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MG Midget and Sprite Technical - 1979 Midget Oil Cooler

Just in the process of tidying up the engine bay of my 1979 midget and in doing so have removed the radiator and oil cooler intending the clean and paint the surrounding area and the rads as well.

Due to the brittleness of the rubber oil pipes to the cooler I cut them off with the intention of replacing them but have found that the replacement aren't jubilee clipped to the unions like mine were, but a complete crimped pipe including the unions.

Can I just buy a suitable length of piping and refasten with jubilee clips or was my car previously subject to a shortcut that shouldn't have happened?

The union nuts have seized on so I'd rather leave them if at all possible as I can't be certain of getting them off without fracturing the joint.
Eamonn Spencer

Eamonn. I have never seen an oil cooler fitting that did not have crimped on fittings. That is a standard practice. I suspect your system has been modified by the legendary "Dreaded Previous Owner". I would recommend using the currently available product. But, keep an eye on the lines as some of the rubber used in the current production parts is not of the quality of the original rubber used by the factory.

Les
Les Bengtson

When I fitted an oil cooler to my Midget 1500 many years ago, since removed as the way I drive my Midget the oil was not getting hot enough to warrant the use of a cooler, I found the pipes supplied were longer than I needed so I cut them to the length I wanted, removed the fittings from the cut off ends, and used jubilee clips to fix the pipe back on to the fittings.

I did it to the 4 connections so that they all looked the same and none of them ever leaked.
JB Anderson

I'm sure a few here have found recently that some of the pipe kits are a bit too long

if you have an oil cooler fitted (remember they didn't originally) then you're best with an oil thermostat fitted also (unless you just block off the cooler this time of year) and with some of these at least you splice them into the existing oil cooler pipes and use jubilee clips
Nigel Atkins

yepp...way to long is standard, not sure why

on the fittings I used anti seizure compound on the threads at the recommendation of (very top people...haha)

prop
Prop and the Blackhole Midget

This thread was discussed on 25/03/2013

MG Midget and Sprite Technical index

This thread is from the archive. The Live MG Midget and Sprite Technical BBS is active now.