UK based 109

[Snagger]

Hi everyone. I just wanted to say hello and introduce myself, having just discovered and joined this forum.

My name is Nick, and as well as a 1995 RRC (soft-dash), I have a 1972 SIII 109 hard top. I rebuilt it fromt he ground up a few years ago, amking a fair few alterations along the way. It's not one for the purists, but make the vehicle a good daily commuter as well as afamily expedition vehicle - I did an 18 day, 2,500 mile trip through France and around the Alps in it last summer, and apart from a couple of very quickly sorted faults, it performed really well and even managed to out-perform a few Defenders and Discovery IIs from time to time.

I'm very impressed by the resourcefulness and expertise of the members here. I hope to be able to use your advice for various upgrades I'm planning, including fitting RR axles and P38 power steering.

 

[diesel_jim]

Welcome! Where are you in the UK? I'm in Wiltshire.

 

[Snagger]

I'm in Bedford.

 

[gjackson]

Welcome to expo. That's a very nice looking SIII. I like the rear seats, and the integration of the SIII dash with the defender dash. Very nicely done!

cheers

 

[stevenmd]

Welcome! Post up some more details about your 109 rebuild, very interested. Also interested in the "soft dash" portion of the rangie.

 

[diesel_jim]

I'm in Bedford.

Ahh... i'll be up your way soon then... visiting messrs. Ashcroft to buy a recon gearbox for my 110.

 

[Snagger]

Thanks for the welcome.

Ashcrofts seem a great company - I work from Luton and have popped in there a couple of times for some advice and parts. They even gave me a mint second hand rear bearing carrier and transfer input gear free when my Fairey overdrive failed.

The RRC is a 300Tdi manual (R380) soft dash Vogue (not SE, so no scuffed/cracked seats and no leaky sun roof, and best of all, coil springs!).

The 109 has been built on a new galvanised Marsland HD 1-ton chassis with TIC HD parabolics. It has a 200Tdi, standard transmission with Salisbury rear axle and RM Roverdive. I have the standard 18IGal rear tank and two 12IGal front tanks, giving over 1000 miles un-refueled range. I also have ex-MoD jerry can lockers in each side. It was set up to run the front tanks on vegoil or diesel, with a heat exchanger for the fuel system under the bonnet. It also has a Kenlowe Hotstart (electric pre-heater).

I have four Defender front seats (the front pair are heated) and matching Exmoor Trim fold up seats at the back, all with inertia reel belts, Wright Off Road and La Salle interior trim, a Mud-stuff.co.uk centre dash for the accessories and several extra gauges. I used a Metro steering wheel.

The snorkel is the late Mantec plastic type. The bullbar has a pair of spots wired to the headlights, while the four spots on the Brownchurch HD rack are dash controlled. The XD9000i winch, extra lights, seat heaters, rear wash-wipe, wing mirror heaters and 10 interior power sockets (including a 240V inverter) are powered by an auxilliary battery.

I fit Defender doors for the bigger window aperture and full opening of the wind-down glazing and for the heated rear screen and wash/wipe. The Defender bonnet and grille were to permit easy installation of the Tdi engine and its ancilliaries, Defender cabin heater (much more effective than SIII), the Hotstart and fuel heater, snorkel ducting and big windscreen washer bottle (twin pump). The wheel arch spats were to allow for the 7" rims. The rear lighting includes twin fog and twin reverse lights, plus 4-way reversing sensors fitted in custom rear corner bumperettes and hitch step mountings. The hitch is the NATO type, and my Sankey trailer has been rewired for 12V electrics. I have twin Dixon Bate 3.5T hitches on the front for recoveries.

The 109 was featured as a six page article in Land Rover Enthusiast magazine last November, the editor asking if he could do an article on it having seen it in action on the trip around the Alps. I have a very extensive photographed blog of the entire build and some running reports/work since (including a recent crash), and also some video and photos of the Alps trip at www.nickslandrover.co.uk

 

[Snagger]

Welcome! Post up some more details about your 109 rebuild, very interested. Also interested in the "soft dash" portion of the rangie.

I'll take some phots for you on my next day off. It's similar to a 300Tdi or TD5 Discovery, but without the binnacle buttons.

 

[stevenmd]

I have a very extensive photographed blog of the entire build and some running reports/work since (including a recent crash), and also some video and photos of the Alps trip at www.nickslandrover.co.uk

Wow, just perused the quickly, I can tell it will be of great help as I go down this road. Thanks!:smiley_drive:

 

[Yorker]

Hey Nick good to see you over here! I'm aka MPi-KMS-72 on the landrovernet.com forums, weve chatted a bit there and via email.

 

[TeriAnn]

I have a very extensive photographed blog of the entire build and some running reports/work since (including a recent crash), and also some video and photos of the Alps trip at www.nickslandrover.co.uk

I just took a look at your web site describing your truck. That's a very respectable rig you have there. There are very few rigs that impress me enough to say that about and this is definitely one of the few. You have every reason to be quite proud of it. I'll have to poke around your site some more to see if there are any ideas I can use on my motor caravan.

Glad to see you here!

 

[Snagger]

Hey Nick good to see you over here! I'm aka MPi-KMS-72 on the landrovernet.com forums, weve chatted a bit there and via email.

Hi Matt!

 

[Snagger]

I just took a look at your web site describing your truck. That's a very respectable rig you have there. There are very few rigs that impress me enough to say that about and this is definitely one of the few. You have every reason to be quite proud of it. I'll have to poke around your site some more to see if there are any ideas I can use on my motor caravan.

Glad to see you here!

I have used your site before - I got a lot of information about the Tdi transplant from you and Glen - so a little reciprocity is only fair.

From what I seen from sniffing around on here and from your own site (widely referenced by many forums), you know your stuff and you have the honesty not to BS people about stuff on their vehicles you have reservations over, so I'll take your comments as a compliment indeed!:victory: I'm sure you'll find plenty of things you'd have done differently, but it seems reliable so far.

I'm about to re-bush my springs (I think the current bushes were pattern-part, possibly even Britpart, judging by the fact that they have failed in just 24 months of driving), and will be fitting a 109 military ambulance rear anti-roll bar at the same time. I'll be asking advice in the future about fitting RR axles (I have a 200Tdi front axle and want to source a 110 Salisbury ot TD5 rear axle) and fitting P38 PAS.

 

[TeriAnn]

I'm sure you'll find plenty of things you'd have done differently, but it seems reliable so far.

Actually I've seen a lot of similarities considering mine is a petrol V8 & yours a LR tdi (LR tdis never came to the States & are VERY expensive here, else I likely would have opted for a 200tdi instead of the V8. But I DO like the V8 power & cheap parts). Even the 3 fuel tanks and the gearbox dip stick.

I'm about to re-bush my springs (I think the current bushes were pattern-part, possibly even Britpart, judging by the fact that they have failed in just 24 months of driving)

You might consider importing a set of greasable poly bushings from Great Basin Rovers in the States. If you remember to periodically grease them they should last a good long time. You inject grease between the bolt and metal sleeve and between the metal sleeve and the poly bushing from the single grease fitting.

I'll be asking advice in the future about fitting RR axles (I have a 200Tdi front axle and want to source a 110 Salisbury ot TD5 rear axle) and fitting P38 PAS.

You have a SIII 109 so it should already have a Salisbury. Why a D110 Salisbury instead????? What do you gain??

 

[Snagger]

I briefly looked into polybushes (we do have them over here too from a variety of manufacturers), but I don't like the fact that they're not bonded and have no outer sleeve. The lack of bonding allows dirt ingress, which then acts as an abrasive. Most of the wear will occur in the polyurethane, but some of the grinding of the dirt will wear the spring and chassis eyes. I was also worried that failure of the pulyurethane would allow the inner steel tube to come into direct contact with the spring or chassis, causing rapid damage to the eye - at least on bonded rubber bushes, failure of the rubber only allows the inner steel tube to rub and wear the outer tube, limiting the damage to the bush. I have seen enough photos of this failure mode to put me off, though I'd buy twin sleeved bonded polybushes tomorrow, if they existed. Interestingly, Tomcat Motorsport and Drew Bowler (the makers of the Land Rover based comp-safari racers) did extensive trials on all the brands and grades of poly and standard rubber bushes in deserts and mud, and found the best handling and longevity by far were provided by the standard Land Rover rubber bushes...:Wow1:

I do have a Salisbury rear axle already, which I rebuilt to have post 1980 hubs and stub axles (so as to match my rebuilt front axle, making sourcing wheel bearings and hub seals very easy, as they're the same as on all Defenders to date) The reason I want later axles are many fold. Firstly, I want disc brakes on all four wheels. Standard parts would give me more confidence int he quality, would be cheaper and a lot easier to source replacements for, especially down-route. Secondly, the steering lock is much tighter on the later CV jointed front axles, vastly reducing the turning circle. Other considerations are the extra track width (having found myself on some worrying side slopes on the Alpine tracks at full load), the elimination of the steering kick-back in 4wd form the CV joints, and the 3.54 diff ratios which my Tdi will pull with ease, allowing the Roverdrive to become a motorway cruising gear (the engine gets a little busy above 60mph, even with all the sound proofing and the Roverdrive, and the 25% gearing increase of the later diffs will help with both noise and fuel consumption).

The rear axle will be relatively easy - I just need to remove the existing suspension brackets and weld on 109 spring seats and damper brackets. I'd like to use the A-frame ball joint on the Defender axle to make up an anti-wrap (anti-tramp) bar, as parabolic springs do tend to suffer a little with Tdi/V8 torque levels.

The front axle is the tricky one, because of the need to set the cator angle accurately and the proximity of the aft mounted track (tie) rod and the leaf springs. The position of the diff being much farther to the right makes life a litle more difficult, too - the side of the diff housing will sit above the right spring, so the right spring seat will need some complex shaping to fit around the diff housing (not just a circular section). This also means the front spring seats need to be deeper than normal for the dif to clear the spring. The plan is to angle the seats a touch and use longer spring shackles, so the axle will be at the normal distance from the chassis and the springs themselves will be the components moved to clear the track rod and diff. I reckon a 1/2 to 3/4" shackle extension, with spring seats 1/4 to 3/8" deeper than normal will do the job perfectly.