simonwh

£2,000-£3,000 for the particulate filter. Of all the companies listed by TFL as 'approved' fitter NONE have ever fitted one to a Land Rover. Convert to V8, gas it then get congestion charge exemption too!

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This might help: Defender Tdi Intercooler Fitting Instructions.pdf

Whatever price you set it will be too high. If you say £300 then people will say it should cost no more than £200, if you say £200 they will argue it should only be £100. Then you get the jokers who reckon they can make it themselves for £20 in the garage. Unless you have identified a specific market I wouldn't bother. A set of deflators and a good compressor can be bought for less than £100. Not sure who needs on-the-move activation so desperately that they can't take 10 mins to do it manually.

No-one can really tell you what it costs to live on the road, we did a trip to Poland in the summer and spent just about £300 in total (fuel and groceries) for a 3,500km trip 4 bags of shopping at a rural Polish supermarket was just £8, the same here would probably be over £50

Hi The Azalai will fit into a HI-CUBE container. These are higher than normal and not available for all routes and all time-slots. But so far we've had no problems getting quotes for the destinations on our wishlist. As for headroom, with the roof up there is over 7ft headroom at the back. There is also room for me to sit at the table with the roof down (I'm 6'4") and you can also sleep 4 even with the roof down. I have to admit that at today's prices the Azalai would be out of our price bracket too. We were fortunate enough to order it over three years ago when the Euro was worthless and we also did a bit of paper shuffling to save donating a further 19% in VAT to the French Government. One advantage is that it will hold its resale value. So far only one has been sold 2nd-hand and it went for 80,000 Euros (same spec as mine) The long waiting list in France (14 months) and UK (9 months) will help maintain this.

Hi Neil. I sent you an email. It's my Azalai that'll be on the OEC stand (thanks to the others for saying you can crawl all over it!!!) But I'd also like to reiterate what mmgemini said, have a look at the vehicles that have already done what you're planning and talk to their owners. There are far too many companies who sell stuff that they have never actually used in the field. Before you buy anything ask the person selling it where was the last place they had to use it. As I said, too many people selling stuff from a catalogue with no idea why its any good. I'll be at the show and I'd be happy to talk you through the pros and cons of an Azalai conversion.

A few years ago I met the bloke who made that MG, the first show he took it to he was physically assaulted by an irrate MG enthusiast.

A guy off the Difflock Forum visited their premises after waiting a while for his tyre (he only wanted one!) and said the place was empty. This is their new 'premises' not their original base in Leek Last I heard they were touting the business around to try and get someone to buy it. I reckon it would be unwise to pay upfront for anything at the moment.

The problem if you're only visiting is transport, are you flying in or driving? Gigglepin is in the south but hardly 'close' to London. I'm on the outskirts of London and it takes me 30 minutes to drive to him, there is a train station nearby but you'll need to get a taxi too. Same for Autopost, they are possibly the most central but not really a place you'd just go to browse. I can't think of anyone worth a visit just for the sake of it. You COULD go to Scorpion if you're just looking, they have lots of shiny stuff. London isn't the most Land Rover friendly place to visit, do the tourist stuff instead.

Cheapest I can find is 95p litre at both Waitrose and LIDL, Sainsburys oil has gone up 20p/litre in the last month alone - about the same as diesel!

WARNING: anything with a 'Land Rover' label is immediately double the cost of similar products for other markets. I tend to look in the motorhome spares section of ebay. I bought 4 map pockets for £3 each and they are MUCH better made than the ebay reference above. and large enough to hold an A4 sheet (12 inches x 8 inches) Mobile Storage Systems ones are also very good quality and they also have a long thin one that fits on the front of the seatbox in a Defender. I also bought a set of 4 cup holders from a VW spares company for £4 each. The sold the EXACT same holder for £10 in the Land Rover section of Ebay just by listing is as a 'land rover cup holder' with a picture of it on the dash of a Defender.

I wanted to view a Defender 130 he had advertised in LRO last year. He was very unhelpful on the phone and was too busy to meet me 'for a few weeks' I bought a 130 from elsewhere.

I got these off Ebay after my genuine LR ones broke There's no way to get a wrench on without the 'key'

Thanks again for the comments and feedback. We are absorbing it all. Unfortunately the last minute technical glitches kind of monopolised our time and a few errors crept in while our backs were turned. We will be keeping both the standard PDF and the digital viewer versions. The digital one will allow us to add video an other fancy stuff later on but we know that people still like the plain PDF version too. Regarding the advertising it won't be so sparse in future issues, or at least I hope not otherwise we can't afford to keep doing it. But you won't ever find that over 50% of the book is ads like some of the print mags are currently running. Lots more new articles to come and it should be out on the first Monday of every month. Cheers Simon Diff Mag Editor

You have to lick your fingers first!

Cheers for such a swift response I'll definitely look into that. It wont be a flick-the-switch conversion but I could probably export the pages as XML format and re-save them for easier/faster PDA viewing. (another item for the to-do list!!) Simon

Many thanks for the kind words of encouragement. I must say we've been overwhelmed by the positive response. Makes it all worthwhile!! We were hampered with a few last minute technical issues that forced us to drop some pages but these have been sorted now. Future issues should be bigger and better! Can I just ask the guys who are reading it on a PDA for some feedback? whether it's easy enough to read or if we need to change anything? We're tinkering with file compression for the downloadable PDF to get the size down as much as possible but if you think its worth offering an additional version specifically for viewing on a PDA we may look into it. I might just go and 'borrow' my lad's PSP games console to see what it looks like on a small screen. Thanks again Simon (Diff Mag Editor)

We built a trailer out of a Rapier platform (the kind they towed behind 101s with missiles mounted on them) A perfect bit of kit and a great base to start the project with. Coil suspension and quick-release wheels too! http://www.difflock.com/project-trailer

I know what you mean. From my brief dealings with them so far it is certainly a case of 'Think of a number' which changes not by the day but by the minute. One company even wanted to charge me for a quote!

It will just about fit into a hi-cube container if I let the tyres down a bit but they are hard to come by in the single form (usually they are double sized and can hold 2 or 3 vehicles) so it could be costly. If not I'll ro-ro it. I can secure the rear body and make it fairly safe from prying eyes so it shouldn't be too much of a risk Apart from that the plan was to send it to Rio but I've been hearing good things about Buenos Aires lately. It sems to be a cheaper destination and has less reported theft/damage than Halifax in Canada. We're still a long way off - at least a year - so it could all change. Cheers Simon

I saw a similar 130 with a demountable body at Lanmania in France earlier this year. There was a gap of two feet! between the cab and the camper body and the whole thing overhung the back of the pickup by nearly 4 feet. I'd hate to take it around a road island at any speed. Geting the kayak attached to the roof of mine is our next problem to solve. I don't want to fit anything too substantial to the roof that will prevent it getting into a container. At the moment I'm favouring cargo rails on the roof which will stick up no more than the solar panel but could be a logistics nightmare lifting it up there, I struggle to get it onto the roof of my Disco sometimes. Cheers Simon

Thanks Mike, we do seem to spend a lot of time contradicting each other but sometimes I DO know what I'm talking about. 150% might cover you for your trips to Africa but other countries are different QUOTE: A guarantee, calculated as the highest potential duty payable. Each country has their own duties, ranging from 100% to 500% of the value of the vehicle. So for the countries on my list I'll be requiring a 400% guarantee. Cheers Simon

I know we probably set ourselves an unrealistic wishlist of features for our truck but we did eventually find the perfect solution. Although a Fiat motorhome would have been bigger and possibly cheaper (buying 2nd hand) I wouldn't want to rely on an Italian built vehicle while in the middle of nowhere. The only other vehicle I'd have been happy with was a Merc Sprinter but the basic 4x4 version of that is £30k plus vat before you even do the conversion. Another BIG consideration is import duty. To take your vehicle outside the EU you will need a CARNET (a passport for your vehicle). These have to be backed up with a bond or insurance policy worth FOUR TIMES the purchase price of the vehicle so if you buy a motorhome for £30k you will need to buy and insurance policy for £120k to back up your carnet. This will cost you thousands of pounds. This is not an insurance policy against theft or damage it insures the governments of the countries you visit against you selling the vehicle without paying the correct duty or import tax. By buying a 10 year old 130 Defender I've saved a lot of money. The Carnet is based on the original PURCHASE PRICE and not including modifications or equipment. In my case that is £10k (the camper body is classed as a modification!) so my carnet insurance bond will only have to be for £40k When you start to add up all the various bits and admin/paperwork we've actually got a very cost effective vehicle. Cheers Simon

As I said, I did talk to Foleys. If I had a 150 6x6 they would have been able to build a box 7ft x 6ft on the back. Fully fitted would have been around £50k and it would have weighed about a tonne heavier than the Azalai and been as ugly as hell. The Azalai gets me a better living space gives me more storage, is lighter and cheaper. I'm glad I didn't pursue the Foley 6x6 option. We've only had this one since May. So far we've had a few weekends in it and a two week trip through the Alps, one week was totally off-road and wild camping. Our plans are to ship it to Rio (Brazil) drive south via Uraguay and Argentina to Tierra Del Fuego cross the Andes then back up through Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador, across to Venezuela then Ship it to the USA (texas or florida) and drive across the states to Alaska then - depending on whether we've run out of money or not - drive it across Canada to get back home. I stress that this is the wishlist plan, things may change, work commitments may force us to break it up into 2 or 3 smaller chunks rather than one hit. heers Simon