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Post by valhalla on May 2, 2023 22:15:21 GMT 1
Finally, after 3.5years waiting, the work has started on my beloved Defender!
Today has mostly been taken-up getting the basic's sorted-out; initial pictures for exterior and interior overall condition, removal of seats/mats/carpets to reduce the weight in the rear body, etc. etc.
The initial pictures do not look too bad, but this is where people fall-down with these vehicles - this is my own main vehicle, but it has lived outside on Skye for 15years now, and worked hard for most of that time;
The bodywork was starting to look a little jaded in late-2019, when it all came off the road; a final MoT confirmed that all was not well in the chassis extremities, but the real reason was that I know what lies under the brackets and crossmembers on this chassis, and it's not good.....
My problem now is to decide how far to go; I don't need a cosmetic Godess that needs continual wash-and-polishing, but I do need something utterly reliable, utterly durable, and nothing to be too ashamed-of when doing longer trips. One other issue I have is more sentimental; I have had this Defender for 19years of its 25years total, and it has lots of happy memories, and some not-so-happy memories. Just before this came off the road, it was the last journey for my workshop-dog, so there are certain features (cosmetic flaws) that I might want to keep;
Such as when the little puppy got tired of waiting for me one day (remote job at a farm) and lay across the centre seats and gently knawed-away at the R/N/S door card........
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Post by OldGit on May 3, 2023 18:34:31 GMT 1
From what you've hinted at, if it was me I'd get the body off and sort the chassis out as a 'rolling restoration', I've seen too many weekend bodgers patching up bits here & there without tackling the bits they really should. A needle scaler is handy for cleaning back and exposing bits that would need work in a couple of years. A lot of people seem to want to wear blinkers so they can file some of the work needed under 'T', if you have a rolling chassis, you can sort that - and any floorpan issues, bolt the body back on then do the cosmetics on that knowing that you have a good base to build on. Good luck!
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Post by Joepublic on May 3, 2023 21:46:49 GMT 1
A friend of mine had one in the same colour, the previous owner wasn't a John C was it?
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Post by valhalla on May 3, 2023 22:05:22 GMT 1
Broadly-speaking, it was always on the plan for the following to happen;
1) The chassis was going to be replaced - a hot-dip heavy-duty galvanized chassis awaits its turn under this Defender. It was one of the first batches of chassis I bought, used as a "filler" to make the numbers up on a few Defender 90 Heavy Duty Galv'd chassis for TD5's that were coming through, where I needed to get a proper trailer-load of things batched together. I'm hoping it is still OK, as it has sat outside for several years now....
2) Assess the bulkhead for structural corrosion - none found yet, but it was 2004 when I filled this bulkhead with Bilt Hamber runny wax.
The chassis and bulkhead are the two things "that matter" under a Defender - the rest is "consumables"....
3) Assess the doors long-and-hard - they were all flapping a bit in the breeze, and lost weight every time they were slammed-shut. I have got the 4x doors and tailgate off the vehicle today, but only just....None is exactly "happy", and if I had a gun to my head, I could repair each and every one of them. My time would be better invested in buying 4x galvanized side-doors and a galvanized tailgate, painting it all up, building it all up, then working hard to pay the bills off. The end-results would be far better "taking the plunge" now, rather than pretending that my repairs to these doors are ever going to be as good or as long-lasting. I have made that decision. No going back now, just need to sort the logistics out for a pallet-delivery.
4) Assess all water-ingressions, and deal with these as-appropriate. If I can keep the water out, then this vehicle should survive another 25years
My "re-chassis" jobs on these vehicles always include a) new CuNi brake and clutch-lines b) new stainless brake flexi hoses c) new suspension bushes throughout d) electrical harness overhaul with insulation testing and re-binding and re-terminations wherever necessary- all as a basic minimum. In addition, I usually overhaul all the brake-system (calipers/discs/pads) to get it all back to new, as most of the vehicles are going-out onto the road as towing-cars, my own included. As this is my main vehicle, it is going to get all the additional bits and pieces, including;
i) New stainless fixings throughout the chassis/body interface ii) New stainless fixings on all the doors iii) New stainless brackets supporting the front footwells iv) New galvanized crossmembers and rear-floor cross-pieces v) New HDG seatbelt anchorage brackets throughout, as well as HDG body-support plates at the middle and rear
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Post by valhalla on May 3, 2023 22:28:01 GMT 1
The camera went flat again today, so no photos, but briefly the following has happened;
1) All the doors and tailgate have been stripped of their door-cards, inspected, removed. They are all due to be replaced, and the innards of the old doors are OK to transfer over. 2) All the rear lamps have been removed from the rear body-tub - these are all recent Wipac LED units, the only things that survive the West Coast of Scotland, and they are fine to reuse 3) The rear harness is dropped down from the body-tub 4) The seatbelts have finally all come out, inspected, and stored carefully. Some of the anchorages were not so good, but they are all due for replacement anyway, and the fixings fought me all the way... 5) A fair few of the up-and-coming fixings have been squirted with release-oil, and an assessment made of the condition of all of these - they are due to be (mostly) replaced with new stainless items
After making an assessment of where the job has already gone, what things are cropping-up, and the general condition of the vehicle so-far, there has now been a major shift in the strategy: I always lift the bodies on LR products in one-piece, but this one does not warrant or even suit that approach. So it's going to be a "first" for me, but I need to change tack, because;
a) The sideframes are a lot worse than I expected b) The roof has to come off as an assembly - it is going to need work at the rear gutter/s to repair corrosion around the top of the tailgate aperture. This means that the main stiffener to the upper body is going to be missing, meaning the whole lot will end-up banana-shaped on the 2-post arms...... c) Also.....the rear upper bodysides have to come off anyway, as the (painted) body-cappings are needing attention to several areas d) Also....the D-posts are badly corroded behind the alloy skin on both sides of the vehicle
In summary, although this is my main vehicle, and one I have owned for 19years, I don't know it as well as I should - time has been cruel to the underpinnings, and more-specifically, I made a big mistake where I parked this up for the last 3.5years; it was on soft ground, not hardstanding. It is going to need more work than I had budgeted, so the workshop is going to be tied-up for longer. The answerphone message is about to change, and the timetable is more like early August for other "ramp-work". Splitting the vehicle down will mitigate this a little, and will mean I can bring some other work onto the 2-post ramps inbetween subassembly and painting operations. C'est la vie......
What has shocked me is the way the chassis has utterly corroded-away - things that were not obvious 3.5years ago are now very, very obvious. Stress-corrosion has set-in to the upper faces of the rear chassis longitudinals on both sides, which is slightly unusual, but accountable by the exceptionally high proportion of heavy-towing this vehicle does to full GTW on some of the roughest roads in the UK. The rear crossmember has crumbled for similar reason/s, yet it all looked fine when the vehicle came off the road. I was going to use the rear 1/3rd of this chassis for repair of another one.....not anymore!!
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Post by OldGit on May 3, 2023 22:54:08 GMT 1
My L319 (now in the 'care' of No.2 Son) was parked up for 14 months, on gravel. What I didn't realise was that the water table was about 30mm below the surface of the gravel, consequently the barely corroded chassis & body due to it being mainly used outside of UK, suffered the sort of corrosion you'd expect from a life at the seaside - but without the salt, mainly due to water vapour from the stone condensing on the underside and having no engine or exhaust heat to dry it off before it 'bit in' to the steel, thoughtfully devoid of any surface corrosion as a protective layer due to being sand blasted in the Sahara several times a year for most of it's life....
so yer, I understand your dilemma... the roofs on the last Defenders were very leaky, the dealer fix was to remove, liberally coat with Tiger Seal, refit with timber baulks to hold the body panels tight to the roof and ratchet strap x 2 all round for 24 hours. Maybe you could do similar to refurb the roof 'out of sequence'?
You've clearly done it all before, and your plan shows it, I've only really done 'in warranty' stuff on Defenders (steered well clear of them after I left) but i've been close to people that have attempted to extend the life of them (as opposed to actually restore them) and it really is 'go big or go home'.
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Post by valhalla on May 4, 2023 23:39:42 GMT 1
Some progress today, also some distractions - other work in-parallel has parts coming-in for repairs.
Mostly a lot of stripping-out of the interior around the roof, including all the wiring harnesses for lights, alarm, etc.
The observant will notice something missing tonight;
It took a lot of effort get this off at the windscreen frame upper flange; I had sealed this for-good a number of years ago. I wish I can remember the product I used, as it is still a) stuck solid, and b) elastic and pliable. This means it is a nightmare to part the panels so well-sealed....but not a drop appears to have penetrated any of my repaired areas for the last 10years or so.....
For good measure, I have included the N/S D-post first photo/s here, as it is clear that this is just the surface of the problem. Behind all that lovely alloy bodywork, lies.....nothing, you can just put your hand through it!
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Post by valhalla on May 5, 2023 22:07:04 GMT 1
I remembered the sealant-product that I had used back then - a cup of tea and a quite-moment over the kitchen table was all it took - and I'm sure it was "No More Nails" in white, or a close equivalent. So that explains why the grip was so strong! Oddly, not only had this survived the ozone on the West Coast, but also the high-levels of UV that we experience from time-to-time.
Not much done today, so no photos tonight.....
Work got in the way pretty badly for most of the day, and then Mrs. V. had a problem in the shop, so that knocked me out until 5:45pm this evening. I got the two upper bodysides off the rear tub, stripped and inspected the mountings and the cappings for the top of the tub, and did a few notes and admin to try and remind myself what I was supposed to be doing!
Mostly, each part is reusable, but the hard decisions are where I should try and upgrade them whilst opportunity knocks. For example, the rear body cappings (steel) are not really all that bad, except in the usual places around the extreme rear corners of the tub - very rusty around the corner upper bodyside mounting bobbin on each side. I could clean these back, treat them, and repaint them to a better standard than when they left the factory : I could paint them blind with a 10-foot paintbrush and still achieve a better standard than Solihull, to be frank. This is because LR insisted on just priming these bits before alloy and steel were riveted together, crudely separated by some draught-excluder self-adhesive foam-strip, before putting the assembly through the spray-booths. You don't have to be a Chemist to work-out what happens when the whole lot gets wet......
I am almost certain that I'm going to fit heavy-duty galvanized new cappings in-lieu of these, maybe etch & prime them to allow a colour-coat to be applied where they are visible outside the vehicle, but at-least certain in the knowledge that they will last the vehicle out - just like the Series Landrovers that rarely have issues in this respect! I will also glue them on with "No More Nails".
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Post by OldGit on May 5, 2023 22:29:32 GMT 1
If it was me, I'd improve where possible - not doing so would grind away at me over time and I'd never really be happy with it until I did what I should have done in the first place, even if it takes longer. As you eluded to , you don't want to tart it up, you want it 'right' - or as close as you can get given it's brummie heritage
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Post by valhalla on May 5, 2023 22:49:22 GMT 1
A friend of mine had one in the same colour, the previous owner wasn't a John C was it?
The answer is "unlikely" as I bought this from a chappie down near the New Forest in 2004. It was a one-family-owner vehicle, except for a brief period for a few months at-new, where it appeared to be a lease-hire vehicle with a company around Salisbury or to the SouthEast of Salisbury (towards the New Forest). The guy's name was "Mark" if memory serves me correctly, and his family were gutted that the family-pet was being sold (the kids were kept away from the sale & pick-up, for decorum I believe).
I partly bought it because of the colour, Biarritz Blue, which is what made it stand-out in the advertisment in the back of LandroverMonthly. As it ticked all the boxes for me, I just paid the asking-price of £12,500 in cash back in 2004, and went back down the following weekend to drive it back. What I did, actually, is drive it back in as-random a fashion as I could, taking in all the sights and sounds of Hampshire, and visiting friends and relatives on the way, so they could all gasp at the beauty of the thing.
What all my family gasped-at was "How stupid are you? You paid what, for what?" I have always declared, "Fate gives you your family, fortune gives you your friends", and never was I so correct as that journey. My friends all thought it was cool, though.....
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Post by Joepublic on May 6, 2023 9:04:31 GMT 1
I think I've only seen one in that colour since, but I don't move in the circles some of you do.
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Post by sorted on May 6, 2023 11:23:17 GMT 1
Well valhalla, I would say that’s a pretty good start, shame it’s worse than you thought/ hoped. I think we all know where this is going though- a full on do everything while it’s apart approach as you won’t be able to dial it back to “just do the necessary “. Ask me how I know 😆
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Post by valhalla on May 6, 2023 22:46:56 GMT 1
Yes, it's going to take quite a bit of research to find the right combination of parts that I want to fit. The bulk of the underpinnings is already decided; I have a HDG chassis from Richards Chassis lined-up, and I had bought several of the accessories available at the same time, such as a galvanized gearbox crossmember, HDG front suspension turrets, galvanized body crossmembers to go under the rear tub - but I know I haven't got enough there - all from Richards.
I'm facing a large bill for a pallet-load of stuff from YRM Metal Solutions, and I think I will make their Christmas for this year. Some things are only going to be available form these guys, as I want to achieve ultimate durability is certain areas, and that seems to include the D-post repairs; to get these in a heavy galvanized finish, you have to buy the whole sideframe assembly, as an assembled (i.e. jigged) entity, you cannot just mix-and-match the parts around you. So although I have a good BC-post from the sill upwards, and a new pair of HDG sill-sections that are designed to bolt-in and bolt-on to the existing parts, I will need to buy a pair of unwieldy and expensive sideframes and have them shipped up here in their proper, finished condition.
I am fortunate in having a fair bit of the "durable consumables" in-stock; numerous stainless-steel fixings kits for pretty much anything you want to assemble on a Defender. So I should be able to find most of the bolts and screws I need from stock, including new OEM flange-screws for most of the interior items (a lucky "find" a while back - 100's of the screws in boxes from dealer clearances) and OEM suspension bolts/screws (which are always changed as matter-of-course on these restorations).
I have had a good relationship with AEW Paddocks over the last 30years or so, and they will likely get the main business of "filling-in" the rest of the parts needed. Rimmers are always there for the esoteric and difficult parts, but also those parts that really must be correct to LR Genuine Parts fit-and-finish.
The Defender fraternity are spoiled-rotten by the availability of parts and upgrades, so I'm less worried about getting stuck on any area of the resto, more the costs incurred to dig myself out of "a situation". Push comes to shove, I can fabricate my own designs, and send them away to be properly finished.
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Post by valhalla on May 6, 2023 23:25:17 GMT 1
I think I've only seen one in that colour since, but I don't move in the circles some of you do. It's a rare enough colour on the Defender. I'm not sure what prompted LR to offer it for so short a period; essentially it was only available for 2years or thereabouts. The first use of this colour was on the RangeRover P38A, and I don't think it suited it very well, so it seemed to have been dropped from the options.
I'm looking at a flat blue colour from the Rover portfolio in the mid-80's. Some early SD1_sersII cars had a beautiful blue colour that wasn't a mile away from this one, just a bit deeper-blue. I wouldn't want a dark-blue like my 3500SE (Cavalry Blue) as it would look too close to the Buckingham Blue that LR used on StationWagons around the same time as mine, and I'm not a big fan of it.
I have had a thought this afternoon - I may use a colour that suits Mrs. V.'s project at the same time, just get a few bucket-loads of the stuff and line both sets of panels in an "assembly line". I have had a lot of success reusing a cellulose on ABS plastics, by just adding a plasticiser to the paint, so one colour and type of paint can be applied to different sorts of materials in bodywork. This means that paint that might normally crack-off when used on flexible plastics, now behaves itself and stays on for decades. I have some front wings on Mrs. V.'s 1979 Range Rover that were made in ABS, and I used the same Sahara Dust beige paint across the whole vehicle, just adding plasticiser for the wings.
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Post by valhalla on May 9, 2023 0:19:34 GMT 1
It's got a bit late tonight to post photos, but there has been slow & steady progress today. A bad-start, due to it being a Bank Holiday and therefore a pain with the shop/newspapers, but I have managed to get the bulkhead stripped down a little, enough to see that it might be OK to reuse for another 20years or so. It's early-days yet, but the main issues appear to be just in a few isolated places where water has accumulated or been held long-term against the bodywork. Given the cost of replacing one of these bulkheads (something like £1800), it would be great to be able to clean this one up and keep it. I went to a lot of effort to wax it properly in 2004, when it was still quite new, and it looks like that has paid-off.
I got the centre floor plate out this afternoon, but the vehicle is now fighting me every inch of the way - every fastener is rusted to a blob - so progress is not quite so quick........ With the floor out of the way, I can see the devastation in the chassis/brackets underneath, so the list of YRM bits is becoming longer by the hour.
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