SteveG

The UK is one of the few countries in Europe that doesn’t incentivize move to EV vehicles and it’s still growing, stats show a different story to the Daily Mail headlines, with EV up 17.8% and PHEV up 39.3% in 2023. January 2024 was even higher with EV up 21.1% and PHEV up 31%. Used car sales for 2023 also up. The only thing holding up increased EV take up is high cost of vehicles and charging infrastructure, both options at people’s homes and on the move. As for China flooding market with ‘cheap’ EV’s, MG who is the largest Chinese EV seller in UK sells a car that retails in it’s home market for £17K for £34K in UK. It doesn’t cost an additional £17K to ship it, and extra duties, so there’s currently quite a bit of profiteering going on in UK market. Used car sales in 2023… Sales of hybrid electric and plug-in hybrid electric cars were also strong, up by 40.0% and 25.1% respectively and, collectively, electrified vehicles represented 5.6% of the market – up from 4.0% in 2022. Diesel and petrol, however, remained the most dominant fuel types, with a total of 6,827,466 units changing hands – 94.3% of the overall market.2 https://www.smmt.co.uk/2024/01/new-car-market-delivers-best-year-since-2019-as-fleets-fuel-growth/ https://www.smmt.co.uk/2024/02/uk-reaches-million-ev-milestone-as-new-car-market-grows/

Might be worth trying the matte spray that folks like retropower use. Can you use the stick on reference dots too with your software? I see that P38’s still rust badly in the wheel well 😉😉😉😉😉…

I haven’t used them yet, so can’t personally endorse, but I was recommended this company for flocking… https://www.flockspeed.co.uk/our-services It was a recommendation I’d value and I’ve seen the end results which are very good and price seemed good value.

That’s looks to be a useful piece of kit Ben. Just looked it up and I see it does Canbus decoding too. That could be handy, along with verifying sensors. 👍

In the UK, proof of ownership is typically a purchase receipt either from a trade business or personal individual. Then V5 is proof that the vehicle has been registered to be legally driven on UK roads. The V5 also clarifies the date of manufacture and taxation class for the vehicle, which in turn determines the amount of road taxation due each year. The two, owner and registered keeper, can be different, for example the owner could be a leasing/finance company and the register keeper the principal drive of the vehicle. V11 is just the annual road tax reminder and nothing to do with proof of ownership or proof or registration.

Sorry just seen this thread - do you want me to send you my Lynx hardware etc. for P38? It’s just sitting in the garage doing nothing.

Sorry, I get the question now - my confusion was due to nothing else being removed. Either all or some range rover classic chassis don’t have the fillets on the front, just rear…

Blackbird Industries Ltd P38 steering kit information pack.pdf Blackbird fitting instructions. Not sure I understand the concern on removing and infill of the small corner section of the spring mount, but maybe I misunderstand you.

You have to drill a couple of holes in the chassis and weld in crush bars, then cut out a section of the spring mount to fit, plus source the end knuckle of the p38 steering column.

Glad you are all recovering well Dave, and sorry to hear about your daughter. Hopefully she is making a good recovery too. cheers, Steve

I haven’t bought off him, so not a personal recommendation, but this guy is constantly posting in range rover classic Facebook groups with RR’s and parts that he brings back from his place in Spain. A few months ago he had at least two rust free 2 door body shells already in UK… https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100024917016942

Here you go, as suggested large radius arm washers, a length of threaded bar and some nuts (doesn’t have any lubricant in pics as I needed to take photos on phone first…

Not meaning to be negative, but just to add a dose of reality - as far as I’m aware, no CSK’s have sold for £150,000 - I don’t recall even seeing one sell for over £100,000, so the price they are asking seems to be unrealistic. Graeme Hunt is always top end of the market in asking prices and even they balk at advertising very good condition CSK’s at over £100K. They currently have one for sale, asking for ~£97K. Obviously with companies like them and Kingsley you never get to publicly know what they actually sell for. I suspect if you auctioned a fully restored CSK today, you’d be looking at getting around the £80,000 mark rather than £100K+. It’s hard to tell as ones like the one linked above have failed to sell when they’ve come up on auction sites. So even this may be too high. As advised before by several people, to get maximum offer/bid it would pay to pull it out and at least wash it, confirm that every part is there (or list if anything is missing) describe or show condition of interior and fully describe and show condition of chassis. Again, not trying to be negative just offering a point of view.

Pipe insulation?

Not sure this has ever been the case in the history of tax collecting in the UK, so I looked up the current stats. You’ll see from this image here that the bottom 50% of tax payers contribute 9.4% of income tax and NIC receipts in the UK, so as you can the vast majority, 90.6%, of HMRC revenue that is from income tax and NIC receipts is from the top 50% of tax payers. https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8513/

Yes Nige all D2’s have front DC shafts 👍

It was simply down to the fact that RRC’s body tended to rust heavily whilst the chassis stayed intact. Defender bulkhead and body parts, at the time, we’re easy to source so hence lots of range rover classic/Defender bodied hybrids.

I’m with Mo here, show respect obviously, but hi-lift aren’t as dangerous as most make out. Properly serviced, they’re useful for lots of things. Not that I use them often for changing springs, but using it as Mo says is not exposing oneself to loads of danger and does make changing out the springs very easy…

As above talk to someone like Ray at V8 developments or Turner Engineering, but I suspect they’d both say don’t bother. When I spoke to them, they both test your block before carrying the liner treatment and if they find any damage/cracks on the block they recommend not using it. Sending pics to them should get you a definitive answer. I have a complete gems 4.6 engine here that I don’t plan to use, but probably no use to you as you’ll only need the block. cheers Steve

I put a bearmach in the range rover classic 3 years ago, and to me it appeared good, and the fitter was surprised it wasn’t genuine after fitting the screen, but if you read Eightpot’s experience they’ve either changed suppliers or the quality is variable. So maybe it’s worth paying the £100 extra to go genuine. Think of it this way, that’s only a tenner a year 😉, although the 8 year old one in the TD5 90 was already splitting in the corners when I sold it, so maybe 10 years is ambitious, even for a genuine one.

What was wrong with Disco that meant it was being scrapped? - that body looks surprisingly ok for a D1.

I suppose, when the previous ‘farm hack’ was/is the old daily TDV8 Range Rover then the Defender probably doesn’t look too expensive to Harry 😉

The reason I mentioned suspension is that it has a big part to play in maintaining traction, maximizing upward and downward travel from your existing spring setup will give you a lot more traction off road especially in dry, loose and uneven ground situations. For example if you fitted a kit like Gwyn Lewis’s long travel suspension, it would allow your springs to dislocate, the adjusted shock mounts and longer travel shocks would allow greater upward and downward movement. The benefits of this in off road traction can be significant. Apart from the damping change of the shocks compared to your existing shocks, none of this affects the on road handling of your Defender. Choose well, like the Old Man Emu long travel shocks and typically I’ve found they perform much better on road than LR or Monroe shocks. You didn’t mention having anti roll bars front or rear, but if you do and want to keep them, then ignore the above advice. 😉 Then your best option for better traction would be to fit ATB’s/Lockers. For your centre ATB, it’s likely that there hasn’t been much support because most of the people here responding are used to using a centre diff lock, don’t find it an issue selecting it when necessary and the centre diffs are fairly reliable. So for most folks responding it’s low value, however, really it’s down to personal choice, if you want to fit one for the extra flexibility, greater reliability and removing some of the driveline shunt and feel that the invest is worthwhile, then go ahead 👍 For the front diff, you mention that this is the weakest link. 2 pin diffs are weaker than 4 pin, which in turn are weaker than one with an ATB or Diff Locker centre, but this doesn’t mean they’re fragile. The standard open diffs can take a fair amount of abuse, and so far I assume it’s been reliable enough for you. If when you pull it, everything is ok, I’d leave it as is, and just go for a rear ATB/Locker only if you do want to go down this route after fitting your centre ATB. cheers

If the goal is to maximize traction off road, you go for MT’s. If you’re going to compromise for on road efficiency/comfort then don’t 😊

Sorry to say this, but your view on a winch is completely flawed. In my TD5 90 I left the transmission as completely stock, open diffs, centre diff lock. I did however invest in the suspension and tyres to give me maximum traction as possible, fitted a winch and carried two waffle boards (You’d carry maxtrax now). A winch doesn’t have to be used just for when you get stuck, you can also use it when you know your going to have difficulty. To get through a difficult section you can opt for the winch first, using a winch and available traction means you can get over some very difficult terrain with good mechanical sympathy too. Add in a set of boards or maxtrax and again these are a real aid, either on their own or in conjunction with the winch. In order of priority this is what I’d personally invest in… Good set of mud terrain tyres Compressor - so I can air down tyres when necessary to get the max out of them Suspension - to maximize traction off road (obviously you need to also meet your needs for on road too/load carrying) Traction boards/maxtrax Winch and good selection of extension lines/strops/shackles etc. That would be my minimum setup for solo off roading. Then if funds allowed… Rear ATB/Locker plus HD halfshafts then Front ATB If budget was no issue Centre ATB Front HD shafts and CV’s