Land Rover Ideas for Grenadiers

[jscherb]

Land of Land Rovers

Maybe someday there will be a story like this about Grenadiers? Somehow I doubt it but we can always hope.

Here's the video:


Maneybhanjang, West Bengal, is about 18 miles from Ghum (rhymes with doom) and not far from Darjeeling. When I was photographing the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway trains at the Ghum Station for a magazine article, a bare aluminum Series Land Rover drove by. I didn't have time to photograph it I've always regretted not getting that photo. That Land Rover may have been one from Maneybhanjang as seen in the video. The Ghum Station:

 

[jscherb]

What does everyone think of storage on the visors? A couple of items from the magazines:

There isn't much clearance between the headliner and the top of the visor in hte up position so I'm not sure how storage on the visors in a Grenadier would work out but was thinking of designing/sewing a prototype to try it out.

And speaking of things on the visors... my better half can't believe that a vehicle this expensive doesn't come with a mirror on the visor. It does seem very cheap not to include one, so to end that discussion, I added this one. It was $13.99 on Amazon and it's very large - you can see how much of the visor it takes up. Attaches with elastic straps. Apologies for the photo inside the messy garage, it was raining when I slipped it onto the visor. FWIW: https://tinyurl.com/27bw4nma.

 

[jscherb]

This photo made me think about patio umbrellas:

What about using a patio umbrella for this purpose? It wouldn't be hard to rig up something to mount it to a Grenadier. If you look closely at the photo it appears they may store this in the large tube attached to the roof rack. If you only needed an anwing like this occasionally, you could rig something for a large patio umbrella, use it for those occasional times, and the rest of the time the umbrella could shade the patio at your house.

Dumb idea?

 

[jscherb]

Land Rover Life magazine had an 8-page article about the Santana Trophy rally. Sponsored by Santana, a Spanish automaker of license-built Defenders, it's an off-road rally where navigation skills are important - participants are given a booklet with instructions which they must follow to complete the course and get to the finish.



The rally takes place mostly in the Moroccan desert, partly on somewhat improved roads and also on trails. More on the rally: https://www.santanatrophy.com/



I think this could be a great Land Rover (ok, Santana) idea for a Grenadier - there are lots of off-road events like Easter Jeep Safari where everyone lines up and follows the trail leader on the trails, and some more involved offroad events like like the Dirt Every Day event that the now-defunct offroad magazines in the U.S. used to sponsor (maybe they still do?), but as far as I know there's no event like the Santana Trophy - an event where each team's ability to follow directions while mostly solo in the wild and their driving skill makes the difference.

Imagine this - starting in Los Angeles or perhaps Las Vegas, the rally instructions route you through the Mojave Desert and maybe Joshua Tree National Park, then across Arizona and north to someplace to cross the Grand Canyon into Utah, north to Moab and east across Colorado with the final destination being Denver. Roads would be used when necessary but as much as possible the rally route would go off-road. It would be a week-long event, with the rally participants expected to live overland, carrying whatever they need to live on the route for a week. Camping would be part of the adventure and each team could decide where to camp along the way each night depending on their progress so far. Starting would be staggered so at least at the beginning it's not just a parade of vehicles following each other.

It could be called the American Overland Challenge.

Would you sign up with your Grenadier?

 

[jscherb]

If you've got a Defender, you can start at 1650 GBP (about $2100 at today's exchange rate).

It's easy on a Defender because the roof unbolts, to do this on a Grenadier you'd have to do some cutting. But for the price maybe some people would fire up their Sawzall?

 

[jscherb]

This kitchen was featured in one of the LR magazines:

It's not much of a kitchen really, mostly it's just a few drawers, but I wasn't so interested in the kitchen anyway but I did find the foam drawer inserts interesting so I researched those. The foam is readily available from a bunch of sources, here's one: https://www.toolfoamsupply.com/custom-foam-tool-kits. I also found a video on youtube explaining how to cut the foam to form-fit things:


The video is pretty long (they talk too much ), but it does give a good idea of how to make drawer inserts like these.

Foam could be useful to keep things secure in an overland/camping Jeep.

I posted this not because of the kitchen itself, but because of the foam in the drawers. A great idea for drawers in an expedition vehicle.

 

[jscherb]

Fire extinguisher

This was from an article on increasing the storage in a Discovery:

As they said, I think it's a good idea to keep a fire extinguisher close to the stove; my kitchen/stove pulls out from the cargo area and I keep an Element fire extinguisher in one of the pockets on my wide rear door:

 

[jscherb]

Covering things carried on the roof rack?

This looks like just a tarp:

I don't think most people load their racks with gear such that a rack cover like these would be a popular product here, but they're often seen on expedition Land Rovers.

Or how about a huge bag for stuff on the rack? Or maybe it's a tarp, can't tell from the photo.

 

[LRNAD90]

So apparently Safety Devices is making an NAS style external cage for the Grenadier?

 

[jscherb]

After you posted, I checked it out. Couldn't tell exactly how much modification of the Grenadier is required to install it. Here are some photos from a Facebook post they made:





Looks pretty good. And turns the Grenadier into a NAS Defender?

 

[jscherb]

Been there, done that. Mosquito Pass

From a U.S. Land Rover club rally trip to the top of Mosquito Pass written about in one of the LR magazines:

More on the pass: https://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/178-mosquito-pass-usa.html

I've done Mosquito several times in my Jeep, haven't done it in the Grenadier yet. I planned to do it this summer but recovery from a knee injury kept me from making that trip.

On the way up... at about 12,000 feet approaching the summit from the east:

Above this point the going is pretty rough; a high clearance vehicle with low range is really a good idea for the last mile or two up to the summit from the east, and the two miles down from the summit on the west.

At about 13,000 feet there was snow on the side of the trail. This photo was taken on August 2 and until sometime in July the trail at the summit was blocked by snow and impassable.

 

[LRNAD90]

The Defender NEEDS a cage, it's roof/body structure is only slightly stronger than an empty soda can. I suspect the Grenadier's roof structure offers more than adequate protection, particularly for a low speed rollover. Not sure that the interior 'mess' is worth it here, but to each their own I guess.

Rovers North is the North American distributor for for SD products, and their sales department manager is working on a group deal if any owners are interested, call RN and ask for Zack.

 

[jscherb]

Pneumatic Tire Carrier

This was from an article about a Defender restored by an 18 year old. He did this pneumatic tire carrier as a school project:

It uses his on-board air compressor to activate the lift. My 32's aren't that much of a challenge to lift onto the spare carrier (or onto the roof rack when I carry an extra spare), but this idea could be very useful for those who have huge and heavy tires.

 

[jscherb]

DIY tailgate table

Another reason to subscribe - each issue has tech articles, many of which apply just as well to Jeeps as they do to Land Rovers. For example:

I won't post the entire step-by-step article, I'm just posting this as an example of a creative DIY idea that you can find in these magazines.

 

[jscherb]

From Land Rover Life magazine:

Last year I tested a similar product while on an expedition in Colorado. It's called a LifeStraw, and I actually bought it for India, where I shouldn't drink the water that comes from the tap.

It claims to remove almost all bacteria and parasites (from 99.99% to 99.999999% depending on the type) so I brought it on this trip and figured I'd try it in a Colorado stream.

I found a good stream to try along the Engineer Pass trail. Filling the bottle:

Later that evening I tried the filtered water from the bottle.

It looked very clear but that indicates nothing because the contaminants the bottle is supposed to remove aren't visible to the naked eye. Anyway, the water tasted great. I haven't died or gotten sick yet, and I probably could have drunk the water directly from that mountain stream without filtering, but it's nice to know it was filtered before I drank it.

I think these are a good idea, especially on a longer expedition away from civilization - in most places you can find a stream (well maybe not the Utah desert) so a supply of drinking water will always be available.