[What gearboxes will bolt straight onto the 300TDi?]

I think the best use for it would be to stick it in a SWB series something where you could have a blast with it and it would be able to handle the sand.

It could be a kind of retro thing and a pleasure for many to see rolling around the streets there amongst the bling.

The LT 85 and LT95 and any automatic fitted to a V8 would be a pain as a whole gearbox would be as easy to find as a bellhousing.

Basically, anything that had 4 cylinders of any vintage will fit.

Now hopefully, without sounding rude and even though I'm a completely new guy here, BUT!!!!

Why on earth would you even contemplate taking a V8 out of a Defender to replace it with a 300Tdi when you live in the UAE?

Especially if you're even contemplating driving in sand.

V8's have more torque, more power are quieter and vibrate less. The only reason they are transplanted most places is because of fuel consumption and no other reason at all. They can be made waterproof, in fact are far safer in the water than a TDI, a teaspoon of the stuff will bend a rod in a Tdi. They can be made to run in any direction with efi or gas and are less susceptible to bad fuel.

The only thing the Tdi has on the V8 would be longevity and more maintenance free as long as the cooling system is looked after.

No replacement for displacement!!

Yes you can tune a tdi but you can tune a V8 too and tuned Tdi's don't last long in desert heat.

[Stage one saga.]

I love your chassis work! That rear section, with so much gap between chassis and axle, is just what I want for my Discovery lowrider project.

That is exactly the dimensions of a series 2 or three SWB chassis. Stick 8+2's on your old Santana and you'll have exactly the same thing.

I've really enjoyed reading some of your mental posts on here, half the reason I joined actually. You had a mad 6x6 thread somewhere putting wheels in the middle of a Discovery, I can't find it now but I've loads of 6x6 info. I was really surprised to see the Engesa 25 come up.I've got photos somewhere of inside the walking beam.

[Adrian and Pauls new truck]

Fantastic build thread. I have a pair of PTO winches I did consider putting motors on. They are 63:1 I think, one Fairey and one Superwinch.

Very similar construction to yours. I have the preload on the clutch set at 90 Nm and used one for many years in all gears in all conditions and never had a problem. I think your 20hp is quite conservative.

I also have some portal axles laying about and the engine already sits back to accept a pump. Hmmmm.....

Have you any more details on your pump drive setup?

What would your 'ideal' setup be that you mention earlier?

[Tirfor Winch or Bumper Winch for Self Recovery]

I think Tirfors are wonderful things. Between a tirfor and a highlift you've covered most bases. You really need to spend some time using them though to become really familiar with them.

I've got both the TU 16 and TU 32 and would strongly suggest getting the 3.2 ton one, the little 800Kg one would be no use. They are bulky but are easily stored and the extra space a bigger one would make over a little one would be inconsequential with a 100 and Sankey. The best way to keep the cable is inside a fat rear motorcycle tyre. You can put this on your shoulder and carry it for miles unlike the spiky jaggy thing designed to wreck your interior and draw blood at every opportunity the give you with the winch new. Make sure you have a long extension as the tirfor ropes are heavy and seldom more than 25m which is too short. The new synthetic winch rope might not be good but get 11 or 13mm, not 8mm equivalent. You'd be surprised at the pull you can generate with one of these things.

You should be doing recovery with other people but if not you can attach a snatch strap to the vehicle (shock horror etc...) and get some pull on it depending on how much you tighten it then you can drive a bit and make the pull easier. I'd only consider a 3.2 with a 110. The bigger they are the easier they are to work.

They are also handy things for dragging things in tight spaces, shifting trees, pulling logs over rivers, making bridges and righting rolled over vehicles. Set up is a bit of a faff and they are very physical but they always work and they are the most versatile form of recovery there is

A buried spare wheel with wheel brace across the middle makes for a good but time consuming anchor.

Hope this is of some help.

[Stage one saga.]

Do you have any more specs on the Santana axles?

I took loads of photos rebuilding the front one, I should make another thread called 'santana axles' or some such or add it to this one?

Trm portals could be a nice hybrid axle with Toyota 8" centers

I'd keep the TRM 7.5" centres as they're so much stronger than a Toyota 8" and already have diff locks. It's the axle tubes that are the problem, they are 1/2" thick and weigh nearly half a ton complete with centre and portal boxes. Altogether I have 2 front axles and 3 back axles but two of them are busy converting a six cylinder phaser engined Renault midliner to four wheel drive.

If I used the front portal boxes they would make fantastic independent units.

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/general-4x4-discussion/924706-portal-axle-rockwell.html

is an old thread about these axles. I'm at about the same place now as i was back when I posted it. I've been back for a few months but couldn't do anything because I had a properly prolapsed disc that was stopping me from walking properly or doing anything.

What are your plans for the rear?

I don't know, I want at least the capping, waist line and something to keep it looking like a Land rover. I don't like the look of tray backs but the upward wheel travel means the wheel boxes are level with the waist line. I had some made from old road signs when it was on the road. The problem is it's just a toy with no purpose. If it had to carry something it would have a tub, if it had to lift something it would have a crane and if it had to pull something it would have a huge winch and that's kinda the problem with where to go. The roll cage stays would dictate the shape a litle but I'm not sure I want to keep using this chassis.

Can I ask what would you guys do with it?

[Stage one saga.]

I'm not sure if this post should go in this section or the members vehicles?

It's my first post so be gentle!!

That said, I see a few names I recognise from elsewhere so I don't feel like too much of a stranger.

I have many off road projects but this one's kinda relevant to this forum. I got an old Landrover in 1990, a 1983 stage one. I'd done two fairly comprehensive 88" rebuilds by then and figured It was time for a long wheelbase experience.
I got it home (on a trailer pulled by a 2 1/4 petrol 88"!!), took the tub off it and was dismayed at the rust on it for a seven year old motor. It had been used as a caravan park tug and I reckon it must have had salt in the back judging by the holes in it. Oh, well, took the restrictors out it, took the doors off and saw how fast it went with no body on it. I was impressed!! I was also young and stupid. I decided I hated long wheelbase land rovers and dumped it in the woods to rust as much as it liked.

I dragged it back out the woods a few years later and made a rear chassis for it using a standard 88" rear prop to give a 90.6" wheelbase between the LT95 and the Salisbury diff. It put the rear wheel in the middle of the wheelarch on an 88" tub where it should be and scratched an itch for me ever since I'd had land rovers. I ran it like this for 15 years or so.

It grew an overdrive and Firestone SAT's (remember them..?) then it got a 3.9 after the lumps wore off the camshaft on the 3.5. I used the front cover and carbs off the 3.5 and was surprised again at how well it went. I discovered 900 x 16 Petlas one winter and never looked back. It could sit at 80mph on the motorway with the overdrive in as I found out going to the vets one day.

The overdrive got sacked in favour of a Fairey PTO winch with the lever shifted to the front and a new fabricated front section of chassis. The new back and front met in the middle by cutting the bottom off the old chassis and stuffing lots of box section in there. I kept bending 'normal' Land Rover chassis doing jumps and pulling them with dumpers and diggers so I really wanted to make one that would last. It's incredible that a standard chassis is only 2.1mm thick / 14swg. I've since worked on the heavy duty Wolf chassis which are still the same but reinforced.

It grew a set of 3" angle iron 'rock sliders' and some heavy duty outriggers at some time before we knew to call them that. I'd sussed out that a high lift jack was my best friend and in the years since never went shopping without it rattling around in the back held on by two spare wheel clamps on the rear tub bulkhead,

It grew Santana PS 10 axles (which don't just bolt on contrary to popular opinion) with the disc brakes and wider track the last time it went into the shed and also got treated to a GMC 6.2 litre V8 diesel engine on an LT95 from a 101. It's still the strongest gearbox Land Rover ever made and regardless about the measly torque those V8's make on paper it pulls like a train and got me up a hill climb I'd been trying for years with the petrol V8's.

I actually got the engine and 'box to put in my Volvo C304 6x6 but thought the Land Rover was a better test bed before I cut up my nice Volvo for it.

Another useful modification I made at the start was to put the petrol tank across the chassis above the rear prop where with a bit of body chopping it sits perfectly and can be made to fit the standard filler point and I could still have my batteries and storage under the seats and not worry about grounding the tank out every time I went shopping.

The old bulkhead was pretty shot by this time so I made one by mistake after getting carried away with my new plasma cutter on the old one and some handy sheets of chequer plate I was going to make a pickup bed for the Volvo with.

The first time I put the engine in I used the original engine and gearbox mounts which was handy but I felt the engine would be better further back and lower down to get a little bit of it's weight further back and lower. Between the engine being lower than standard and the wider track it's actually very stable off road. I also got a bit inspired by 'teamidris' amongst others to make space for a hydraulic drive off the end of the crank to power winches and other ridiculous ideas.

Moving it all back meant the poor chassis got the chop again to allow a by now wide angle heavy duty but standard length propshaft to fit. The wheelbase is now 8" longer at 98.6".

The poor old thing was starting to look a bit used as well as the years rolled on and during the last refit also gained some pipework as is the current trend amongst all Land Rover fashion victims like myself. Used to be when it fell over you just put a new roof on it, kicked the wings back into shape and got on with it but alas now after all the EU shenanigans and maybe Y2K or ISO 9001 now we have to put metal bars all over the place to fall over in this health and safety world we live in.

So metal bars it was but I'm quite wee, only 5'8" and as the suspension and tyres grew I didnt. Putting the engine lower meant I was starting to struggle to reach anything over the wings and being the younger side of geriatric knew my eyesight would soon be failing so figured getting in close would be the plan so I decided to have a flippy front.

I know a lot of the challenge lads like to have the front wheels right out front but that can bury you too and I reckon a flat bumper a bit narrower than the track lets you turn into obstacles as you like but in the serious stuff stops the wheels getting caught up in trees and fences and stuff. It also lets you push things easier and gives me something to put the hinges on and saves me cutting up a perfectly good bumper. The hinges are made from old Santana spring shackles cut at a funky angle, polybush type spring bushes and bits of scaffold tube. The bumper is 6mm high tensile box section from a log bolster on a truck and it slides into 10mm plates on the chassis and is a removable thing with the winch to let the PTO power anything else that might go in there instead.

The other end has shaped plugs which slot into the same thing on the front roll hoop and lock with a couple of bolts.

The bonnet has to be lifted off to flip the front.

The suspension is 8+2 Station wagon springs, both drivers side with 5 leaves removed and 11 leaf diesel drivers sides with 4 leafs removed. The shocks have different geometry as do the hangers to make it all work and one ton shackles. It steers and stops as good as a coiler and as you can see has way better articulation than a standard coiler with the added advantage that the steering is so much less vulnerable. I'm not saying it's better, just different and allows it to drag itself through tree stumps, logs and holes easier without the front wheels pointing different ways and run into things much harder with less damage than a coiler.

This is about where it's been for the last three years when I've been in Afghanistan plotting new ways to make noise and mess with it.

I think I want the engine and box back for the Volvo so do I put a Cummins 6BT in? LSx?

Do I get a galvanised chassis and make a nice road legal motor out of it?

It will never ever be competitive in any competition in the UK any more so do I just forget it and move onto building something completely different? The front and rear hoops are not joined as I'm not convinced I want to finish the cage yet if it morphs into something else.

Just to throw a spanner in the works I've got 3 spare TRM 2000 portal axles laying around, a Praga V3s winch coming soon, a pile of 16.00 x 20 tyres and the summer off.
I'm also recovering from spinal surgery I got last week so there's gonna be a bit of vapour building going on first.

Suggestins please!