Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Plus Four, Supersport & Plus Six (CX & CXV Generation Vehicles) Gauges not working

Supply chain......
A chain is made up of links. Depending which one breaks you get varying degrees of problems.
Remember the Suez Canal blockage? A large number of ships ended up stuck waiting to proceed. The consequences were shortages of items of all sorts that were sourced from the Far East/ India and more. Shortages started to build up.
Money is the basic driver as holding stocks costs money.
This is where a company’s policy and management have to make decisions.
JIT......works if done properly but a chain link break gets costly. It relies on suppliers ( internal or external) being able to supply when told to. They might decide ( in a contract term or themselves) to keep a buffer stock.
The customer might take a buffer stock option as well. A partnership is needed and suppliers chosen to meet the needs.
Co-ordinating supplies to manufacturing schedules is the basis. Having good suppliers is essential. Looking at consequences of breaks in chains and deciding on covering these off or not essential. Costs of not meeting targets quantified. Both financial and effect on the company’s image.
When in a radiator factory I ran the final assembly. Parts were mostly made in-house ( press shop making tanks, brackets, core block components. Others bought in, such as fittings for screw in sensors etc.)
We had a monthly schedule for rad type . BL plus others (Caterham, JCB, Hyster, London Taxis, MOD etc).
Take BL... please! SD1 rads had several variants. The Midlands factory planned ( ?) for each model . Let’s say 3.5l Auto with oil cooler in the bottom tank. Planned for week 3. I’d set up our schedule to deliver the numbers ordered at the end of week 2. We’d get a phone-call in the morning.... “We’ve run out of gearboxes for the 2l cars so are switching to the 3.5l auto with oil cooler and need a minimum of 30 for the night shift. “
Hmmmmmm. A quick parts check revealed no bottom tanks available and not scheduled to be made for another week. Drop everything, get the press shop to change tooling on a press and make tanks. IMMEDIATELY. Chase up other parts and get them assembled similarly. Go to press shop and others to collect a kit of parts to take to the next stage. Rush them through, holding up other jobs. Assemble the rads, paint and test, load into containers and put onto a lorry waiting for them. Send out. Then deal with the consequences of that rush job caused by a supply of gearboxes not available. Basically fire fighting.
After trying to get improvements and hitting brick walls I left there. Had enough. Old school attitudes and shouting/ arguing to get things done. The problems were basically lack of coordination and poor supply integrity.
I did enjoy watching a Spitfire core block being refurbished. A BoB plane under major service. The factory had history of manufacture and we still had a couple of employees who could do the job.

Hi Robbie!
Hope this finds you well! Those adorable little girls of yours must be all grown up!


Because, I would imagine, like all wise new owners, they have not altered the previous regimes (post 2002) business model, internal accounting or staff that they inherited, especially as it relates to non-current models they are not interested in. THAT earlier regime operated on the odd premise that supplying parts and service to earlier models is not profitable and new production is sacrosanct. (where the industry sees the highest profits in parts supplying post warranty cars. Yes, it is nutty and frustrating for owners such as we but there you have it. The parts you mention are all available from other sources. normally much better and much cheaper. IIRC, dealers are restricted by contract to buying most near current parts from the Company, unless the Company says they are no longer available or they are beyond a certain time frame. Violators can be in BIG trouble.

There is, I believe, a single individual in parts sourcing, regardless of the decisions/needs of Development/Parts demand. He has been trained by the last regime to source by price as his priority. Examples of that are fascinating. You see the consequences here every day. Easy to remedy but that hasn't happened (yet). If I were the current executive, I would be more interested in dealing with the two Rally cars. The latest Financials filed certainly doesn't look like
profits are a priority any longer. These people are enthusiasts.

By way of example and back to this thread, PCBs are the most frustrating and devastating electrical problem I have ever encountered on the gomog help line. I won't deal with them anymore. Waste of time. Even if you fix them, regardless of the fashion you do so, issues and diagnostic confusion will only pop up again in time. It is wisest to bite the bullet and ultimately wire them out, which is too expensive for most unless one does it as a DIY. I can speak to that shortly as I am planning to rewire my non-PCB Morgan shortly, probably next summer when I am back in Canada. Our American cousins have muchly upgraded wiring kits for all cars. BTWm below is an image of Bill Beck, the MMC Service Manager (trained the good Mark Baldwin) and then Development Director at the MMC. He is wiring my current mog in my little garage in 2003.

L.

Lorne - the whole business will grind to a halt if they cannot get the radiator issue sorted and sufficient stock of proper radiators acquired for supply to the dealers who need to repair cars. The car is basically brilliant but if it cant be used due to a failed radiator it is rubbish!!!

Peter must be turning somersaults in his grave!
Cheers!

Update.
Part received by dealer yesterday. Being fitted today, est 3/4 hour job. Plan is to pick the car up tomorrow.
Fingers crossed that no hiccups occur during the fitting. I’ll call to confirm this afternoon.
I have decided to go by train. Dealer is picking me up from the station. I fancy the train journey as a “treat” or ? Tickets not expensive. Train schedules ok. Rucksack with bits and bobs for return trip. Now....which route home? Motorway or cross country? I’ll see what the weather is like and time pans out.
I did similar years ago when picking up my first Morgan. The train journey was enjoyable and added to the experience. Chose to drive home non motorway to get to know and learn/enjoy the car. Good decision.

Always non motorway for me!

Car sorted. A pcb and loom connection were replaced. The loom section was tried first but no result. The pcb had to be changed as well. Looks as if something was blown/burnt out/ damaged on it due to the loom wiring into plugs caused component failure. They “adjusted” the fuel filler as well. It was one of the awkward ones and gone worse a bit. Much better after they had rounded off the corners of the plastic locating lugs so they were not catching on the filler outer lip. The Caterhams use the same fillers but apparently better functioning.
There was a gorgeous Plus Six GT there. Black, silver cowl, black hardtop. Also an immaculate E-type.
Chatting to the service boys was interesting. They are doing quite a bit of race work. They look after 9 Caterham Academy cars/drivers plus a few other cars. Not just UK racing but continental as well. Spa, Zandvoort etc. Some neat rac3 cars there. Morgan, Caterham, other makes.

Good to hear a positive result. A bit concerned that presumably external unprotected PCB's exist on CX models though. On my Roadster the only exposed PCB's (if they can even be called that) are the small retangular ones on the back of each electronically latching push switch. Hazard one can be seen below.

Richard, and just for information. Here’s the new CX panel.

Robbie,

It was interesting to read the 2022 MCC accounts in which the number of administrative staff fell from 22 to 17 (from memory), which may reflect a squeeze on overheads. Whilst automation can deliver efficiencies, I would have thought that during periods of immense change, introduction of new model ranges and the level of increased warranty work, it would be a very challenging environment to deliver administrative savings.

There was also mention of ongoing warranty cost etc., so the cynic in me might suggest by reducing stocks or stockholding of warranty spares, you could stretch out the incurrence of warranty costs over a longer financial period. of reporting. There may be a quite understandable wait and see period as to the most recent radiator/software improvements to see if the latest iteration solves the problem. Whilst this is amazingly frustrating for the customer, within reason, I'd far rather have a final solution to a warranty issue, than the worry at the back of my mind, is it fixed or will we revisit this again possibly outside the warranty period. Shame it leaves a slight doubt in one's mind as to the final outcome and any future exposure to the same problem and for for myself has lead to delaying getting an automatic CX for yet a while until more evidence of a permanent fix is in place.

The back of the gauges look pretty acceptable for a normal car trouble is its fitted to a Mog with water ingress, hey ho.........Em