Forums Forums Enthusiast Forums A - Z Autowirral Looking for an old engine

Hi. I’m after an old engine, any condition. Prefer a A series from old mini or metro if possible.

Purpose is to educate myself in basic mechanics.

Thanks.

I learnt a lot by taking my first Mini apart with a Haynes.

Not sure if you'll get anything cheap these days though now they're collectors items

This would have been £50 at one time, now £400!

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/285830290203

Actually, BITD I bought Minis for £50 from the "runners or spares" section of the local paper!

Should be fairly cheap from any scrapyard, they don't bother trying to sell them on unless they are near/known perfect.

There's more recent cars with similar sort of basic (no-ecm, no-injection) engines which should be easier to obtain. Peugeot/PSA TU1/k engines spring to mind, though it is OHC rather than OHV and the bolts are all metric not imperial. Those engines are probably a bit lighter than an A-series so easier to work on.

First engine I stripped down was a BL-B-series, followed by a GM-BLY.

Best advice I can give you is to get a decent socket set, stripping the heads on stiff bolts is the last thing you need. I tend to have a set of 6-point impact sockets as they are much less likely to spin on bolt heads and they are surprisingly cheap. A cheapo 12-point socket set is fine for co-operative nuts and bolts but if you are doing it outside a lot of toolsets are not chromed these days (lidl) and will rust if they get damp/wet. And of course you need a torque wrench for rebuilding, no need to spend silly money on those although the electronic ones are a lot quicker and easier to use, all mine are mechanical and work fine.

Good ratchet spanners are a godsend but not cheap, perhaps not as useful for engine-out work. Cordless impact drivers save an awful amount of time and patience.

Cheap air tools are pretty useless.

Most cars have been metric for a long time, if you start on a imperial A-series you will need another toolset for metric - noting its not totally uncommon to find imperial bolts around exhaust and brakes on a car that is otherwise metric.

Its a bad hobby to get into, you end up collecting more and more tools especially with modern cars, my collection is bad enough and the newest car I've worked was a 2000 model.