A Few Original Details

My car has a BMC South Africa sticker on the rocker cover. It has the correct body plates which were cut at the factory to remove "Made in Longbridge England". The blue dymo tape was a distribution mark from the factory at Blackheath, Cape Town. My car obviously went to K&M, one of the largest distributors in Pretoria. The wiper motor is stamped 04 69 for April 1969, although my car was first registered in November 1969. The block has the remains of the pinky purple paint that BMC South Africa used to differentiate locally built 1000cc motors from UK built ones which were painted green. The engine number begins with 9AK- showing that this is the original motor. Let me know if you want to know more of this obscure trainspotting stuff.

Kev

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-

My car also has the K & M dymo tape on it. The prefix at the end of mine reads W.O. , while yours reads W.E. , do you have any idea why? Mine is a 1970 model, body number 1071.

Jared Mk3 wrote:My car also has the K & M dymo tape on it. The prefix at the end of mine reads W.O. , while yours reads W.E. , do you have any idea why? Mine is a 1970 model, body number 1071.

Its great that yours also still has the tape. Ryno Verster said he wasn't sure until quite recently what the dymo was for but he has now found quite a lot of cars with it still in place. I am not sure what the suffix means, will email Ryno and ask.

Kev

Kev, where's my demo tape?
:-)

It would just be interesting to find out what it all means. Also, I was wondering if you had noticed any discrepancy with the chrome around the windows? Some cars seem to have it, while quite a few others have no provision for it at all. Perhaps on the later cars Leykor tried to save money and started making the doors without chrome?

SAMK3 wrote:Kev, where's my demo tape?
:-)

Unfortunately yours is missing!

Kev

Jared Mk3 wrote:It would just be interesting to find out what it all means. Also, I was wondering if you had noticed any discrepancy with the chrome around the windows? Some cars seem to have it, while quite a few others have no provision for it at all. Perhaps on the later cars Leykor tried to save money and started making the doors without chrome?

Thats really interesting. I assumed that they all had chrome on the doors. I know that the door is fairly unique but wasn't aware if this detail. I like the waistline chrome on Elfs and Hornets - a pity BMC South Africa didn't include this on our cars.

Kev

I noted that in Ryno Verster's book, the Mk3 doors had some faults like rattles etc, so the doors were improved and introduced on the first Clubman models. This could possibly be the reason for the later cars not having this chrome as they received the later improved doors.

The doors on my car (with chrome) do rattle and I have never been able to sort it. Yours is the best explanation I have heard so far.
Thanks
Kev

Its a logical possibility, but who knows, especially with the reshuffle of the entire BMC group into Leyland at the time.

Have you heard anything from Ryno about the difference in those prefixes by any chance? My car's tappet cover sticker didn't survive at all compared to yours. I also noticed that your air cleaner is painted black with a sticker on it, mine seems to have been resprayed in silver.

Also, with the doors, the reason why some cars don't have to sought after door bins/pockets could be down to the fact that the later doors were put on. I've never seen a later car with my own eyes, so I don't actually know if they had the later door locks on either.

Jared, I plan on shooting some high quality photos of Kev's rocker cover decal (if Kevin doesnt mind) and fixing up some repros. I'll see how much the printing will be and ask around if anyone wants to join in.
M

That sounds good. Let me know what happens there, thank you.

SAMK3, before my last trip to South Africa, I was going to have some of the 998cc valve cover stickers made up to bring with me. (My Wolseley 1000 has the original valve cover and sticker.) They were to be gifts to Ryno for MOCSA and to others as we made our "one lap" of South Africa. A local sign/decal maker said they could do them and to come back in a couple of days when the boss would be back to give me a quote. I showed up with the valve cover, again, a couple of days late. The boss said they couldn't do them, in a manner that sounded more like he couldn't be bothered. By then it was too late to have them done elsewhere before I left on my trip, and the idea got lost in time.

If you find a good source, I'd contribute to having a batch made and if they're good enough I suggest we donate most of them to Ryno to distribute to the South African Mini clubs.

Hi,
I would be very happy for SAMk3 to photograph my car's stickers and badges. The one one on my air cleaner is unfortunately badly damaged.
Kev

You're welcome to use this printer-ready art that I just whipped up if it would help you to reduce costs at the printer.

Just let me know I'll email you the EPS vector file.

Great work, thanks,
M

If you can get me good photographs and sizes etc I will probably be able to get them made, a friend of mine is a screenprinter and makes all my stuff for me.

Ah. Another question to be answered. The photos of the valve cover badges are very big and only partly show, but there is enough showing that when I checked out the one on my Wolseley 1000, I noticed it is different, among other things, having 998cc printed on it.
I wonder when the change was made. During the W-1000 days or after the W-1000 and with the introduction of the Mk3? Or even during the Mk3 run. Seems like another question for Ryno.

My brother bought me this rocker cover. I asked on a South African forum roughly what year it is. Apparently the rocker cover plates were replaced by stickers in about '66 or '67. Also, due to South Africa receiving the first 998cc non-Cooper Mk1 Minis in '65, the engine capacity would thus be placed on a plate. I just thought that it would be interesting to for others to see another of the quirks of SA cars.

That's the same one that is on my current '68 W-1000. (The previous one didn't have the sticker left.) So, I guess the question becomes at what time did that one stop and the later one begin?

Wow. Everyone here is awesome. Bill, I'll see about measuring and finding out the right material to print on. We should ask around and see how many to make.
Thanks.

hi,
thats the one I´ve found on my 1967 S.A. Traveller..........
bit different, but if you are going to reproduce some of them I would be interested

I did notice yours was a little different to mine, but maybe that is down to the fact that yours is a sticker while mine is an actual plate. BMC South Africa in the '60s did some strange things when it came to local cars. But if SAMK3 is making up some, we could possibly get some like mine made.