Starting to make some good progress.
September 5th 2019
My plan today is to tackle the cooling system which appears to be full of what I can only describe as bilge water. Not only that, but I noticed that the radiator starts to get warm as soon as the engine has been started. That suggests the thermostat is stuck in the open position which means the engine would struggle to reach and maintain its proper operating temperature.
Before launching into that job, I thought I'd start with an easier one. An original fuel cap which I'd won of eBay arrived in the post today so I can finally get rid of that terrible rubber 'LPG' cap which is currently on the car. It looks like someone has fitted some sort of adaptor ring to allow the non standard fuel cap to be fitted so first I had to remove that.
Once I had removed that, the original Morris cap fitted perfectly. All I had to do was to attach the retaining chain to the little loop which was just inside the filler neck.
It always feels good adding original parts to a classic car.
And now onto the job I've been putting off for a while! Opening the radiator cap I could see that this was something that badly needed doing. Not only was the radiator full of pea soup but there was obviously an issue with the thermostat and the heater doesn't work. Ok, so let's get this done!
I loosened off all the radiator and heater matrix hoses before popping them off and draining the torrent of brown sludge into a plastic box. Then I undid the thermostat housing and prised it off to reveal the horror that lurked within...
The old thermostat was a rusty mess, like something that had been dredged up from the Titanic. It was obviously stuck open as I suspected so I prised it out and cleaned off the remains of the old gasket before giving the engine, radiator and heater matrix a good flush through with clean water. I then fitted the new thermostat and gasket, then I reattached all the hoses and topped up the system with water and a radiator flushing chemical.
Next, I ran the engine at a fast idle for a few minutes and this time the radiator stayed cold (as it should do) until the engine was up to temperature. Then the thermostat opened and allowed the hot water through the radiator. Another little victory!
At this point I jumped in the car and took it for a little drive for a couple of miles to allow the radiator flush to do its thing. As another little bonus I noticed that my heater was now working very well! I've heard many people criticise these old Morris heaters as being not very effective. Maybe they just need a good flush through because mine is like a little furnace under the dashboard!
I returned home and left the car to cool down for an hour before draining off all the water and flushing everything through again. Finally I topped up the system with antifreeze and ticked yet another job off my long list.