Hi All

Does anybody have an early type subframe - the one that uses a pair of bolts on each tower mount? All the ones on ebay etc seem to be mounted with single tower bolts.

Regards

David

Hi David. I have 2 "as new" subframes which I don't think I will be using. One front and one rear. Both come with the hubs, wishbones, suspension rubbers, etc. They are coated in what seems to be underseal on top of red lead on top of the original BMC paint. There doesn't appear to be any rust! This is all original stuff from a kit that was dry stored and never completed. Let me know if any of it would be of interest.
Cheers, Mike

Hi Mike

You have mail.

Regards

David

Anybody know if you can convert a new type sub frame with tower bolts to the old style and if the new style will pick up on the same mounting points on the front of a coupe?

David

The tower bit is easy, I converted my rear subframe on the Coupe by drilling out the middle hole and welding a big washer the same size over it to give a bit of thickness, added a 4mm ally spacer to the top of the tower as there is a bit of a chamfer on the locating spigot. All will become clear when you look at one. The problem will be the legs to the rear of the s/frame as the single bolt jobbies are rubber mounted here and different to the 2 bolt frames. Having said that should'nt be too difficult to convert to solid mounts. I think later Minis had a slightly different floorpan for this.

Reading this thread:

http://www.theminiforum.co.uk/forums/index.php?showtopic=10075

It looks like that given I need to straighten the bottom of my tub, beefing it up a bit to take some of the new style solid mounts is feasible??

It should be - AFAIK the mini floor didn't change in that area when the subbys did - apart from the mounting hole positions.

Another thing to bear in mind is that there is in existence an Finite Element Analysis of a coupe tub, and it shows one of the areas of most stress to be in the area of these mounts - so some intelligent beefing up would be more than helpfull.

You might also find that due to these stresses you have more localised rot in that area than you were expecting.

Although that is true, I'm not at all sure the GTM bulkhead is in the same place /at the same angle as a Mini. At least I don't think mine is.
The new subrame may not meet the bulkhead
The other alternative: it looks very much like BL just chopped the wings back on the newer subframe to get the mounts in. It should be perfectly feasable to lengthen the frame to mount in the correct position.

As indeed it is on the later Mini, the bulkhead is renowned for cracking at the new mounting point.

Dino, I completely agree.

The main thing I would take from this is yes, the later subby will be short of the tub, but will not clash, and the solid mounts will almost definitely not fit to the angle of the bulkhead.

If I was in this position I would fabricate my own mounts - but make the tub side mount plate very large to spread the load around the bulkhead. Plus, i'd weld decent thickness washers to the subby mount holes as they have a habit of stretching.

Sounds like a plan then......