Ed Poore

Something that being pondered amongst some friends who are into the amateur rally scene is to build a kind of KERS / regenerative braking system. Except rather than store the energy in batteries you store compressed air into a dive cylinder. When you want a boost you can then dump that air through the intake.

When I bought a switch or two I found Si was cheaper than Mud due to postage.

Technically everything is replaceable - it depends on the style of the battery and how good your skills with a soldering iron are... I have seen some which are simply located in a slot on the motherboard (similar to those used in rifle scopes - odd comparison but watch batteries are smaller diameter and thicker but one of my rifle scopes has an identical battery in it for reticule illumination). Other boards I've seen have the batteries soldered in whilst one I have seen just used a hefty capacitor (well it is kind of like a battery after all ). Without opening it up I'm afraid you're not going to be able to confirm whether it's easily replaceable or not. If you're feeling adventurous you could always drop in a voltage regulator and power it off the Landy's battery . Depends what's more likely to go flat first

Do you lose the time as well? It might be conceivable that the battery on the motherboard which is there to keep the clock running (and perhaps keep power to chips that store the BIOS' settings) is knackered.

If possible try and find out what the weather is as late as you can before you set off. Because of the terrain there it's very prone to flash flooding and the like. I was supervising a Duke of Edinburgh expedition there a number of years ago and witnessed one of the rivers nearby rise by a total of 8ft over the course of the day.

Perhaps I'm in the minority here but about 5 years ago I bought a 10,000lbs Champion winch from Winch Solutions and to say that I've looked after it is a gross overstatement. It's been swimming and through a bit of mud and all I've done is once in a while un-spool it and re-wind it, I've even given the wire rope a spray of WD-40, once... Having said that it's never let me down (touch wood) and always dealt with what I've thrown at it. The only time it really had any difficulty was in rescuing a reasonably heavily laden Series III that was up to it's axles in mud and sitting on it's leaf springs rather than the wheels (and it's not the first time John's done that either, seems to drive in a very bouncy manner). What ended up happening was the winch was struggling and eventually made a little bit of progress, pulling the 110 towards the Series... So a snatch block wouldn't have helped in this scenario if we'd been able to rig one up, keeping the 110 on firm ground meant that the winch cable was fully spooled out and even then we threw caution to the wind and included a large tow-rope in the mix. I've typically used it more for pulling trees and so on around the farm (and lifting gearboxes etc) than recovery situations and gets used regularly in short bursts but with minimal maintenance it's been superb. If it does break then in all likelihood I'll just repair it or may go hydraulic instead. The only criticism I have of it is that it's slow, particularly when spooling out and since it doesn't have a free-spool option you'll inevitably end up on your back in the mud as you lose your footing dragging the cable out.

Just to clarify a few things in case they get misinterpreted: I assume what you mean here is that a lower geared winch will draw less current than a higher geared one. Introducing a snatch block will in in effect halve the gearing ratio of the winch and thus reduce the load on the motor and subsequently reduce the current draw. I challenge you to find a fuse reasonably cheaply (other than an M8 bolt that is) that will deal with the kinds of currents that electric winch motors are capable of sinking...

I can't remember off the top of my head but the current to the starter motor is already switched by the starter solenoid. I think the earth is the column itself. Since you have the dash apart I would clean all the contacts thoroughly. Any chance of a of pic of the damage?

I suppose I could have a go. Although I did find a way of grabbing OS (amongst other map types) from the Web... Got all the 1:50k and 1:25k from Bing maps

The valve will be fully closed when the push-rod is at it's lowest point. However I think what you actually want to do (IIRC from attempting the timing on my Series) is that you adjust the clearance when the corresponding valve is fully open (meaning that the push-rod is at it's highest point). Note that the way the camshaft lobes are designed means that there isn't one highest point but rather a plateau so you ideally want to get to the highest point, come off the highest point and then back to the middle. Also I think making sure that you always approach the highest point in the correct direction of rotation for the engine. However, all that may be more important when you're actually setting the timing (direction important to keep the timing chain taut etc) rather than just adjusting clearances.

As an alternative I did find and make some modifications to a bunch of Python (it's a scripting / programming language) scripts that were able to decompose the .qct files into loads of little .pngs. Note the .qct files only contain the "imagery" whilst the other extension (I forget off the top of my head) contains the terrain profiles. Unfortunately I have no knowledge about how to interpret these. I also seem to remember a pdf that detailed the file-format which should be with the scripts. I have no idea where I found the original (many years ago) but still have a copy lying around somewhere on my computer. If people want a copy to try out then they can PM me.

That's kind of what I was hoping, the main unknown (assuming the input shaft is the same length - which I think is "different" on the LT77 version because of the shorter bell-housing) is the selector side of things. I think I'll need to have a look at microcat when I get back home and see what the differences are...

Hmm, I had not heard about the clutch issue before. Given I did manage to re-assemble the Series' gearbox four times in one day (kept putting things back in the wrong order and forgetting various gaskets) perhaps the simplest would be to "strip" down the two side by side and then "simply" swap over the guts rather than faff-around with the housings... I think I need to have a look at both side-by-side to see what the differences are - now that we have a nice pit dug in Wales which should be able to fit both in at the same time (that took a lot of concrete to finish off).

What has been a long (two years or so) story has resulted in the following situation. I have a 300Tdi 110 with the R380 main-box exhibiting all the usual symptoms (5th -> 4th synchro-mesh and input shaft wear) and a Disco of exactly the same age that needs substantial structural repair work and a complete overhaul of all dampers and anti-roll bars to be road-legal and safe, but has an almost new gearbox in it and the power train is without fault. I've done a bit of research into this and find conflicting comments about whether it's possible to do a Disco -> Defender R380 swap. The three major questions surrounding this seem to be The bell-housing (some say it's different and some say it's identical) The selector shafts The input shaft length Essentially what it boils down to is that I need to minimise down-time (ideally something that can be completed in a weekend or long-weekend if necessary) and to make matters more interesting (although not a major hurdle) is that I'm based in Surrey with the 110 and the Disco is based in very West Wales. So is it possible to simply swap the main-boxes over (ideally don't want to have to do any modifications such as drilling new plates or machining of selectors / shafts)? The simplest would be if I could simply take out the main-box from the Disco and put it into the Defender swapping the top-housing over to keep the gear lever in the correct place. The second issue would be considering I do a lot of road mileage if I were to put the Disco transfer box onto the Defender are there any complications or is it a straightforward swap? One consideration would be what it's like towing since I do have the need to be able to pull the maximum weight possible on the odd occasion - although these are rare enough that dropping down to the low box to get started would not be a major issue I think. [edit] Looks like the selector forks would need to be changed over but to be honest after completely rebuilding the Series' gearbox I think I can manage that reasonably quickly [/edit]

Usually if you can provide a valid reason for possessing it then you're ok. We've never had an issue with the 2ft machetes I tended to carry around in the Land Rover. Similar approach with firearms etc. After speaking with my new Firearms Office in Surrey (when I moved from Dyfed Powys) because of the farm in Wales and the land up in the Highlands I've kind of got a carte-blanche when it comes to what firearms I want to possess...

I got myself a Skeletool CX (?). Carbon fibre version anyway and best tool I've had. Snapped it in half doing something it want really meant to do and dropped by a mate who sells them and had a new (beefed up) one free of charge.

Also unless you already know you have I2C or UART working then you're likely to be wasting more time.

Are you sure that you've got the clock polarities and so on correct? I spent ages debugging an SPI acellerometer for one of my projects and eventually realised I had misread the data sheet. The other option is to slow the clock speed right down first to see if that works. Since SPI is non-differential then it can be quite susceptible to noise.

Just confirming what CwazyWabbit explained - didn't know about the way they function but certainly on my Series and 110 there's two 1/4" terminals and it doesn't care which way around they go.

The problem I usually have is that non of my recovery gear fits on most vehicles. I remember once having to bump start a friend's car in Snowdonia a couple of winters ago and only just managed to get the shackle through the eye on the Micra. And that had a pretty large recovery loop on it. Once had to give a 4x4 at Bisley a tug out of a ditch and ended up having to find a smaller rope because there were no suitable points to put my tow ropes onto it...

Whenever I've stripped down motors / alternators then I've always used petrol to clean them. Building on FridgeFreezer's reply above an alternator is a very simple device so stripping it down isn't usually too difficult and things do usually benefit from a good clean - especially the way LR parts tend to get treated.

My philosophy on my 110 now. Plus the rate that I'm racking up the miles on it ~30k in 18 months although I've only just crossed the 100k boundary the sights are definitely set on the 200k. Although since it's an early 300Tdi it's suffering from the common gearbox input shaft / 4th gear synchro issues. Trying to decide what's better a rebuilt or simply get a recon unit - unfortunately it's my main form of transport so downtime is a major factor. Major items shopping list include - sort the gearbox, locker for at least the rear, perhaps the front as well. Some higher driving lights would be nice - predominantly to avoid the recent near misses I've had with a few sheep in the Beacons. Aiming to do as much preventative maintenance as I can though. The next major fix will be the gearbox, although I suspect I can get another 100k out of it it's getting a little trickier with the colder weather. Become pretty damn good at double de-clutching though! To be fair it has had a new turbo through no fault of it or me (see an old thread on here where a garage that did a service dropped a sump-plug washer on the wrong side of the air-filter. Needless to say that the turbo damage was pretty spectacular. Although I think my 110 has decided that it's the pack leader and there's nothing anyone else can do cause it doesn't feel the need to mark it's territory like any other Landy.

I didn't actually. I've had Britpart (shhhhh) ones fitted on the rear to replace the previous ones and get rid of the SLU for the last 17k or so and they've been (touch wood) fine. Had a brief look around for Genuine ones but didn't look very hard for a reasonable price and that could guarantee a quick delivery (driving 9 people plus kit to a shooting competition next weekend) - the only firm that I've not had problems with to be honest has been Paddocks, tried out a few others and had (up to) months of delays for something that was apparently stocked - even when I paid extra for next day delivery . Lady manning the reception in the office had a nice surprise when this lot (including a brake servo) got delivered - at least they're good about receiving personal mail and packages. Although I did chicken out of having a Famous Four tubular winch bumper delivered to the office - I'm not sure how well that would have gone down... It's not as if I've given them a particularly easy time either since 80% of that mileage has been with at least half a tonne in the boot. Fitted them initially to stop the back bottoming out when I was taking 9 people shooting regularly for a Uni club. Since finishing there I spent the summer back in Wales and most of the mileage covered then was driving (not particularly softly softly) on the farm with the back full of equipment / wood / general farm carp (including at one point our digger's bucket). The trips I did to and from London varied but again always carrying something - be it moving out after Uni so sofas / chairs / desks / guns / climbing stuff etc or doing some work for the department which meant I was shifting 250kg of motors (plus additional stuff) back and forth. The pièce de résistance was a week or so before moving up to Surrey to start work was just a tad over 3.5 tonnes of lamb to go to market in a three axle cattle trailer. That was an novel experience even it it was only a few miles. Oh and I couldn't be bothered to unload the logs that were in the back from cutting up trees on the farm so had the second row of seats full of chainsaws, machetes, ropes etc and the back almost to the roof of logs. The only time I've ever had to genuinely go down into low first out of necessity - turned around after loading up the sheep in one of the fields and parked there whilst we loaded the other two trailers up and then when I went to leave couldn't get started. I would have said it was a flat field but this being Wales what we define as flat is what the rest of the country calls 1 in 3.

What a difference! As per suggestions went for HD yellow's on the front (already did the back with 110 hard-top ones - I've got a CSW) last year and only been for a short spin to go order an ammo cabinet but can notice the difference already. It's now sitting more or less level - at least 2" lift compared to the knackered ones. I hadn't realised quite how bad the old ones were until I started replacing them and noticed the bump stops had been hitting fairly regularly. The test will be the speed-bumps in Guildford on the way into work. Also kudos to Paul at Challenger - I found the turret rings but Paddocks when I'd ordered them hadn't sent the nuts to accompany them even though they were included. Tried to pilfer some from work but typically not a metric thread so no luck there. Stopped by at Challenger on the way home and instantly produced all 8 free of charge - I know they're pence but it's the little things that count, either that or the substantial service done a few weeks ago in preparation for the spin up to the Highlands...

What you need is WokFi - seen it in operation up in the Beacons and they were able to get 10Mb/s over 2 km.