squashy body roll and squealing tyres. After a couple fo corners I looked at him and he was white in the face. He said 'slow down, you're driving it like a BMC car.' People had lots of digs at BMC cars in those days but 30 or so years later I see that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery! Just a pity it took some so long to catch up (e.g. Falcon, but catch up it has I'm pleased to say).
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#6 | ||
AS IT SAYS.....
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: IN THE SCRUB
Posts: 270
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Mini's do not like low cut pine tree stumps.
Well me and 4 mates were rallying in a pine forest in a mates mum's mini that he had just resprayed. Doing somewhere between 50-60 MPH through tight pine break tracks, front passneger on the handbrake to help get around corners, got a a ripping right hander that we were going waaay to quick for, decided to take the "new" track that was just put through from a harvester doing a 3rd thinnings, problem was the saw dust from the machine cut was thrown over the face of the stump we were travelling...needless to say AIR-BORN for a good 10 feet, landed on her side and sild her roof into a standing tree. 3 in the back not injured..driver 8 stiches to his right eye brow from steering wheel..front passenger 5 stiches to his lip from the dash and a busted nose, cracked front teeth. And the poor little mini...dead... Picked a few pieces of sump out of the stump.. the front floot pan was pushed up so far when u sat in the front seat your knees are litteraly on ur chin more so than before.. the head rests on the front seats were touching..really buckled the the mini's belly. Also the front end looked more like a VW combi than a mini afterwards... it was a good day for it ![]() everyones got a good mini mishap.. ![]() |
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#7 | ||
1967 XR Falcon
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: South Coast
Posts: 2,231
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gf's got 2 minis. sold the mini s last week.
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Coflash.com |
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#8 | |||
FF.Com.Au Hardcore
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Shoalhaven
Posts: 3,161
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Quote:
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#9 | ||
building the xe...
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: western sydney - home of the mullet
Posts: 2,473
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would love to own one, but cant fit in them properly... loved driving it though... was a cooper... mad little car...
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#10 | ||
Well hello Mr Fancypants
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Perth
Posts: 1,066
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i have a 1995 Cooper with 1.3 fuel injected motor. it isnt the fastest car in the world in a straight line, but ask anyone who drives one and they will tell you that corners and roundabouts are what they are made for. No body roll and stops like nothing else. also, those 'slow points' that councils install are the most fun. just change down a gear and nail it :-)
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#11 | ||
DPC PERFORMANCE Race prep
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Bundoora Victoria
Posts: 3,379
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i used to hang crap on them till i drove a cooper s dont know what it was either being so close to the ground or the handling but shure was an awsome drive there OK
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#12 | ||
Saving for a Jet Car
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: richmond.nsw.au
Posts: 3,745
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I know you can put a Swift GTi motor in them, then they haul ***
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RIDES 2011 SZ Territory Titanium TDCi - Smoke 2001 Mitsubishi "BONSAI" GSR Mirage - see thread |
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#13 | ||
re
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Victoria - where being slow & incompetent is considered being "safe"
Posts: 1,323
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My first ride in a “hot” car was in my bosses Cooper S. We went up to Winton in it – so loud and noisy, lots of revs on the highway. Even though the clutch was going on it it still beat a lot of the other mini’s up there. I couldn’t believe the acceleration the thing had. In the right gear sat the right speed it was good and the braking and handling was far superior to what I was used to in Dad’s family car. Since that day I have always valued cornering and braking over simple straight line grunt.
Eventually the guy moved on to an Appendix J Mini which he built from the ground up, megadollar A-series engine. Set a lap record at Bathurst, appeared at the Adelaide GP support race and was beating Mustangs at Phillip Island (a real horsepower circuit he was on the nominal redline halfway down the front straight and just used to rev the nuts off it and hope that it would hang together (and hold off the V8’s that were gaining in the mirror) until the corners)). Another guy at work bought a done up Cooper S and he too loved it until he started having kids. Don’t the old ones look so small when they are next to the new (BMW) minis? There are kits for putting Honda VTEC 1.6 and 1.8 engines in to the square nosed clubmans………. |
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#14 | ||
65 Galaxie Hardtop
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Brisbane QLD
Posts: 3,751
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Thanks for all the comments. We're off to see it together on Friday. He's taking a bankers draft with him so we might be coming back to his place with a go-kart. Keep you posted.
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Red on red 65 Galaxie 390FE C6 9" ![]() |
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#15 | ||
owning V8=having no $$$
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Brisbane...
Posts: 1,717
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Just do me one favour....MAKE SURE THAT THE BATTERY IS STRAPPED DOWN AND SECURE!!!!!!!!! I cannot stress this enough...12 years ago i rolled a 1967 mkI cooper S, the battery was not secure, car landed on roof, petrol poored everywhere,battery sparked cause it was loose...ill let you guess what happened!!
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Weekends - 1965 XP 302 sedan... ![]() Weekdays - 1980 323 Mazdabator complete with cheese cutters & FF sticker :dr_Evil: The Reality: 13.1 @ 106mph.... The Goal: somehow get into the 12s!!! :sm_headba www.qldsuperkart.org |
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#16 | |||
DPC PERFORMANCE Race prep
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Bundoora Victoria
Posts: 3,379
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Quote:
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#17 | |||
owning V8=having no $$$
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Brisbane...
Posts: 1,717
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Quote:
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Weekends - 1965 XP 302 sedan... ![]() Weekdays - 1980 323 Mazdabator complete with cheese cutters & FF sticker :dr_Evil: The Reality: 13.1 @ 106mph.... The Goal: somehow get into the 12s!!! :sm_headba www.qldsuperkart.org |
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#18 | ||
Regular Member
Join Date: Oct 2005
Posts: 139
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here is a MINI i built it has a E1500 nissan engine in it,5 speed g/box and 4w disc brakes, it is lowered by 4" so low that your foot won't fit under it. has 13 x 8 wheels 2x 2 barrel downdraft webbers flowing 635cfm. reves to 11,000rpm and makes just over 140hp. it won the QLD under 2 ltr sports sedan hillclimb Championship in 1999. took 8 months to build and cost under $4,000.oo on the track, it was the last race car in AU to be race registered with an alloy roll cage, It now runs a Turbo and EFI.
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#19 | ||
Member 178
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Rockhampton
Posts: 1,385
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Got drum brakes on the mini I am restoring at the moment. They have been fully rebuilt and I can tell you they are not that special. The gear stick sounds normal as well. Check out my sig if you want to see it.
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#20 | ||
FF.Com.Au Hardcore
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Shoalhaven
Posts: 3,161
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What about a V8 then? See the V8 Clubman in my image at http://www.fordforums.com.au/showthread.php?t=12190
vino3o2 how the hell did you roll a Mini? That's almost impossible - you must have tripped over something. Glad you came out alive. The battery should be secured in any car.
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#21 | |||
Grinder+Welder = Race car
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Briz-Vegas
Posts: 3,937
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Quote:
__________________
"No, it will never have enough power until I can spin the wheels at the end of the straightaway in high gear" - Too much power is never enough....Mark Donohue on the Can Am Porsche 917. |
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#22 | ||
FF.Com.Au Hardcore
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 3,150
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you can always fit an old VH44 remote power booster.then you will have good brakes
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Hervey Bay QLD Great trades recently- GILMORE BOSSYONBIKE |
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#23 | |||
Regular Member
Join Date: Oct 2005
Posts: 139
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#24 | ||
Dedicated to Safety....
Join Date: Jan 2006
Posts: 313
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I remember when I first got my licence about a thousand years ago I had a Mini for a while. We had to hack a huge hole in the firewall to fit the Webber carby on!
Sounded good from inside the car too! Got scary when she backfired though. Roasted Nuts anyone????
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TotalDriver |
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#25 | ||
Regular Member
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: perth australia
Posts: 161
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4 wheel drums..you get used to them...just stomp harder.the drums on my '51 clevo mustang are actually surprisingly good and have saved me from some tricky situations.but really not nice in wet weather.
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#26 | ||
striped
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Sydney
Posts: 656
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http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...2732953&q=mini
surely this one hasnt got drums up front watch till the end for the stoppie ;) |
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#27 | ||
Regular Member
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW
Posts: 244
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thats an insane piece of driving. How good is that guy at controlling the car
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#28 | ||
You gotta pay to play
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Hampton Park Victoria
Posts: 306
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Anyone know anything about Minis?
yes I do Never Ever Try To TakeOne Around A 15 KPH corner at 80 MPH!
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Regards Gilesie AU I Forte Wagon 4.0 Dodge D5N Twincab (Project) 2003 Mazda Bravo (work truck) 1979 F100 Ambo |
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#29 | |||
owning V8=having no $$$
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Brisbane...
Posts: 1,717
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Quote:
__________________
Weekends - 1965 XP 302 sedan... ![]() Weekdays - 1980 323 Mazdabator complete with cheese cutters & FF sticker :dr_Evil: The Reality: 13.1 @ 106mph.... The Goal: somehow get into the 12s!!! :sm_headba www.qldsuperkart.org |
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