BogMonster

There was something about it recently - I thought it was on here but maybe it was in a mag? I just did a google but "winch web" just turns up every website about winches which isn't useful. I'll see if I can find the item in a mag tonight if nobody else replies. I was thinking maybe Lifting & Crane Services but I can't see it on their site. But I think the view was that while the web was cheap, you couldn't splice repair it like ordinary string, and it was too easily cut on any sort of edge then it would just tear and was F*ed.

Well I would buy a Jag over a BM any day even if it is not quite as good at 180mph in a wet corner on a track day. A bit like the new Aston vs BMW M6 vs Porch Beetle that was on Top Gear here the other day:- The choice of classic British (with the emphasis on the "ish" these days) elegance versus a car that a drug dealer would have to wear a bag in... ooh let me think about that for a second. Jags don't look that different because they got it right the first time IMHO B) you only need to keep faffing around with a design if it dates quickly. Did anybody say "Defender"?

You're welcome

I was wondering that Dave but he says no spring pressure out of reverse - is there not an additional spring for reverse on an LT77, that pops the lever into the 1/2 plane? (apart from the main bias springs I mean) I didn't reply because my experience of gear selectors falling to bits is limited to the bit you describe so I probably don't know what I am talking about

Yesterday and today I am seeing lots of photos missing on posts, e.g. the "competition time - how high" post, some of them wouldn't come up yesterday, then none of them would, and this morning still none of them.... other posts are affected too anybody else seeing this problem? it's not a PC specific problem as the same thing is happening at work and at home

What do you call "real gear oil" then? I have just put about £45 worth (landed cost here) of Difflock's much vaunted MT75 extremely fancy full set of bells and whistles included manual gearbox oil in my R380 about a week ago and frankly there doesn't seem to be much difference to either Land Rover's MTF94, or the ATF (Castrol TQF then later on Castrol Dexron III) that I used to use in the old 90. The cold gearchange is noticeably better (first 100 yards on a cold morning), but when hot (after a bit of use offroad in low range for example), if anything it is slightly worse, and to be honest it is not really that much different to the gearbox in the old one running ATF. A chap I know used to use ATF in his 90 gearbox, changed to MTF and then changed back again because he reckoned the gearchange was better with the bog standard ATF. Hmmm £4.80 for ATF or £45 for fancy stuff ... I wonder what I'll use next time round Bog standard ATF might not last as long but at 1/10 of the price you can afford to change it every service ... expensive stuff might be needed in fancy gearboxes but as I don't run a gearbox costing nearly as much as my house, I think ordinary oil will probably do me OK

Oh how I wish mods could still change users titles A few slightly coarse alternatives spring to mind Sorry Fi back under my stone I go

From the second photo "What do you mean you forgot to put the plasma on the rear winch?"

Suzuki SJ's are quite fun in the snow in 2WD too

Would you trust anybody called Ujimabooby? Come to that Lara is a pretty dodgy name too!

Hehehehehehe Now where can I get some LOx?

Could do ... the EGR valve opens at certain part throttle settings but then should shut off above certain load/speed ranges - maybe it wasn't shutting the valve when it should. The whole EGR system is rubbish anyway and any Tdi engine which has it is better off without it IMHO. If it ain't there it can't break

I've never done anything like the Lions Back but I regularly drop down over banks etc inch by inch using the brakes, the thing that is always taught of "feet well away from the pedals and don't touch the brakes whatever you do" is fine up to a point and quite correct in some conditions (slippery but smooth surface for example, where using the brakes just makes you slide) but in many real world situations is a recipe for a crumpled rear fuel tank and/or spinal injuries! As it happens I measured the "crawl speed" of the 90 on the weekend using the GPS, and idle in 1st low is about 1.7mph (slight fluctuations) but in many cases (dropping down over a 12-18in high bank for example) that seems #kin fast!!! I think as with any situation you have to be prepared in case something starts to go wrong. I guess in the case of that Blazer there probably wasn't a hell of a lot she could have done on a slope like that, but jamming the auto box down into 1st would have got them to the bottom a bit slower, even if it had over-revved the engine and blew that up half way down. But it is easy to say that with hindsight, when you're halfway down and something breaks in a situation where you probably already need a change of underwear before the brakes went, I guess the capacity to make calm decisions is probably already handicapped a bit

I can say for sure that BFG ATs are much better than BFG MTs on icy surfaces, because I run both, though the MTs are still quite reasonable and better than many others. The ATs with electronic traction control and ABS on the Discovery, makes it a very sure footed vehicle on icy roads. I have always found that dropping a few psi out of the tyres to spread the contact patch seems to improve grip quite noticably (which is at odds with conventional wisdom which suggests a narrow tyre is best!). Overheating the tyre isn't really a problem (I'm only talking about losing maybe 5psi anyway) as you shouldn't be speeding on ice anyway There is certainly quite a difference between different tyres - for example BFGs are light years ahead of something like Avon Rangemasters or the old crossply Avon Ranger for example, the latter one is a truly, deeply scary tyre to use on ice. Some of our company vehicles used to have them fitted (and some still have Rangemasters) and they have given me a few brown trouser moments over the years! I don't really know "why" there is a difference but there certainly is, to the extent I tend to avoid driving the ones with Rangemasters on if the roads are icy. I think if there is a scientific explanation it is to do with the "siping" on the tyres (more gripping edges), the old design of tyres like the Avons means they don't have any sipes at all. Never tried any of the proper winter tyres so I don't know how anything normal compares to them, nor have I driven on studs (contrary to the media image there isn't actually that much snow here!)

When you were designing this thing with no windows, it was still summer, right?

I think the trouble is, rallying is unfashionable. On the face of it, you would have to be mad to stand in the pitch darkness for hours on end just to see 3 seconds of blinding light and then be showered with mud and gravel, but it's "real" motorsport and I love it - even if I've never been able to see one 'live'. OK so the leading cars are far removed from the models which carry their names in the showrooms but it's still far closer to the real world than F1, where absurdly rich people drive round in ludicrously expensive cars that break as soon as they run over a blade of grass. And the drivers are, on the whole, real people (or at least they come across as such) - not some flesh and blood marketing exercise like so many sports are these days. I actually hope rallying stays the way it is because if it goes too mainstream and bland, the way F1 went a few years ago, it'd be a bit sad. Burns, and the current crop of drivers, are much of what makes it the superb sport it is and it would be sad to see it move too far "upmarket" into something that becomes completely ruled by television and sponsorships. As Jules commented, absolutely nothing in the media about Burns - I think I heard one little report on the end of a radio news programme, nothing at all on telly. As a world champion he should have been mentioned in the same breath as the Ashes victory or the rugby world cup, IMHO

One shouldn't speak ill of the dead (unless they are Argies) but... I have never understood the fuss about Best The guy hasn't been a good footballer for 30 #kin years!! How long can you dine out on history for? As far as I can tell he's been a professional slob since he stopped footballing in about 1970-something, though as I am about as interested in football as I am in flower arranging, I suppose I might have missed the point. But even if I had missed the point, he would still be a git.

There speaketh a Range Rover owner

Export spec ones didn't - I know of one 1995 and one 1997 300Tdi auto Discovery here and both of them are mechanical only pumps - no EDC (electronic diesel control). Not sure which countries had this setup and which would have had EDC engines but they do exist, they just might be rather rare in that part of the world - possibly all European cars had EDC, don't know. I had a vague notion that the early 1994/95 ones in the UK were mechanical injection? - but I might well be wrong on that.

I think the Jap stuff is more reliable - you can get good ones and bad ones, like anything, but comparing 10 yr old Toyota with 10 yr old Discovery.... They probably go wrong 1/3 as often and the bits probably cost 3x as much ... so as a long term ownership prospect there probably isn't too much in it.

I have 2, a 3 legged filter remover I just bought (haven't tried it on an oil filter yet but it gets a #kin tight grip on anything else when I was "testing") and a strap wrench which is a web strap about 1" across and a bar thing that goes onto a ratchet (3/8" one end 1/2" the other) as you turn the ratchet it tightens its grip and then continuing to turn rotates the filter - good but only works if the filter isn't oily or greasy. Both mine are draper items I think I also have something called a "boa constrictor" which I guess is what Yanks would call a 'gator grip' - good for holding shockers while you do the nut up, loosing the top of my beer barrels and all sorts of other things so I would think filters would be OK Boa constrictor

Never done wheelarch eyebrows but a jigsaw usually works well on that sort of plastic

I can imagine the consequences might include: Barbecued meat/cook/garden/house/neighbourhood? + being prosecuted for "conspiracy to cause an explosion"

Jim How big a head do you make? just wondering what the success rate was in something like this and how big you found it needed to be? (Future requirements at this end in mind!!!)

I don't really know - except that it was an aerosol can of some sort and put out a good long spray - he stood back about 4/5 feet from the tyre when it went on. Wasn't really much flame as I remember, just a bang and the tyre popped on! I guess if you put too much in you might end up with 400psi in the tyre which could be interesting