I have a tdi rangie and a (newly acquired, Irish registered) series 3 lwb, and am planning to combine the two for challenge events, due to the fact that the rangie will cost over £600 a year road tax, and as the series 3 is over 30yrs old, its classed as a 'vintage' and is therefore exempt from all forms of MOT/testing and its cheap to tax... (watch this space for some interesting mods!)

i have a PTO winch for the series transfer box that i would like to use, so im trying to explore all possibilities...
is it possible to fit a series gear box to a 200tdi engine?
is it possible to fit a series transfer case to an lt77 gearbox?

i know that a replacement PTO dropper box for an lt77 is like hens teeth/rocking horse ****, so thats out of the question...

thanks in advance...

I would look/search in the series section
I would guess the series box will fail pretty quickly with a TDI attached

Just to sound stupid hpw will it cost of £600 to tax a year

Eire prices! I couldn't beleive it looking at the tax discs on tdi discos over there (900 eurosish IIRC). Is it not cheaper to have the RRC regiustered as comercial?

Series box will fit a 200tdi, threads in series forum.

Series transfer box can be mated to LT77 but not easy/worth it, Jon White or Tonk will probably confirm this.

PTO goes on main gearbox not transfer box I think so LT77 wont help.

Exactly what I've done:
300 tdi disco base with s3 body and lt77 box. Winch driven from lt230 transfer box with a superwinch PTO. Old sodbury sortout is everyones friend, as most parts for this project came from there.

Daan

Sweet truck Daan

I am about to start a similar project with my old (soon to fail MOT) Disco. Was thinking of either
a. trying a tray back design and see if it can be made reasonably acceptable in the looks department but still allowing me to keep it badged as a Disco without Q plate issues OR
b. making a 100" series bodied hybrid like yours but with longer wheelbase. But not sure I want hassle of SVA.
Probably try the trayback first since if I dont like it I can keep going and try the hybrid afterwards

You potentially have to go SVA, if you play by the current rules. Mine was registered before 2002, when things were less strict.
I personally wouldn't waste time with a series gearbox or transferbox, especially if you have the parts. The rangerover (and disco) have a longer bellhouse though, which needs swapping for a defender one, if you were to build it 88".

Daan

In Eire (southern Ireland), the road tax is based purely on the engine (unless classic or comercial), and a 2/300tdi costs 840Euro and i think a TD5 is 920Euro



i could try, but i have no reason to have a comercial vehicle, ie i dont need one for a comercial purpose, so it is hard/complex to have it as a comercial.

also i took it for a spin with munster 4x4 (www.munster4x4.com) and the bodywork looks even worse for wear... these are the guys who do the Steve Maddison, 3 Peaks challenge, and they dont mess about!
So am going to put an external cage round the series 3, cuz in 8000 acres of forestry, its kind hard 2 miss ALL the trees...



I must agree there!



A friend of mine was going to do the same thing to a 4door rrc in england, but on enquiring, was told that if he altered the A post(windscreen), B post (between the doors), or C post (behind the rear doors), then the vehicle would need an sva test because the srtuctural strength arround the cab had been removed...


Does anyone have experience running a tdi with series box?

Thanks, its not built for show purposes though:



As I said before, the series box doesn't last long with a TDI and has to short a range. Also, if you were to use a PTO winch, you cant use an overdrive, making things even worse.

Daan

Where was that photo taken Daan?

it will mate straight on, its life would be limited though.

series t/box can be made to mate to a lt77 but theres alot of engineering to make it so, imo keep the lt230.

Malaysia, during the RFC in 2003.
Anybody on this forum fancies the RFC in 2007? we could team up with 3 cars in one 40 foot container.

Daan

I must be in the wrong job! How can you afford such a trip and get the time off?

Cheers, Paul.

I think you will find the cost very reasonable, especially with the 3 car team scenario. I am not earning the world, otherwise I wouldn't spend my time hanging around old sodbury sortout for bits would I?

With the 3 car in a container idea, the price is going to work out at around 3k per car all in: the shipping of the car, the entry fee of the event and two return flights. Not pocket money for most of us, and definately not for me, but still achievable if that is your intention. If you have a willing co driver (which I had) you can split the costs 50:50 and for 1.5k your away. I think it is comparable to a seasons offroading in the UK. Guess why I am not doing much events in the uk.......? You and your co-driver will need 2 weeks off in november.

To spend 10 days offroading in the jungle I think that is exeptional value. It is a live experience and the best thing I have done.

Daan

Sounds great, and you must have done plenty of homework to get the costs down to that level. Have you done this sort of thing in any other countries?

Not really, apart from scotland, belgium and holland but none of these events got close to the RFC in terms of length and toughness. Either you can go to russia or australia for international events. It is hard to organise this as a team as it is a big involvement to go and do it. In 2003 there were 6 teams suppose to go, but when it was time to load up cars in containers, there was noone left but myself and my co driver. So we shipped my car in a 20 foot container and that was team UK/NL in 2003. Not cheap as you can imagine, but no regrets.



Daan

Sounds like fun. Do you do all your own maintenance on these trips?

Why don't you put all the running gear into a >30 year old Rangie and then you have a nice Range Rover with cheap tax. Or put the Rangie body & running gear onto a 30 year old Rangie chassis (like I have at teh moment) - same result - more comfort.

umm.... cuz that sounds too much like comon sense for me...
no, personally i prefer a series for off roading, several years of trialling has taught me that you can squeeze a series body thru places a rangie gets wedged, also i think its easier (considering im building it myself) to build a cage on a series body than a rangie body, and if i wrap it round a tree, its only an old series body thats cheap/easy to replace.
my opinion is that there is too much glass in a rangie to go bouncing it off trees.
and i dont like bobtailed rangies...

Err This kinda made me shudder since my (very long term) plan it to make my RRC into a pickup - anyone know a difinitive answer on this?
Rog

I ran a really well sorted (headwork, uprated pump, injectors, intercooler).

And if i was really nice to it i could get 4 events out of a good second hand series box

But as soon as i abused them they died really quick.

Normally i just stripped the teath off reverse gear, ocasionally it did the same to first, i once had a large part off 3rd gear punch a hole in the side of the gearbox.

I'd tried just about all the different surfix's, i'd used 1's, 2's, 2a's and 3's they all broke just the same.

The only one i didn't try was a 1 ton box.

thanks, that is exactly the kind of information i was looking for, much apreciated.

as for the 1 ton box, i believe its a standard box with a lower ratio transfer case...but i may be wrong