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Joined: Feb 2019
Posts: 1,876 Likes: 15
Talk Morgan Enthusiast
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Talk Morgan Enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2019
Posts: 1,876 Likes: 15 |
wow that is very different than mine
Rodger 2018 M3W "Dreamers on the Rise" 2004 Plus 8 (wife's) old Goldwings and a couple of Harleys
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59
Talk Morgan Expert
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Talk Morgan Expert
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59 |
I happened to call by my "local" dealer this morning on a completely unrelated mission. While there they said that they needed to check my pedal box and chassis which took all of five minutes; I never had the early M3W pedals and my chassis is not cracked at the foot of the vertical tube by the lower wishbone mount. When I took delivery of my car at the end of 2012 I was slightly surprised that it didn't have the M3W pedals but it was pretty clear that there was a reason for the change so I was not bothered about it. Subsequently, whatever the reason for the change at the time (cost/delivery issues/failures or any other) it became fairly clear that there was a higher failure rate than is acceptable for a pedal box (not that the failure rate would have to be very high to reach this threshold) and MMC has now effectively acknowledged this. "Not before time" may well be a fair comment but this is progress, hopefully is a good sign for the future and I certainly do not see it as a reason to condemn Morgan whether as part of a vendetta or otherwise. The chassis checks appear to be different from and unrelated to the cracking of the upper chassis rails at the upper wishbone rear mounting brackets that led to the bolt-on brace a couple of years ago for pre-2014 chassis or indeed, new chassis for those of us that have experienced the cracking of the 2012 and 2013 chassis. I would be very surprised if anyone outside of the factory knows how many chassis have failed on this vertical tube and given the nature of the internet, it may well be a very, very low number that have gone: I am aware of one such failure, possibly two, but internet forum self selection of the sample always leads to distorted results. Put simply this does not mean that there have not been more failures but let's just say there are 100 M3Ws on this forum and there have been 2 failures, to then assume that the overall failure rate is 2% is rubbish. Again, I'm going to take what appears to be the contrarian view to many: this "recall for inspection" is progress on MMC's part, and I hope it continues. It may well be down to the new owner's influence and policies, and it also may well be some of the MMC engineers now being allowed to act where before this kind of action was discouraged. I'm not a factory insider, don't have access to any inside information but am quite willing to read between the lines along with everyone else but not necessarily coming to the same conclusions. NDT of the chassis to pre-empt a failure is unlikely to be viable; magnetic particle testing is going to need clearance round the tube for clear visual access and removal of all coatings; think body and engine removal followed by grit blasting then you can test it. Dye penetrant much the same but you would want to chemically remove the coating rather than grit blasting. X-ray? Again a bare chassis required and I would be surprised if even a seriously good radiographer could identify any cracking that wasn't already visible or MPI detectable. Eddy current inspection would also need clear access to work round the welds and tubes with the probes and I suspect would not give definitive results given the thin walls, the geometry and the shape of the fillet weld caps. Ultrasonic testing would be a waste of time due to the thin walls and the fillet welding. This pretty much leaves visual as the only viable in-service inspection method. I do not expect that any fatigue cracking of these tubes would be otherwise detectable in a bare chassis environment for very long before being clearly visible if you look for it; think rapid propagation due to the high vibration, high cyclic loading of thin walled tubing going from initial incipient crack to "oh bugger" in not many hours. My suspicion is that the root cause of the failures of these chassis tubes is more in initial QA/QC than in-service conditions; what batch testing is done on the chassis; what batch testing of the raw tubes is carried out; what trade testing is carried out on the welders; what control over the welding process is carried out; how much do you really want to pay for a chassis? Cracked chassis are neither a new thing nor unique to MMC; it's not even unique to separate chassis: monocoques crack and tear too! if all this seems a bit too much on the "glass half full" side then reflect on this, my glass is actually empty right now, has been empty all day, and I'm off to do something about it! Slainte. 
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Joined: Oct 2013
Posts: 1,642
Talk Morgan Enthusiast
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Talk Morgan Enthusiast
Joined: Oct 2013
Posts: 1,642 |
The chassis checks appear to be different from and unrelated to the cracking of the upper chassis rails at the upper wishbone rear mounting brackets that led to the bolt-on brace a couple of years ago for pre-2014 chassis or indeed, new chassis for those of us that have experienced the cracking of the 2012 and 2013 chassis.
Got it. My car is from 2014 so I thought I was safe regarding the chassis problems but this "recall" is for all cars up to (and including) December 2014, so my car is within the time frame concerned. I have no idea what (and where) I should be looking for. Called the dealer, he doesn't know either but he told me he was going to ask the factory for more details Have no "M3W" pedals so that doesn't concern me
Last edited by MarioCP; 21/06/19 06:41 PM.
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Joined: Jul 2007
Posts: 28,428 Likes: 180
Salty Sea Dog Member of the Inner Circle
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Salty Sea Dog Member of the Inner Circle
Joined: Jul 2007
Posts: 28,428 Likes: 180 |
Well said Calum! I suspect I may have beaten you to the  though 
Graham (G4FUJ)
Sold L44FOR 4/4 Giallo Fly '09 Gen2 MINI Cooper ragtop '90 LR 90 SW
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Joined: Feb 2019
Posts: 3,854 Likes: 2
Talk Morgan Addict
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Talk Morgan Addict
Joined: Feb 2019
Posts: 3,854 Likes: 2 |
The light at the end of the tunnel is actually a train. 2019 M3W
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Joined: May 2011
Posts: 1,613 Likes: 22
Talk Morgan Enthusiast
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Talk Morgan Enthusiast
Joined: May 2011
Posts: 1,613 Likes: 22 |
The chassis checks appear to be different from and unrelated to the cracking of the upper chassis rails at the upper wishbone rear mounting brackets that led to the bolt-on brace a couple of years ago for pre-2014 chassis or indeed, new chassis for those of us that have experienced the cracking of the 2012 and 2013 chassis.
Got it. My car is from 2014 so I thought I was safe regarding the chassis problems but this "recall" is for all cars up to (and including) December 2014, so my car is within the time frame concerned. I have no idea what (and where) I should be looking for. Called the dealer, he doesn't know either but he told me he was going to ask the factory for more details Have no "M3W" pedals so that doesn't concern me My car was the first to have the lower wishbone crack discovered, the picture below shows the crack propagating from the weld. 
2021 M3W 2013 M3W - Sold 1971 4/4 2 Seater 1934 Sports
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59
Talk Morgan Expert
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Talk Morgan Expert
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59 |
Well said Calum! I suspect I may have beaten you to the  though I may be catching up...glass keeps emptying itself but I am diligently refilling it! Also watching Catch 22 on Catch-Up, think they may well be doing the book justice.
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Joined: Jun 2015
Posts: 572 Likes: 2
Talk Morgan Regular
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Talk Morgan Regular
Joined: Jun 2015
Posts: 572 Likes: 2 |
Calum,
I think the percentage of early chassis failures may be considerably higher than you suspect. Out of the 5 early M3W owners in France I know plus myself, there have been 3 chassis failures and there must have been one other as well from someone I don't know, since I know Marcassus had replaced two in Toulouse and two French cars (including mine, were done in Malvern). It may be that the early LHD chassis are more prone to failure than RHD. There are at least another 4 or 5 contributors to this forum who have had chassis failures. One had his replacement chassis fail as well. There must be a Mk2 and Mk2a chassis as my new chassis does not apparently need inspection according to today's email to me from Morgan.
I don't know if Morgan reused the wrongly installed (Marcassus local agent in Le Castellet) replacement chassis on mine, when they rebuilt it for the second time, as there was some question about the first replacement chassis having been dropped and bent but there were so many porky pies being told by the various participants over the whole three year mess of my chassis replacement, I have no idea who was telling the truth and who was making up malicious stories.
My original 2012 chassis failed in July 2015 at just over 4000km, with no competition use. It was not working satisfactorily again until November 2018, when I collected it from Malvern.
Wilson
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Joined: May 2014
Posts: 363
Learner Plates Off!
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Learner Plates Off!
Joined: May 2014
Posts: 363 |
My chassis crack was discovered in 2018 when it was spotted by RogG at the Goggles & Gauntlets rally in June that year. The crack on mine was very similar to that of RogG's (as in his photo above). My mileage was then at around 15,000 and at that time I was aware of 4 other cars (i.e. 5 in total) with this same type and location of crack. MMC insited that the cars should not be driven until they had repaired the crack and we had to get the cars to the factory at our expense. The repair involved removing the existing wishbone mounting lugs and welding on a redesigned lug each side of the car, which had a much larger footprint with the chassis tubes.
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59
Talk Morgan Expert
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Talk Morgan Expert
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 2,776 Likes: 59 |
Wilson I don't disagree at all...I'm one of several owners that have had two chassis failures and replacements...both failures being to the top chassis rail, not the vertical strut between the chassis rails. There may well have been more failures of this strut than I know of (I will happily phrase that as "of course there have been more than I am aware of") but the earlier failures seem to have been to the horizontal rails and the failures have been remarkably friendly in nature. By this I mean that a degree of vagueness has set in...a bit like a slow puncture on a road car rather than a full scale "Oh F*ck" moment like you would have had with a dodgy rose joint failure on a race car being driven in anger. The failures to the vertical tube may well be more likely to cause a catastrophic event but this is supposition. I know of at least four clearly different M3W chassis; 1. Pre-production with no cross-brace behind the engine (but ahead of the body) - don't think any production cars got this one, but I could easily be wrong. 2. Bolt-in cross brace behind the engine - straight brace across between the top rails with a rubber bush at each end - my first chassis, 2012 and into 2013. Very crackable. 3. Bolt-in cross brace behind the engine plus small gusset type stiffener plates and a different steel specification and wall thickness. 2013 and up to 2014. My second chassis and just as crackable. 4. Triangulated, welded in brace between the top rails behind the engine. Doesn't seem to crack on the horizontal rails but the vertical tube now has a question mark against it. This might be batch related (this is a guess...could be batch of tube, batch of welding wire, dodgy weld plant - too much current, too little current, wrong polarity, hungover welder...who knows, too many variables, too little information). This version also has the rubber mounted bevel box. 2014 onwards. Just read KBMOG's post I'll add "more than a question mark" and quite possibly much more. 5. Very like 4. but with the bevel box in a rigid mount. Very few about. My third and current(!) chassis! Probably only as a replacement chassis and for a short time...and probably not many of them made it into the wild. 6. Much the same as 4. but with additional brackets for the Euro 4, SUV ride height version.
Before getting a bit too "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition" I will add that Revolutions in Perth, my local dealer, have been very, very good at cutting through any dodgy information/possible porky pies etc. that may have arisen and I will stick with a degree of optimism regarding the future of MMC and its approach to these issues although my glass is becoming empty again and needs sorting out!
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