David Wright

Surely there must be a decimal point in the wrong place for these figures. For £23K you could jack the ignition key up and run a new car in there!! It would appear that the obvious solution would be to transport the engine to Germany or the UK and get it rebuilt - there are hundreds of companies out there capable of a rebuild

My H reg RRC came originally with a remote fob but I think it only controlled the alarm - but it never worked anyway. The central locking worked with the key in either front door.

I had to buy these in the not too distant past and I believe the hoses are 1/2" bore but the fittings are all SAE. I removed the fittings from both the oil pump and the radiator and took them to my friendly hydraulic hose maker and he made hoses to suit.

No afraid not - that was of course the first topic of conversation with Adwest. I even sent them a photo showing the serial number and they confirmed that I had the correct box. I would agree with your remarks regarding rebuilding of these boxes - it seems that nobody can get them correct and keep them sealed for any reasonable length of time

All I can say is that is what happened to my RRC - I had to take the oil pump out to get the original box out and the new one in - all I can say is that the body castings are not identical. They may have been the OEM to Land Rover but that was 20 years ago a lot has changed in 20 years

I bought a new Adwest box for my RRC and fitting was very tight between the oil cooler hose and the box. I then took it for its MOT and as the tester arrived back in the forecourt all of the lube oil was dumped on the forecourt. This was caused by the new steering box cutting through the oil cooler hose and thus dumping the oil. Now, of course, all the hoses for either the power steering or the oil cooler are no longer available so it was back to my friendly hydraulic hose manfacturer who made me a pair of hoses. When I came to fit the hose adjacent to the steering box there was insufficient space to get it threaded onto the connector. So back to my hose supplier who then made a short steel pipe section which allowed the connector to be threaded and made up. I did bring this problem to the attention of Adwest ( I even sent them some photos) but of course this was "the first time this has ever happened sir" was the standard answer. Indeed they did not even bother to respond to my photos. So be warned fitting the box is not all plain sailing - they do not appear to be the same as the original

I might suggest that you ask Adwest if they can do it - there is a design fault with the original boxes (something to do with a bearing moving) which they now accept and have developed a fix for (all this some 15 years after the first boxes were fitted - clearly there was no particular rush!) that is why they have tried to put all other rebuilders out of action. What you get from a standard rebuilder is new seals but NOT the modification - you will only get this from Adwest, so your resealed box will soon start to leak again. I gleaned this information at the Peterborough Show some years ago when Adwest were there pushing their new boxes

I bought an Adwest box directly from Adwest and it did not fit - it was quoted as the correct one but when fitted the box fouled the oil cooler pipes and within 50 miles had cut through the oil cooler pipe and my RRC dumped the sump full of oil. The genuine hose replacement is no longer available and so special hoses had to be manufactured by my friendly hydraulic hose supplier and fitted. The advice I have to offer is that in the same situation I would now get my own box rebuilt as then you are sure it will fit

Most Land Rover R380 gearboxes are fitted with a transfer box immediately behind the rear oil sealso any leakage will go into the transfer box and does not drip onto the garage floor. Having said that the two R380 gearboxes that I have owned never seemed to loose any oil - but Land Rovers have a very poor record on oil tightness so any minor gearbox leak tends to get lost in the general flood of oil that drips from everywhere!

I ran my RRC for some six months without the rear propshaft fitted without any noticeable difference - it even went for an MOT without said prop, now that did cause some head scratching but it was given an MOT but a note was made of the fact that it was missing a propshaft.

My suggestion would be an earth fault because what you are describing are the classic symptoms of a discharged battery. This can either be caused by a discherged battery or a poor earth connection to the engine block. Since the fault clears it is unlikely to be the discharged battery thus may well be a earth fault. The next time it happens connect a jump lead from the negative side of the battery to the engine block. If this clears the fault run a permenent new earth. Another possibilty is a poor connection from the positive terminal of the battery to the starter motor. Check by running a jump lead to the starter motor from the POSTIVE on the battery.

It depends where in the country you are but there is one sitting in my garden in Cambridge David Wright

The torque convertor needs to be installed into the gearbox BEFORE you attempt to offer up the gearbox to the engine - check Ashcroft's website this gives the dimensions for the offset from the gearbox face to the face of the torque convertor. This procedure ensures that the oil pump is engaged into the torque convertor and allows the gearbox to be bolted up. DO NOT force the gearbox onto the engine as you are almost certain to damage the oil pump and will need to start again.

When I rebuilt my 3.9 engine I followed the oil pump priming instructions and it primed immediately but I have a colleague who had exactly the same problem as you are having with the priming operation. His final solution was to pressurise the crank case with an air line - this of course meant blocking off all the breather system and getting about 10 psi in the crank case - this primed the pump when all else had failed.

Having had another look at the Microcat drawing it looks as though part no 607107 is the tubes that you want - can you not make the gaskets from a piece of gasket material?

According to my Microcat these are part no 607107 and Cotswold Land Rovers are selling them for £2 each - I do not know anything about the tubes that you refer to - there does not seem to be any tubes on the Microcat drawing

The best people I have dealt with are Tinley Tech in Bourne Nr Cambridge. Great for advice help and kits of parts - but I do not think that they will do the installation

Well I followed your advice and got it started with a new distributor cap and leads and it is running well so it seems that I have got away with it. I have of course discovered one of the built in safety features of the V8 in that if the top hose splits water pours over the distributor and shuts down the engine before it can overheat - now wasn't that a clever design!! Thank you very much for all your help, advice and encouragement

If it needed a rebore or rings would that not affect the compression?

Tried that and pressures now around 165 psi but several of the cylinders take three strokes to get up there - is this acceptable? The engine is a 9.35 CR

Since a complete rebuild

Probably about 5000 miles

This afternoon whilst out the engine (3.9 on gas) just died, loosing cylinder after cylinder until it came to a full stop. Upon inspection the upper water hose had split and all collant had been lost and no temp rise on the gauge. My immediate reaction was that one or both head gaskets had gone(these are composite gaskets fitted some 3 years ago) after a compression test using a Gunson tester all 8 compressions were in the green indicating 105 -120 psi. This suggests to me that the gaskets are OK is this likely to be the case? and if so where else should I start to look for the problem

Many years ago (more than I care to remember) I worked in Abu Dhabi and had a Range Rover Classic (It was a 2 door) and before I took it out there I went to a firm in Birmingham called Abbott Engineering who fitted a van type air con unit, manufactured by Carrier, which was mounted on the roof, the compressor was of course mounted on the engine and the refigerant pipes were in the windscreen columns. This was a perfect solution and after ten minutes running people were complaining it was too cold. In my expierience in the Gulf European cars had completely inadequate air con and only the Japanese and American manufacturers have arrived at an adequate response

Strangely enough the wiring diagram is actually missing from the LR workshop manual - there is a space for the diagram and the key for it but just a blank page where the actual diagram is supposed to be. So you may well struggle to find the diagram