Practically Classics Forum

The factory head stay should be fine, these extra hardcore ones aren't needed with the amount of torque available from almost any mini, certainly any with a factory or only mildly tweaked engine. The issue is that most people who have problems with the exhaust aren't fitting it properly or are taking it to K**k-F*t and letting them not fit it properly.

Then there are the pure animals, like our Terry, with their turbo nutter mad b'stad engines.


Clubfoot with FWD Rover V8 installation!

hi folks. thanks for replies.I have fitted a new clamp and held the downpipe in place with the jack.At the moment all seems well, Fitted it up without paste and time will tell. Regards jtk

Good luck with that. (Did you check the head stay bushes and the security of the rigid clamp on the remote extension)?

Hello, you haven't mentioned the stay bracket that's bolted to the diff casing and should hold the lower downpipe rigidly to the engine- is it still there? These tend to vanish over the years- if it's not there then you'll be doing the job again soon. It should look like this, http://www.minispares.com/product/Class ... |Back%20to this bit attaches to the diff housing and the dowpipe shoud then be be fixed to this with another clamp, http://www.minispares.com/product/Class ... |Back%20to
Other purveyors of mini bits are available!

This a common problem with replacement exhausts which are nowhere near as good a fit as they should be. The manifold clamps are important too- the single bolt pressed steel versions are useless, get the hefty two bolt cast version, they're only a couple of quid more.

That's the same one but on 850s with the magic wand gear lever. On anything with the late remote, it goes horizontally, hence the extra holes in the new ones but it's this whichever way it's used (I've put a picture from the second of your links up to this post, Mr R):

I wrote:Good luck with that. (Did you check the head stay bushes and the security of the rigid clamp on the remote extension)?

But if the o/p tightened that before letting down the jack, assuming he used at least something to help the bell end seal at the manifold, it should all be fine. Assuming the upper engine stay is on good order too and that's what we don't know. If that clamp, be it attached at the diff on magic wand cars or the extension casting on others, is missing in action, then the pipe will come loose again, even if the engine stay bushes are good.

johnnythreeknees wrote:product that will seal the exhaust downpipe to the exh manifold on my mini.

Don't know what downpipe to manifold join is like on a mini,but would one of these help?

I've seen a thing like that used to mask the symptom for slightly longer but it's not a solution as such, usually found in minis owned and/or maintained by people who are new to the cars so don't necessarily notice when bits that should be on there are missing.
The point is that there should be no relative movement between the manifold flange and the bell end of the downpipe, so if it's jacked up, the clamp - mentioned by Mr Rusty and myself - is present and correctly fitted and the assembly paste isn't used heavily to mask any cracks or pits that ideally need to be dealt with, then that interface ought to last the life of the pipe.

Here are images showing the shape of the manifold and of the pipe, along with the original clamp. These are standard parts with a three into one manifold and single pipe attaching to it:





miniMETROs, Coopers and 1275s used a three into two alternative so lots of original, smaller capacity minis now have those retro-fitted:

ah right,thanks JPB,it's clear to me now. I've got the same issue on my Cortina having bought one of these

so the branch manifold can join neatly to the system,but it is not sealing.
So the plan is to do this

...forces both sides together. Would that be possible to do the same Johnny?

On a car with a longitudinal engine such as a Cortina, the downpipe will be far less likely to fail its connection as the engine might rock gently from side to side and the whole system will move roughly the same amount, but it won't have the much more violent movement of the typical transverse engine which, because it's mounted across the car, will rock back to front, so its exhaust system needs to be supported differently from that of the Cortina if issues of the sort we're on about in this thread are to be avoided with a mini.

So yes, provided that the 'Tina's system is supported rigidly at the bellhousing and/or where it passes across the car before heading down the other side of the tunnel and by flexible supports further back where the bodywork carries the exhaust, the type of connection at that point - where the pipe is still able to be supported rigidly and to move with the engine - shouldn't matter as much and that sandwich arrangement looks fine to me.

Thanks John for the explanation,sticking with OP problem,would the 'sandwich arrangement' not work on the mini?