FridgeFreezer

A mismatch between the transfer case and the rear diff, or both diffs? Where are you checking the part numbers from? If the rear diff has been swapped and is the wrong ratio then it would certainly be a problem. Assuming yours is a normal defender then both front and rear diff should be 3.54:1 ratio which means if you jack a wheel up and spin it the propshaft will go round 3.54 times for every turn of the wheel. The most likely mistake would be if someone has swapped a Series diff in, which is 4.7:1, but that would be a rare breed of numpty If you have gone from a 4-speed to a 5-speed did that involve a swap of transfer box as well as gearbox? If so, check the ratio sticker on the transfer box to the left of the handbrake drum If it has a Holley (or a Weber) then it's almost certainly running too rich all of the time my suggestion would be MSEFI but then everyone expects me to say that every post anyway

The stock breathers are banjo bolts with a small barb to connect the plastic tube to, the hole in the axle is 1/8" BSP and you can get new breathers for not much money. If you are off-roading/wading it's a good idea to extend them, you can buy extended breathers for around £25 a set, or for about a tenner at the local hydraulics place you can get two 1/8" BSP elbows and a few metres of nylon push-fit hose. They are needed to relieve pressure in the axle as the oil heats up / vapour is created. Also when wading as a hot axle casing hits cold water it contracts and will suck in air through the breather (hence why to extend it, otherwise it will suck in water!). If your breather is blocked then this pressure buildup / suction will find its way though other places like oil seals - which is less desirable

Looks like a cool truck though, MDF aside

I know I'm a right-minded petrol sort but how is this any great shock when the two are so similar? A group of Shires members went on a LR factory engine & gearbox course a while back and proved you could bolt a 300 in place of 200 using genuine parts (I don't recall the details as it was TDi-related so quite tedious ) it's surely not a great revelation?

Could do, but they seem to run fine once it's running so that would sort of knock that one out also if the MS isn't seeing the missing tooth on the wheel then god knows what the code is doing to try and work out when to fire what coil - it could be that without seeing the gap it won't fire all of the coils. Fingers crossed the ECU will check out OK (if not I blame the eejit who built it ) and Rog can then start to track down why he isn't seeing the gap on the trigger wheel as at the very least that can't be doing it any favours!

So it's nice and reliable then

Some bits are inside but I have just moved all my junk out of Jez's workshop so have boxes of random LR bits in the dining room, lounge, the range rover and the company van and it makes sense to sort it all out so I can actually find the bits I need to do a job and not end up buying twice as many bits as I need (for example I have somehow accumulated 5 oil pump gaskets and two sets of V8 exhaust manifold gaskets ) Easy-ish job for tomorrow is to bolt the back door, door tops and side window glass in so it's reasonably weatherproof. Considering making the rear floor out of perspex any good reason not to?

I'm actually sorting though the piles of LR bits in the lounge to make a shopping list since it's p***ing down outside, hopefully tomorrow will be a bit better and I can get the grinder out / go rummaging at the scrappy. PPC have a feature on LS1's (bizarrely "LS1 Vs Mazda RX-7 rotary" ) so I buyed a copy of that while I was out posting JST's alternator (it was sunny then, of course )

So your missing tooth has gone missing , I reckon Dan has spotted your wheel and "fixed" it for you by sticking the missing tooth back in

A good idea but I don't know if that useless thing is there for a reason, and the wall belongs to next door so is best not fiddled with

You can spend big money on any engine, and people do. But the proper Skyline lump is a real beastie - it was made for the jap version of touring cars - to be eligible they have to make a few road cars too so the lump was basically de-tuned to 280bhp and punted out. There is a gentleman's agreement in japan that they don't sell anything over 280bhp, but with very minimal outlay (EG a chip and a tweak of the boost) you can up the skyline lump's power very easily. PPC had a feature on them a while back and the internals are all race-spec and capable of putting up with massive BHP/boost etc. without having to delve into new cranks, pistons, or even blocks and heads, etc.

I know dat - I meant 200SX or Skyline as the SX lump is a skyline one with two cylinders lopped off. Both can be had up to silly HP and there's quite a few crashed ones around If I had the time/monye I'd be looking at a Skyline 2.6 as it would complete my classic restoration (the 109 was originally a 2.6 6cyl )

^^^ what he said, it's what we did on Petal.

Did you know you're allowed to undertake if you're keeping up with traffic - EG if the other lanes are moving slow and yours is moving fast. If someone (even a copper) is sat in the middle lane you can undertake if the fast lane is full, however diving under someone just for the hell of it will still land you in trouble. Personally I undertake lane-hogging idiots all the time as I figure if a copper is watching they will be more interested in the numpty sat at 50 in the middle of the road than me trying to keep moving at 70. Also has anyone noticed that on the 4-lane sections of the M25 you end up with the middle two lanes full of idiots driving within 1mph of each other (and usually only 1mph faster than the inside lane) who will NOT pull over which forces everyone else into the fast lane just to get by them. Vauxhall corsas - ghaaaaa! I'm with SniffPetrol on those...

That's a good point Ian - the fuel map is for a dizzy engine, could be worth upping the fuel map / cranking pulsewidth (I would do this 1st) by a few % to see what happens. The RV8's like to idle rich.

Audi drivers as they have an inferiority complex over BMW/Merc drivers so seem to drive like twice as much of a wan*er to make up for it Anyone who drives with their foglights on when it's not foggy deserves to be shot, then shot again, then run over, then shot a bit more. It's ignorant/inconsiderate and shows that you are unaware of the basic functions of your own vehicle.

I don't like body lifts because: - You're raising the CoG but... - You're not gaining any clearance under the vehicle chassis - You're not gaining any suspension travel - They are more work than they sound (will your wiring harness and brake lines happily reach 30mm extra? Steering shaft? Gear shift? Fuel filler? etc. etc.) - It always always always ends up looking like some redneck from the Scary Steering files has been at it, the more so the higher you make it If you want bigger tyres, chop the bodywork a bit. Look at Nige's 90 for inspiration of what can be done with big tyres / huge articulation with NO overall suspension lift and NO body lift. I'm not saying body lifts are always bad and wrong as some of the above is purely my opinion, just that they are a bit of a workaround / bodge compared to achieving the same results with a bit more effort and overall engineering elegance.

Another vote for Britannia, they've recovered me once or twice

COSWORTH! ;) In all seriousness, talk to Dave H at the Shires about the ford V6's, what he doesn't know isn't worth knowing. His website is www.ep90.com you can have a look at his hybrid, he was responsible for writing some of the EDIS code that MegaSquirt now runs, hopefully he'll be getting the hybrid back on the road for Seven Sisters in two weeks. Failing that, I know someone who might be *very* interested in buying that vehicle from you. Don't fit a landy engine, yuk

Out of the box EDIS is easy enough to do, the main arse with any of the dizzyless systems is retro-fitting them to a 40-year-old design of engine if you picked up a lump that was dizzyless to start with (EG LS1, K-series, Zetec, Cosworth) and arrived with coil packs and crank sensors already mounted it would be a far quicker job. Even quicker if someone else has done one before and can e-mail you the settings you need. There is the point that Nige, Jon and Geoff are among the first to fit EDIS to an RV8 and Rog is only the second chap I know of to try the direct coil drive (the first being Phil who wrote the code in the first place!), as with any development the first install takes 10x the effort of the second. Nige's engine is so specialised that he has had to develop his own spark & fuel settings from more standard ones, and Rog is the first guy I know of to run a stock RV8 with direct coil drive so has a bit of a hill to climb in working out all the settings that the EDIS module would take care of in an EDIS install. Once it's all smoothed out the info Rog will have will mean the next person has a far easier task ahead of them. Back to the subject at hand - from my understanding an LS1 wouldn't be too bad on fuel, certainly not in proportion to its power output, as the ECU is really clever. It shuts down cylinders when under low load and the mapping on it is very advanced, add to that the thing is smaller & lighter than an RV8 and it makes a hell of a lot of sense.

Won't that get in the way of your... errr... oh you still haven't got a car have you? :ph34r: Seriously, I do appreciate your offer Al but it's not just the £10 round-trip (which I can't afford anyway), it's the ~30 minutes each way and being in someone else's workshop. Here I have all my tools, all my junk highly valuable treasure and a nice warm house with a toilet and a kettle about 10 seconds away. Rather than having to make every trip count, I can nip in and out when I get the time and nip back in if something else needs doing. TBH I reckon I'll get more done this way, especially since all the major fab has been done at the lab. Doing some pricing up of stuff tomorrow to see what's feasible, now I have planned the jobs that need doing on the 109 if it's sunny out I may stick with open-air or tarps just to get the thing done. The fence panel(s) will have to go back up to keep the local chavs out - although they're both totally carp the lodger's motorbikes are a desirable step-up from moped ownership for the thieving scum and I'd never hear the end of the moping if one went walkies

I think Joe enjoys designing the stickers more than sorting the event

Troubleshooting suggestions from me mate Dave (AKA Top Secret Dave) are: - See if it starts on EasyStart, if it doesn't then you know you have basically zero spark - Check the timing on all four coils to confirm they're all sparking and as they should be - Check the timing on all four coils on cranking - Run less idle advance on the ignition map / less cranking advance as this will make it harder to start as mentioned above

Will - an LS may kill stock LR transmissions but then if you have a big yank motor you can bolt a big yank gearbox and transfer box the the back of it. Your TGV hasn't exactly been kind to your transmission , and it cost more to buy than you can land an LS on these shores for. I know which I'd rather have. Engine choice is nigh on impossible, there are very few right or wrong answers, it's all about what you want it to do, how much you want to spend, how you drive it, etc. etc. TBH if I had any reasonable amount of money to spend on a powerplant I wouldn't be looking at LR ones. TDi's are walking a thin line IMHO between being slightly better than an RV8 on economy but being more expensive to repair. I reckon the future is with more modern lumps from cars in the scrapyard - BMW, Jag, Ford, etc.) or at the bigger pennies end of the scale, LS lumps. As CorrodeFinger pointed out on the bunfight thread, the Rover 220 lump has better specs than a 3.9 V8 and probably does better MPG than a TDi, but costs pennies even with a car attached and can be bolted to a LR gearbox with parts-bin stuff. The Ford Duratec/Zetec lumps are the same, better performance than any LR lump from "only" two litres, millions of them have been made and they run forever. Cosworths are cheap and adapter plates are out there. Then there's the VW TDi's, Audi 5-pots, Nissan Q35 V6 or the 200SX / Skyline lump which is good for 500bhp just by asking it nicely. If you want to really confuse yourself, buy a copy of Practical Performance Car and see what they've stuck into what in there

No danger of that - and anyway I have a vehicle with no workshop, not the other way round like Al