Turbocharger

Ah, but we've got £20 back every time you visit the fuel station, so we can afford blingy injector pumps etc. Go diesel Ian - once it's started, it's running.

Doesn't the internet link people quickly?

Well, I pulled both mine this weekend and followed the 50/50 route: Drained them both, put a sachet of one-shot grease in there and chased it down with about half a litre of EP90, until it reached the filler plug. TBH since it was totally dry and I'd never topped it up I was gobsmacked when I pulled the pin and found oily greasy glop (and plenty of it). I was expecting the worst, and a bill for two CVs.

To throw another hat in the ring, I ran without one for ages. Then I got the dreaded steering vibes, fitted one and .. no difference. I just can't be bothered to climb underneath and un-fit it. I'd run without for a bit and see if there's any difference, Nige.

Have a go at tightening the grub screws at the base of each wiper arm - my driver's side one works loose every month or so and wipes less and less of the screen. A tweak with an allen key restores my rain-washed vision.

My front discs aren't ventilated - are 110s different from Ninetys? It sounds like I've got a pair of bearings in the axle then, but might need a bottom pin too - I wonder if Christian Autos do 'sale or return'? Grease or oil - probably neither, it's not leaking at all...

I'm contemplating a swivel rebuild this weekend, and I've read Les's excellent Tech archive run down. I've got 300Tdi axles on my Ninety, but I'm sure I remember doing this job before with a big Railko pin and cup arrangement in the top of the swivel, although that might have been on the original 1984 axles. Save me stripping it down then needing a return trip to the parts shop - which arrangements should 24-spline axles have? Pics stolen from Les's thread, showing the 2x taper-roller bearing arrangement. When there's a conclusion to this, can we add it to the Tech thread? Les says that all axles are much the same in his text, but I don't think that's quite true for the top pin.

I can park outside my flat, I just need a permit from the company who own the block. Who won't answer their phone to tell me how to get one, but who will send their contractors to lift cars not displaying permits. A stern letter is on the way demanding the return of my money.

Will, can I make you feel a bit better? After finding an empty parking space outside my flat, several phone calls to disagreeable people and a run across Bristol, I finally had to spend £250 to be able to see this: which is my car being lowered back onto the road. I hate clampers.

Time on your hands, Keir?

You can diagnose a leak by smearing grease around the unions and the fuel filter - it seals out the air temporarily.

Alright - enough with the beam bender debate. Whether or not individuals travelling elsewhere have the habit, I'll be using gaffer tape. Black tape, for those who are interested. Anything else I might forget or should consider before heading for the ferry?

Will's the fastest chequebook in the west...

Mature, sensible contribution to the forum: snigger [/mscttf] I'd agree with the recurring advice here - go to college. If you play your cards right, buy a MIG for stitching your own scrap sculptures at home, and use the college machine for your ali welds.

@ Al Minivin: you don't really get scavenging from the exhaust because LR (diesel) engines go too slowly, and you've got too many cylinders interacting.

The airbag slots are because the dash underpinnings are lifted from a Disco3 I believe. The issue isn't where you can nail an airbag unit, it's with the way the chassis deforms. To me, the whole thing looks like an interim solution to a much deeper problem - the Defender doesn't crash well.

Al, please will you stop dragging science into these arguments, you're blurring the bull****. Paul - you need a bigger intake than exhaust because you can generate as much pressure as you like to push the gas out again, but you've only ever got 1013 millibar pushing it in.

I'll be taking a hi-vis anyway - I don't like being out of the car on the roadside without one (and of course, once inside it is like a shield of steel and I am impervious to harm...)

Many congratulations - quite humbling when I'm stressing over a bimble down through France!

Some really good stuff here, thanks. I'd got most of the mechanical stuff in my mind already, but thoughts on paperwork and hi-vis are new ideas. I'd forgotten beam benders entirely - anyone got a set of LHD halogens they'd lend me for beer? Re tolls, we'd planned to avoid them and see the countryside more, spend a few days just travelling there. Mappy.com (great site!) reckons we'd go an extra 40 miles avoiding tolls (860miles total, to Monte Carlo), but an extra six hours driving. Diesel's 80p/litre? I'd been told around a euro a litre (68p). Recovery - RAC looked attractive until: ... and then suddenly they didn't. DirectLine want my car to be 16 years or younger so looks like £80 will be going to the AA.

I just got a phone call from Fi - she is indeed back from Croatia but doesn't have t'internet in her new house. She still has her Discovery (with a small power steering leak) and is still loving her new job on the Highways. She may join the Welsh laning trip next weekend.

I'm considering a holiday in the south of France, and by calculations it's cheaper to drive than fly (my environmental concerns, y'see). Any thoughts about spare parts to take / preventative maintenance beforehand etc? I've just done all the oils, the timing belt isn't two years old.

I was on the committee there in the late 90s - can't see any familiar faces on the website though. It's a cracking site but not large, quite rocky but with mud too when we managed to get the vintage fire engine boys down from Hartington steam fair. Indeed, it's the site where TroddenMasses cut his teeth on offroading in his immaculate Series 3.

Munch on my tasty ass, Mr Watts, I'm going for this "off the roading" thing. I fancy driving some of the lanes we did on the weekend from Llanerchindda in 2002/3?, especially one bit (of Sarn Helen?) with the river crossing we refused. Or maybe Strata Florida? Anyone have grid refs for suggested lanes? The reasoning is, we could go over to Salisbury Plain but it takes an hour and a half to be on the Plain, and from Brizzle we could be in the mountains by then.

Don't forget their favourite claim, and a true advantage over different rims: "Lowers vehicle centre of gravity"