The Rover-Landers of BC

looks good so far

Well I got busy yesterday and made up an aluminum cowling for the radiator and mounted the 2 12" cooling fans.
The cowl: Cutting the 12" holes in the panel was .... interesting. I decided to modify my 3" fly cutter to make a 6" cutter to mount in my small milling machine. I cut a 7" length of 1/2" dia. steel rod, drilled and squared a hole at one end for the cutting tool, cut a locking groove into the other end and mounted it in the existing cutter arbor (the centre drill holder). Guess I hadn't realized the amount of torque cutting the thin aluminum would exert and the arbor started flexing in the mill, causing the cutter not to stay parallel to the aluminum surface. Made for an interesting few minutes as it kept jamming. Sorry no pics as I needed both hands. I slowed down the rotation speed and very gently cut each hole. Took about 15min each, but I still have both arms and eyes, all fingers and no broken equipment. :mrgreen:

Cowl mounted to the Rad: Rad and Cowl mounted to the frame. Clearance to the engine is enough that I can change the fan belt if needed (barely): I even pieced together a lower Rad hose from two hoses I had. I had to cut out the section with the hose to feed the pressurized coolant reservoir, so I'll add a spigot in the gauge hole in the connector (the small black thingey 1/2 way along the hose) to add another hose to feed the reservoir: And did a trial fit of my replacement transmission oil cooler in front of the rad: It doesn't look like I will have enough space between the breakfast and rad to mount headlights after all. Sigh - a lot of work resurrecting the old rusted out S2 breakfast gone to waste. Guess I'll have to go back to plan B - adapt and use the Series 3 breakfast and just have 2 headlights.

If you have sharp eyes, you might notice that I riveted the fender headlight panels to the fender. My Birmabright welding attempts with scraps I had cut from the fenders to get them to fit, were a disaster. So rather than destroy my good parts, I decided to use solid rivets. Seems to be fine and once all is painted, should not be too, too noticeable. :oops:

One thing I discovered - The oil lines from the engine to the rad use a different connector than in the Defender rad I have. The radiator connector is a male-male NPT/JIC adapter: The end of the oil line pipes & nut use an o-ring to seal and a different thread: I did a bit of investigating and it seems Land Rover switched from the JIC to an ORFS (O-Ring Face Seal) connection between 1995 and 1996 model years. And, of course my Rad is pre 1996 and my engine is 1996. So now I have to look for a couple of male-male ORFS/NPT adapters to make them fit. I just hope they aren't a combination of metric and imperial because that will really be a pain to sort out. Always something.

M. :mi5:

I've found the people at new line hose in Port Kells (just west of 192nd on 94th) to be very helpful when looking for oddball fittings.

looks like it is coming along nicely

Well.... The 1/2inch tube was some kind of metric tube fitting. The rad fittings turned out to be 3/4" BSP (14tpi) / BSP pipe thread. BSP and NPT are pretty much interchangeable. So, I went to New Line hydraulics (thanks for the suggestion Jake) and based on their advice, ended up cutting off the end of the pipes and mounting 1/2" flare SS compression fittings, with standard 3/4" flare / pipe thread adapters. Works perfectly. Forgot to take pics, Duh..... :albino:

A few days ago I finally got around to doing something definitive for shifting the transmission. I came across a used Lokar hot rod automatic shifter. It looks like a normal series manual shifter, but shifts an auto tranny using a 1/4” pin moving along a quadrant shift plate.

I had already mounted the hi-low/4x4 lock shifter, but decided to move it further forward to make room for the new/used tranny shifter. I then mocked up the mount for it.
Great, now to figure out how to make it correctly shift the ZF tranny. I measured the movement of the original Disco shifter cable, for each gear. Total movement, 2”. Then I measured how much movement the Lokar shifter had. 1.25”. Damn. Ok, I need to make a new shift plate.
First. Made a drawing... then I started fabricating the new shift plate.. ZF is Park, Reverse, Neutral, Drive, 3,2,1st. I cut hard settings for the park, reverse & neutral locations, and small divots for drive to 1st. the final product.

Then I bolted it into the shifter Park setting: And checked that it would actually shift. Drive setting: Next I remounted on the tranny and measure the actual movement for each gear setting and fabricated a new arm and rod to connect to the original shift cable.
It works !! :bounce:

A few shots of the finished assembly You can see the linkages I made for the relocated hi-low lever to work Seat box back on. The shift lever is in the “parked” setting
The gear shift lever is too long. I’ll have to trim and re-thread the end for the knob, once I mount the defender seats I have. The brown seat is temporary, just to help me figure out ergonomics.

Bed time.

it is coming along nicely Martin,

Here is how the shift lever works.
Park Reverse Neutral Drive To move from one setting to the next you pull the lever to the left to unlatch it, then pull it or push it to the appropriate setting.

I’m planning to cut off the shift lever at the green tape and re-thread the end for a std Series shift knob.

Today I mocked up a transmission tunnel/centre console. This is what I came up with:
I left it wide on the pass side, so I could embed a couple of drink holders (per a request from my better half)

Now to figure out where to put the hand brake lever. :D

Looking good. 8)
Don't forget to put some thought into how to make it easily removable. Once driving, It will likely be on and off a few times until you get it right .
Are you planning a middle seat or a cubby box?

Thank Andy.
Cubby box of some type.

You could use flush paddle latch of some sort, make them permanent for easy access

ANDYD wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 6:57 pm Don't forget to put some thought into how to make it easily removable. Once driving, It will likely be on and off a few times until you get it right.

Ah yes... Measure twice; cut once; try to fit; swear; repeat 3 more times; lots of swearing; throw the non-fitting parts away; go out and get beer; go watch TV for the evening. :oops:

Well with the pandemic raging and all this time I'm now spending at home, I decided to see if I could make my own parts de-ruster from odds and ends I had around the house. What I came up with after scouring the internet for ideas, is a DIY "Ball Mill", also known as a rotary tumbler. Basically it is a tube with one fixed and one removable end, filled 1/3rd with sand blasting media and your nuts and bolts and other parts that will fit, and rotated slowly for a number of hours. The tumbling action and parts banging against each other, scrubs off all (well most) of the rust. A construction site across the road provided me with a length of broken 6" PVC watermain pipe and one cap. I had to buy the other cap ($7). The wood, casters, other bits and electric motor I scrounged out of my long term used and extra parts repositories. :bounce: I also bought a 50lb bag of sand blast media for $14. Total cost=$21. These pics are from my 1st version, which rotated too fast to do any tumbling - centrifugal force kept everything stuck to the walls. A short video:
DIY Tumbler
My 2nd version, in order to make it rotate slower, required me cannibalizing the pulleys and 2 speed motor from an old band saw I haven't used in years. Pics of it in my next entry.

Now you just need a plating setup to take all your bolts back to shiny new.

So here is the final setup. I also drilled and mounted two pieces of 1"x2" scrap wood, opposite each other, along the inside the length of the tube, to improve the tumbling action. Works like a charm. Here it is running:
DIY Tumbler V2

Below are some before and after bolts. Even odd shaped bits. For really bad cases like these were, it won't get out the worst of the rust, but does get over 90%. :mrgreen: And Jake - what makes you think I don't have the stuff needed for a small DIY zinc plating setup???? :bounce:

Yesterday I did a trial mount of the fenders, radiator and breakfast.

Here is the backside of the Radiator with the cooling fans mounted: The front side. I decided not to go with a 4 light front end and modified my S3 breakfast to fit. There really wasn't enough room for clearance from the headlights to the rad using the S2 breakfast and it did block a lot of the air from the rad. The military hood is via Matt in Victoria. The grill is from Jeremy in N.Van. I like it way better than the original plastic grill. You can see the replacement tranny oil cooler behind the centre section. I still have to sort out the plumbing to it (something for tonight)

Because my hybrid is a 100", and I am using a 109" box, I moved the bulkhead quite a ways forward. This means the front axle is a about 6" closer to the bulkhead than normal. Yes the wheels (235/85r16) still clear with about 3" of space at full lock and articulation. Not too, too bad (I hope!). However, it also meant I had to cut and reform the fender cutouts. This is how it looks now: More later.
M.

Hey Marty,

Like the nut & bolt tumbler, would the pipe hold liquid if you were to use a de-greaser or such like?
Can you start on the Hot Galvanizing Dip next, that would be great :D

Maybe some Defender Flared arches would help to centralize the wheel in the fender? Then you would need bigger wheels or spacers ummm maybe not!

Well, not much progress over the summer. Camping and day trips, and looking after the granddaughter every Fri/Sat put a damper on my progress. I did manage to get the bulkhead sand blasted a few weeks ago.
Before: After: I had this past week off, and no kids around, so was able to get more hours in. Because I made a custom S2 style console for my S3 bulkhead, none of the standard mounting points existed. So, first I made up and welded on tabs for the vent controls and defroster panel:
Next I remounted the bulkhead (thanks for the assistance Andy D!) and bolted up the steering column. Then I mounted the wiper motor to the left of the steering column and drilled a hole for it to protrude above the console so the wiper assembly can screw into it. Then I mounted the vents and control arms and mounted the rail for the defroster outlets (thanks for the rail Matt M!)

This past weekend I finally built the transmission tunnel. First I mocked up (for the upteenth time) a design using Bristol board.
Then I cut out the panel shapes from 1/16” aluminum.
Then I bent them up, but of course didn’t have my camera handy 😬 needless to say, it was a painful process using my little Princess Auto bender. Then, many trial fits:

Next I drilled mounting screw holes and refit:
The final tunnel looks like:
Then I figured out where and how to mount the hand brake. I decided to use the stock Disco lever and mount it in the standard (left hand drive) location. So I had to make a bracket to hold it, separate from the seat box. I ended up making a bracket from some scrap steel and tacking it to the LH tranny mount. I will drill some bolt holes later and cut the tacks to make it removable for reassembly.
Doesn’t look too bad in the footwell and is out of the way of my leg. Push to engage, pull to release. Then, clean up the mess in the garage, a well deserved beer and Labour Day steak dinner. :bounce:

Now that I’m re-energized, there will be more progress over the next few weeks. Next on the agenda, a heater/air/defroster distribution box.

That tunnel looks pretty great! Not out of character at all.

So I got busy wth cardboard last night and mocked up the heater/defrost distribution box. A few pics:
I think I might take an inch off the bottom. It seems too deep for my ascetics. You can see the line I drew on it, in the middle picture. I still have to figure out placement for floor vents and a defroster louver on/off control. More to come.

Oh, and the brown seat is just temporary as I don’t want to dirty my nice Ex-Defender seats (the one on the left). It’s from an old Triumph sports car build, if anyone wants it free.