Work on Hagerty’s classic Mini Cooper S is still underway, and in terms of the engine bay at least, things are really starting to take shape.
If you’ve not been following the full story, here’s a recap: Our colleagues in the US bought a 1965 Cooper S a few months back, and any attempt to run the engine filled the workshop with a haze of fumes.
The culprit was determined to be a damaged block, with sizeable channels gouged out of it thanks to escaping combustion gases. With the block skimmed and rebored (and given a coat of paint), our host Davin set about rebuilding the short block, while waiting on a few replacement parts.
Now, the parts have arrived – so Davin has got immediately to work dropping in the pistons, lubing up the bearings and tying the bottom end of the 1275cc A-series together. That’s as satisfying as it sounds, and the rest of it goes together well too, including the timing chain and its cover (also painted in traditional dark green).
Next up is the water pump and then all the pulleys. Keep an ear open for Davin’s tips along the way (most aren’t just relevant to the A-series) and a few product recommendations towards the end.
There’s still some way to go, so if you want to keep up with the Mini rebuild in future, bookmark our Redline Rebuilds page and subscribe to Hagerty’s YouTube channel.
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Hi Davin just a tip on fitting the timing case . temporally fit the crank pully to align the seal before snugging up the holding bolts as there are no well fitting aligning dowels in these light tin timing cases from BMC.