preacherman
Explorer
It is my uncle’s fault that I bought this Land Rover. I blame it on him really. In the late 1980’s he gave me a subscription to Petersons 4x4 for Christmas. Not only did he give me my first glimpse into the world of off road trucks, he renewed the subscription every year until I got out of college and could afford to get it myself. I still remember the 1st issue. It had pictures of the camel trophy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camel_Trophy on the cover. Bright yellow Land Rovers dripping with character, covered in mud, slogging through an unknown mudhole in the middle of the night, in God knows where. I was hooked.
In 1996, when I was in college, my roommates and I where sitting around our house one Saturday after spending the whole day riding mountain bikes. One roommate picked up the TV guide (remember when you had to look up what was coming on TV??) and started to read. “Hey there is something coming on tomorrow called the Eco-Challenge. This description sounds pretty cool.” Passing around the TV guide, we all agreed. Mountain bikes, Land Rovers, adventure racing and British Columbia. What’s not to like?
On Sunday Feb 16, 1997, we tuned in to the Discovery Channel to watch the Eco-Challenge Adventure Race. For the next 5 nights, we watched 360 men and women ages 18-73 compete in 5 person teams. The 5 days of TV coverage were actually a condensed version of an 8 day, 323 mile endurance race that was held in British Columbia in the summer of 1996. The race was the brain child of a then somewhat unknown producer named Mark Burnett. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eco-Challenge
While the race had run twice in 1995, they pulled out all the stops in 1996. While my roommates and I were more interested in the rock climbing and mountain biking portions of the race, we could not help but notice the charisma and appeal of the bright yellow Land Rovers driving the race teams, film crews and staff around. 28 Special Addition 1996 Land Rover Discovery XD trucks painted in AA Yellow. Each Land Rover Discovery XD was decorated with special event badges, sponsor stickers, roof racks, Hella lights, a rear ladder, brush guards, and more magnetism than my college age testosterone could handle.
It was a defining moment for my life. There in the living room of the pink rental house we affectionately called “Pepto” just off campus, I made a promise to myself. Whatever happened after college, wherever my career took me, whatever life had in store for me, I would stay actively involved in the outdoor activities I loved, and I would have one of those 4x4s. While I soon forgot about the 4x4, my promise to stay active stuck with me like crazy glue sticks to your fingers after making model airplanes. Within two years my roommates would get jobs, start playing golf and slowly become fat, middle aged men who “used to do outdoor things”. I, however, kept riding, started overlanding, hiked, backpacked, drove, hitchhiked, and climbed my way around the world. Then I got married and drug my wife and kids along with me.
The Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge stayed somewhere in my sub-conscience. Someplace in the layers of things you forget, it rested between old girlfriends and the first car I drove. I would occasionally think about it, but for the most part it was just something I saw on TV back in college. Then one day, I came across an ad for this truck, a 1996 Land Rover XD Eco-Challenge.
1996 Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge
I had watched the truck go for sale a few months earlier but was turned away because of the higher price tag. Now several months later it was being re-sold at a much lower price due to conflict and difference of opinion around the cosmetic restoration it had recently undergone. Now, the price was right, I was between projects and I felt confident that with some work, this could be a great adventure truck for my family.
Note: There is a considerable amount of opinion and conflict around the circumstance surrounding the previous transaction of this vehicle. For this reason, I have chosen to not add some information or easily found web links in this thread. I would like to keep this thread about what I have done to this XD. Before I purchased this truck, I was able to have several lengthy conversations with all parties involved and my main questions where easily answered. All parties agreed this could be a solid truck, no one questioned its authenticity as one of the 28, and for me, the new lower price was closer to what I was willing to pay.
While the nature of some of my repairs will most likely elicit comments about previous statements made about this truck on other forums, I would really like to keep the past arguments in the past and focus on just how great of a truck it is in now becoming with the time and energy I have committed to it.
I believe great trucks deserve to be driven, enjoyed and properly kept. From my first conversations about this truck with the past owners one thing was clear. This great low mileage truck was being overlooked in a larger conversation about disclosure, quality of work and proposed value. For me, the necessary repairs were achievable, within my budget and abilities and small in the larger scale of vehicle preparation and restoration. In short, I felt like this “child” was getting overlooked in a nasty divorce. At some point, it became more about the divorce to many involved and the fact that a very solid base for a truck was being sold was overshadowed.
With that said, I will now start the fun part of chronicling my building of this great 1996 Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge.
In 1996, when I was in college, my roommates and I where sitting around our house one Saturday after spending the whole day riding mountain bikes. One roommate picked up the TV guide (remember when you had to look up what was coming on TV??) and started to read. “Hey there is something coming on tomorrow called the Eco-Challenge. This description sounds pretty cool.” Passing around the TV guide, we all agreed. Mountain bikes, Land Rovers, adventure racing and British Columbia. What’s not to like?
On Sunday Feb 16, 1997, we tuned in to the Discovery Channel to watch the Eco-Challenge Adventure Race. For the next 5 nights, we watched 360 men and women ages 18-73 compete in 5 person teams. The 5 days of TV coverage were actually a condensed version of an 8 day, 323 mile endurance race that was held in British Columbia in the summer of 1996. The race was the brain child of a then somewhat unknown producer named Mark Burnett. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eco-Challenge
While the race had run twice in 1995, they pulled out all the stops in 1996. While my roommates and I were more interested in the rock climbing and mountain biking portions of the race, we could not help but notice the charisma and appeal of the bright yellow Land Rovers driving the race teams, film crews and staff around. 28 Special Addition 1996 Land Rover Discovery XD trucks painted in AA Yellow. Each Land Rover Discovery XD was decorated with special event badges, sponsor stickers, roof racks, Hella lights, a rear ladder, brush guards, and more magnetism than my college age testosterone could handle.
It was a defining moment for my life. There in the living room of the pink rental house we affectionately called “Pepto” just off campus, I made a promise to myself. Whatever happened after college, wherever my career took me, whatever life had in store for me, I would stay actively involved in the outdoor activities I loved, and I would have one of those 4x4s. While I soon forgot about the 4x4, my promise to stay active stuck with me like crazy glue sticks to your fingers after making model airplanes. Within two years my roommates would get jobs, start playing golf and slowly become fat, middle aged men who “used to do outdoor things”. I, however, kept riding, started overlanding, hiked, backpacked, drove, hitchhiked, and climbed my way around the world. Then I got married and drug my wife and kids along with me.
The Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge stayed somewhere in my sub-conscience. Someplace in the layers of things you forget, it rested between old girlfriends and the first car I drove. I would occasionally think about it, but for the most part it was just something I saw on TV back in college. Then one day, I came across an ad for this truck, a 1996 Land Rover XD Eco-Challenge.
1996 Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge
I had watched the truck go for sale a few months earlier but was turned away because of the higher price tag. Now several months later it was being re-sold at a much lower price due to conflict and difference of opinion around the cosmetic restoration it had recently undergone. Now, the price was right, I was between projects and I felt confident that with some work, this could be a great adventure truck for my family.
Note: There is a considerable amount of opinion and conflict around the circumstance surrounding the previous transaction of this vehicle. For this reason, I have chosen to not add some information or easily found web links in this thread. I would like to keep this thread about what I have done to this XD. Before I purchased this truck, I was able to have several lengthy conversations with all parties involved and my main questions where easily answered. All parties agreed this could be a solid truck, no one questioned its authenticity as one of the 28, and for me, the new lower price was closer to what I was willing to pay.
While the nature of some of my repairs will most likely elicit comments about previous statements made about this truck on other forums, I would really like to keep the past arguments in the past and focus on just how great of a truck it is in now becoming with the time and energy I have committed to it.
I believe great trucks deserve to be driven, enjoyed and properly kept. From my first conversations about this truck with the past owners one thing was clear. This great low mileage truck was being overlooked in a larger conversation about disclosure, quality of work and proposed value. For me, the necessary repairs were achievable, within my budget and abilities and small in the larger scale of vehicle preparation and restoration. In short, I felt like this “child” was getting overlooked in a nasty divorce. At some point, it became more about the divorce to many involved and the fact that a very solid base for a truck was being sold was overshadowed.
With that said, I will now start the fun part of chronicling my building of this great 1996 Land Rover Discovery XD Eco-Challenge.