Land Rover Ideas for Grenadiers

[jscherb]

I posted a photo of this Land Rover tub trailer earlier in the thread - here are some detail and interior photos of it...

Interior views:

With the matching tow vehicle:

Would be cool to do a trailer like this that matches the Grenadier. For the Land Rover these trailers are made from scrap Land Rover tubs but since scrap Grenadier bodies don't really exist, a fiberglass version could be made. Or a Land Rover tub could be used, the shape isn't that different from the Grenadier body.

Is anyone interested in a trailer to match the Grenadier?

 

[Zeep]

Sounds like you are! Off to the mold shop with you!

 

[jscherb]

Sounds like you are! Off to the mold shop with you!

I am interested but not enough to start making molds. And I've still got the Jeep/Safari trailer, which looks just fine behind the Grenadier and if I ever stop hauling cargo with it I'll be able to finish the interior as a camper. Also don't really have room to store a second trailer here.

 

[jscherb]

An interesting table/Maxtrax mount/Gear panel that bolts to the side of the hardtop:

Shown open in this next photo (ignore the cargo hatch that replaced the window glass):

It's pretty simple, here's the hardware. The one on the right has mounting studs for holding Maxtrax; a table/gear panel could also be installed as seen in the photos above.

These are available for Land Rovers from a Swiss company: https://www.rough-parts.com/online-shop/sandblechaufnahme-168.html and they start at about $300 USD and go up to about $650 (!) with table and Maxtrax mounts. Wouldn't be hard to manufacture something for a lot less here in the US.

You'd have to drill holes in the Grenadier body to install this, but it wouldn't be too hard to make a version that attaches to the L-track on the side of the Grenadier and the roof drip rail (or a second piece of L-track mounted just under the drip rail.

 

[jscherb]

A table/storage box that bolts to the rear door, this one is a DIY job.

It's easy to imagine a DIY project something like this on a Grenadier rear door.

 

[jscherb]

I've installed my RTT to open off the back and off the side, but never this way:

I'm trying to come up with reasons to install it to open over the front like that and haven't come up with any other than it reduces the overall footprint of the vehicle + RTT when set up. Anyone have a reason this would be a better setup than off the side or the back?

 

[luckyjoe]

I've installed my RTT to open off the back and off the side, but never this way:

I'm trying to come up with reasons to install it to open over the front like that and haven't come up with any other than it reduces the overall footprint of the vehicle + RTT when set up. Anyone have a reason this would be a better setup than off the side or the back?

Exactly what you say - to reduce footprint to the size of your vehicle.

Lots of great accessories in this thread!

 

[jscherb]

One Defender feature that I think makes a lot of sense is how the factory jack works. The factory Defender jack looks like this:

It's got a much higher lift than the Grenadier factory Wrangler jack, and maybe easier to use. To use it, the shaft is inserted in one of the jack points around the frame (I believe there are 8 jack points). The front and rear crossmember jack points:

And it's probably more stable and secure than that popular off-road fashion accessory, the High-Lift. I wonder how many people have tried jacking up their vehicle with a High-Lift at home before they get into the wild and find out there aren't any good jack points for a High-Lift on a stock vehicleu?

To make use of the excellent Defender jack points, adapters are available for the High-Lift:

And they seem to work great:

In addition to High-Lift adapters, the aftermarket supports the factory jack (and High-Lifts with adapters) with additional jack points. These rock sliders, for example, include two jack points (http://www.extreme4x4.co.uk/Store/Protection/Protection-Rock-and-Tree-Sliders/defender-rocksliders):

And there are aftermarket jack points for other vehicles, FrontRunner sells these for Mercedes G-Wagens, they're a bolt-on installation (https://www.frontrunneroutfitters.c...acking-points-mercedes-benz-gelandewagen.html):

And they also sell these "generic" ones (https://www.frontrunneroutfitters.com/en/za/front-runner-hi-lift-jack-jacking-points.html):

The product includes two jack points, a High-Lift adapter and a foot plate (necessary to stabilize the tiny foot of the High-Lift), High-Lift not included.

They don't seem to provide instructions for mounting the jack points above, in response to a question about that on their web site they basically say "if you can't figure it out, use a different jack"

I believe a set of jack points like these would be a great asset on an off-road vehicle like the Grenadier. They would simplify and speed up jacking the vehicle in the wild and would greatly increase the safety over a vanilla High-Lift. And they could turn many "fashion accessory" jacks into useful tools .

I'll have to crawl under the Grenadier and see if there's a possibility of mounting some of these generic jack points to the Grenadier frame.

 

[jscherb]

Maxing out interior storage with pocket and MOLLE panels on the rear door and side wall of the cargo compartment. Also some drawers on the floor that don't take up the whole floor. No info on the maker of the panels in the article; this was a feature about this particular Defender and not specifically about the storage.

 

[jscherb]

Need to carry lots of fuel? I hadn't seen anything like the rooftop jerry can rack before. Looks like an interesting way to carry lots of extra fuel, although there probably isn't an expedition you could make in the continental US that would need that much extra. From the current issue of Land Rover Life:

 

[Zeep]

30 Gallons visible. May even have more hanging off the back!

Edit: Those may be 20 liter cans!

 

[jscherb]

Land Rover Owner published an 8-part series about an expedition along the Continental Divide in North America. The first 4 parts covered the Divide in Mexico, and the expedition entered the U.S. in part 5. I'll post the U.S. parts 5-8 in this thread. In this installment (part 5), they enter the U.S. from Mexico and then deviate from their Divide route to explore the Pacific Coast from LA to Washington. A great trip by itself.

 

[jscherb]

In Part 6 of the article series, they go from Seattle east back to the Divide and south into Colorado.

 

[jscherb]

Articles like the one in the last post are good sources expedition ideas...

One pass they did in the installment in the previous post is Rollins Pass, it's the site of an early railroad crossing of the Divide that was later replaced by the Moffat Tunnel. This is one of the trestle bridges on the western approach to the pass:

Been there, done that (again, in the Jeep, before I had the Grenadier)...



Closer to the summit, there are several trestles clinging to the side of the mountain. This one is called Devils Slide:



The high altitudes were in a cloud the day we ascended the west side of the pass, visibility was very poor. I thought it best to park the Jeep and hike the rest of the way.



The hike was rewarded with Needles Eye Tunnel, a short tunnel through the highest point of the pass:



The next day we did the eastern approach, the tunnel was much easier to get to from that side:



The route over the pass was so hard to maintain for about half the year because of the heavy snowfall so eventually they bored a 6.2 mile tunnel through the mountain, which is still in heavy use today. This is the east portal, which is several thousand feet lower in elevation than the pass.



In addition to the magazine articles, both sides of the Rollins Pass approach are documented in several trail guides.

 

[jscherb]

In Part 7 they cover more of Colorado.