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Tips for racing a Defender


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My local car club (IOWCC) runs an unsealed surface autosolo championship and for a giggle I took my completely standard 300TDI 110 Station Wagon along with the sole aim of not coming last. Ended up coming 22/28 (beating a few fwd hatchbacks) on a grass field. Had a complete blast and went back for more - 18/21 at the next grass event and 27/31 on gravel.

Mission accomplished in terms of having fun and pushing my skill and bravery to the limit.

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I'm never going to win with the worst power to weight ratio out there but there are a couple of things I think I can do better to get more out of the Land Rover. So, some tips on the best way to handle the following would be great...

  • Bravery (or lack of) - I'm not going to push corners that hard as it's my daily driver with no safety gear fitted. It's hard to gauge some of the corners with the excessive body roll and at the relatively low speeds involved the tyres do tend to grip rather than let the car slide. So far I've only had one really scary moment where the back end came round on a downhill corner with a lot of adverse camber, which I'd like to never ever repeat. Managed to steer into it and gently stop the slide that time.
  • Tight turns - Occasionally the course has a tight loop around a single cone and at the last event I barely had enough space to get round. Is there any way of reliably getting it round something tightly that you might handbrake turn in a regular car? I've had it oversteer neatly through 90 degrees or so when shifting from 2nd to 1st around a tight corner if enought weight is over the front axle from braking.
  • Low box - Any reason not to use low box? On the last event there were a few corners where the top of 1st was a bit twitchy but 2nd would have been too long and I felt I wasn't as stable as I could have been. Perhaps using low box 2nd/3rd/4th would mean I could find a nicer gear to be in.

The Land Rover's staying absolutely standard, so any improvement needs to come from my skill increasing - I'm just keen to see what I can get out of the old girl without breaking anything.

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I'd say (especially from the photos) step #1 would be get a proper MSA-spec roll cage.

As for "performance" improvements, a TDi 110 is a bad base to start from, so buying a cheap anything-with-a-v8 to race would be preferable to polishing that turd (turd in racing performance sense before people jump down my throat).

Over rough ground at speed, money spent on suspension (esp. shocks) is going to be high up the list - and I don't mean £50-a-corner ProComps.

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Fair play to you for having a go, Isuzu have put a 'standard' pickup in the bccc and there's a video of what they did to the vehicle then a video of each round saying what problems they had and how they overcame them so it might be worth a watch. There's quite a few freelanders in there too so might be worth a look if you do have a budgets for a second car.

As you want to keep it as your daily drive your a bit limited as to what changes you can make.

The handbrakes a no no obviously. No reason not to use low box, put an LSD or locker in the back and keep the difflock open and you might be able to push the back end around on corners? Not sure what it would do to the rest of your driveline though, the transfer box might not be too happy with a high speed difference between the two propshafts?

I'm no race driver but I have done the odd track day and the biggest mistake I'm prone to make is too fast into the corners, start off going in slow and getting the line right.

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Do mods that will make it both better on-road and when you're having fun.

I'd suggest first investing in a set of good-quality dampers if your existing ones are more than 50,000 miles old. Avoid the 'off-road bling-bling' stuff pushed in the mags and go for a brand that has proper rally-car pedigree.

Which in my book means De Carbon, Koni or Bilstein.

I fitted a set of yellow gas-pressurised Bilsteins to my 90TD5 a while back and the overall improvement in handling was utterly unbelievable, specially when fast-towing on twisty roads. Best £400 I've spent in a long time!

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Thanks guys, the 110 will stay absolutely standard. It's my daily and this is just a bit of fun. If I was going to the trouble of building a race car, a diesel 110CSW wouldn't be a sane choice of starting vehicle.

Photo two is a tad misleading - that section was across some track ruts so the wheel is off the ground as it had just come off the top of a bump, rather than any impending doom rolling over. Apart from the one exciting moment mentioned above where I slid downhill (learnt that limit and not to be repeated) I'm not pushing so far that I'd expect it to fall over. The centre of gravity is still reasonably low, it's just the springs let the body roll around all over the shop.

Cynic-al I think you're right about the line and accelerating out of corners rather than barrelling in to them.

Dampers were new OEM the other year so work reasonably well.

Left foot braking makes some sense, but I don't think my feet are disciplined enough for that without some practice!

I won't win anything, but if I can have fun and feel like I've driven well and safely then I'm happy.

There's a nice bit of aerial footage from a quadcopter which I'll dig out and post up later if I can find it.

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Autosolos have limits on the length of straights etc to keep speeds down and allow folk to compete at an entry level motorsport in road legal cars and without race licences - 1st and 2nd gear usually, so I think using the low box might give me more options for finding a 'right' gear for some awkward mid speed corners.

The emphasis is on being controlled and smooth, which is where I think my technique can improve and there's a lot of satisfaction to be had from hustling the 110 around a tight course. Never gonna beat the Imprezas, but it's good fun chasing the lower powered hatchbacks and learning a bit more about car control. I've done their tarmac events in my kit car and Ford Puma, but the loose surface is brilliant too.

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A set of (discarded) 205's on spare rims would go a long way - reduce CoG, lower gearing, lower stress on drivetrain, lower unsprung weight...

But I still say #1 is roll cage or at least a hoop, it only takes a wheel to dig in or catch a rock or rut, even at low speed, and Defenders have zero rigidity above the top of the bulkhead. A cross-braced roll hoop would also cut down chassis/body twist.

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Looks a good laugh!

When I was competing in comp safaris in a light weight, I would often use low range instead of high, because I could get in to 4th which I thought would give less transmission loss being 1:1.

I could of course be talking complete BS, but the 3rd to 4th change was smoother than 1st to 2nd.

No use if you have long straights of course.

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When I was competing in comp safaris in a light weight, I would often use low range instead of high, because I could get in to 4th which I thought would give less transmission loss being 1:1.

Well, you'd have less transmission loss in the main box, but you just moved the reduction to the transfer box. So all in all, probably about the same losses, maybe more in the transfer box due to gear design.

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I would put a hoop in. Slightly more dished wheels will help with stability and turning circle. Why not just try low range for a run ? In theory it's a good plan as the auto solo is all low speed but you might be forever changing gears. Apart from that I wouldn't do anything. Maybe a driving course to help with the bravery but I'd leave the 110 pretty much as is.

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For my 2 penny's worth

Fit a simple rev counter. Works from the alternator and mounts anywhere you like on the dashboard. It can help your normal road driving as well.

Definitely use low range.

1st gear becomes useless so ignore it.

2nd gear will help on the really tight turns where other cars will be using the handbrake. By dropping the speed it helps with turn in on the front axle.

3rd gear, you will probable (with a few revs) mean you will start in this gear. Gear ratio of 3rd low is

nearly the same as 1st high but due to internal ratios being different it will accelerate faster.

4th gear is now lower than 2nd gear high range and quicker to engage than trying to find 2nd gear

5th gear is good for about 30mph, so I think will cover 99% of what you will need.

By watching the rev counter it will give you a good idea when you should be going up a gear or when you have a gear too high andthe engine doesnt want to pick up.

Look at your lines. By following FWD cars your nose will want to push straight on (understeer) Without spending money you will never cure that, and I fully understand and agree that you do not want to do that. The old aged theory of slow in/fast out will work a lot better for you. Therefore try to get a wider entrance to the corner to carry the speed. The earlier you can get on the throttle and get the turbo spinning the faster you will go. This is where left foot braking comes in. By braking with your left foot as you are approaching and entering the bend, the right foot is on the throttle, getting the turbo spinning so that as soon as you are coming off the brakes the truck is wanting to get up and go with no lag.

Consider a smaller steering wheel. Again, it does actually make it nicer to drive on the road as well as it gives you more elbow room.

But otherwise, just enjoy it. Looks a lot of fun.

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  • 2 weeks later...

My local car club (IOWCC) runs an unsealed surface autosolo championship and for a giggle I took my completely standard 300TDI 110 Station Wagon along with the sole aim of not coming last. Ended up coming 22/28 (beating a few fwd hatchbacks) on a grass field. Had a complete blast and went back for more - 18/21 at the next grass event and 27/31 on gravel.

Mission accomplished in terms of having fun and pushing my skill and bravery to the limit.

Looks like you had fun. I did something similar a few years ago in a Jeep, although this wasn't an autosolo, it was a bit more open and a bit faster.

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The Jeep did really well, 4.0 litre 190hp and not as heavy as you'd think. We were running mid table stage times too.

As for improvements, your best bet would be to ID the areas you thought the vehicle was weak on and address them directly.

Me, I'd run high tyre pressure (40-45psi) all round. Maybe widen the track (different rims or 1" spacers). And if you want a bit more pep of the line, then have a fiddle with the injector pump.

Moving on from here you are into mods, such as better brakes, stiffer ARB's etc.

Ashcroft do a LSD centre diff which I would think would work well for this type of use.

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