honitonhobbit

Does this mean he will actually read his PM's rather than letting them die of old age?

I knew Ralph would be right he's the man

My money is on Ralph; questioning his knowledge is like not breathing

Ralph I believe I may have a spare HF unit - if it's where I think it is it's yours as I can only use one at a time M6IRL

A piece of history that winch... Grease routing needs modifying and the bearings up grading but a lovely thing all in all

Oooh G12... mmmmm quality veteran leccy winchy stuff. Is it 'improved'? Got a useful scource for the OE bearings fitted by Uncle David

IIRC correctly the torque curve is deliberately programmed to be relatively flat as the original gearbox fitted to these engines in the Rover cars was less than strong... There is a modified ECU available that was used in the Tomcat (Rover 220) racing series as part of the control mods There's a chap called Marcostic (sp?) used to hang out on here in the very old days who fitted a T16 to his 88" then went balls out to tune it - very nice job...

Have to disagree with you on the NA T16. It's still a great engine and at 134bhp with oodles of torque and rev it would still have been so much better than the 1.8K in the Freebie. It's also bullet proof and as we all know the K isn't. Even in the Disco MPi the NA T16 is generally a big mileage lump.

We put one of these (out of an 820Turbo) into a QT ultralight some years back, that used the Disco MPi LT77 and bellhousing and a 1.44 T box... It was fun. It's a superb engine, one that LR were foolish not to put in the Freelander in NA and Turbo form

The A3 does dive like a bitch under heavy braking but that is due to it's massive front bias and ****ty back brakes. The fronts are C25 calipers and discs and the rears are escort Mk3 drums. The handbrake works (if that is a word I can use) off the rear drums. As for handling , it's astonishing once you get use to the roll. I took class wins in a number of european endurance events (sub 2.0lltr diesel NA) where due to the lack of power speed was maintained by getting round corners quick. Once you fit a decent turbo lump in them the A3 is a hoot on the road and you can use that rear wheel drive and LSD to its maximum advantage - hell even the NAD is damned quick. It's all about weight balance, springing, shocks, wheelbase and CoG

The greta thing is John has no idea who 'HonitonHobbit' is I can see some mickey taking potential here

Did you not! Did you tell Mark? He's all wedded and fathered up now so has no time for anything... He has a possible buyer but if it falls through I think a discounted offer might work

Persevere

I would also work on the 'if it works why mess around with it concept' The A3 is the only light 4x4 vehicle I have come across in 30 years that is mass produced with 'A' frame front and I've yet to see more than a couple of engineered specials (and they were carp). These days you can't turn round for falling over 1 links and they are so simple if you can do the maths and fab Also what do you want it for? And why? The A3 that Dan and Jez worked on is up for sale and it's almost finished - I believe the owner wants £1k for it. It's less than 1000kgs is beautifully traybacked and challeneg winged and has a sweet 1.9TD in it

Chap called John Bowden, owns a garage called Gumtree 4x4 He's honest and knows the vehicles inside out as do his guys

Allow for the fact I don't know East Sussex that well and haven't been there for more years than you would care to know

How far is Ditchling from you and could you get a vehicle there? If so there is a man there who is 100% trustworthy - he's not cheap but he's fair and he's been doing stuff to LR's for ever.

Get confirmation off the garage as to what they did When run up to heat is the rad hot all the way down (mind your fingers) 300Tdi's have a habit of overheating when they are poorly maintained or thrashed to death so it has to be on the list and if it has been badly overheated the head will most likely be toast as the casting quality is poor BUT always check the other possibilities first Remind me, where do you live?

As the owner of three A3's (one of which Dan has played with) I can tell you the main problem with this set up is the front overhang needed to mount the 'A' frame to. On the A3 the front 'A' frame is shorter and is curved to shorten the overhang but it still causes issues with approach angle. Mind you in standard form you get 13" of travel and that's with the limiting staps still on; added to which an A3 simply won't run big tyres without a T box change...

I'm liking this one Dan

My first thoughts would be thermostat, water pump, massive airlock (but 300's are easy to bleed) Did the garage confirm the headgasket failure by chemical test or by pressure test All the pipes would be red hot with a head gasket into water jacket failure Is the watertank pressurisation due to an air lock? What are the winning numbers for this friday night?

Did you say that it's in the red and some pipes are cold? Or did I miss a bit?

See if you can find HFH's post from back in the dark ages when he trimmed his arches to fit 34's on standard height springs

285's on a set of freestyles rub at full articulation on standard springs but only just and that is on genuine bump stops Freestyles are +33 Standard modulars are 0 or -8; with a 235 on a 7" wheel you have less than 10 mm of arch cover 235's on -8 mods with disco 2 bump stops will rub on the rear at full articulation So common sense says that at full articulation 285's on 8" mods with a -35 offset will rub the flares - so trim the flares You will also need to extend the flares to cover the wheels

It's not meant to sit level... It's meant to have a slight 'back up' stance Any idea what colour code your rings springs have?