Orange

I have used the powder with good results. Haven't personally tried the beads, but I know others have (and also used BB rounds) with good results too...

If the vehicle has a history of being used in mud/muddy puddles, I would also take the opportunity to leave both rad and intercooler submerged in water for a few days to clean between the fins. Leave to soak for a day or so, then a quick blast with the pressure washer (or hose with your finger over the end), then leave to soak.....repeat a few times and it'll soon have the fins clear!

Also remember that Google Earth and such now exist, so there is more than likely an aerial picture of your property... Councils have been known to look at this if you are applying for retrospective planning permission in order to work out how long the structure has been there!!!

Yes please, Disty. Will drop you a PM. Cheers Adrian

I recently had my rad re-cored. It was about £30 cheaper than a new unit from Bearmach and meant I could specify how I wanted the core rebuilt. I asked for slightly deeper with wider fin spacing to make it easier to clean, yet still provide the necessary cooling capacity/surface area. I got what I asked for all fitted into the original frame with the existing tanks. Apart from having to clean the threads for the oil pipes, it was spot on. I have also bought Bearmach rads before and have had no issues with them. The company I used to do the recore are called Radicool

I think I might have had something to do with that original thread... I have a 6-way one of these - Click Me!!! They do a 12-way one, too. I got mine from - Click me too!!! It wasn't cheap (definitely sub-£30) but was the best I could find at the time. I expect there are other places to get them now (Devon 4x4 do a similar product, but just for the positive side), but the important thing for me was that there were both positive and negative feeds to the fuse box. This means only one (fairly substantial in your case) feed for each back to the battery, rather than multiple wires or multiple earth points around the vehicle.

If your budget could stretch a bit, I would highly recommend Makita tools... Been very impressed with mine and Mark has a wide selection of them, too... They seem to be taking over from Dewalt on the quality side of things. We definitely used to see more DeWalt tools back for refurbs than Makitas (in the drylining side of my old company). The tools were getting heavy use from met-sec erectors on a daily basis.

Excellent little write-up Grim. It's nice to see it from the beginners eyes again as we were in pretty much the same boat last year. We turned up with what we thought would be a fairly competitive truck only to find that even with 2 lockers, 2 winches and 35" Simex, we were well out of the points!! All we did was treat it as a steep learning curve and amended/modified the truck to suit and, most importantly, had a bl@@dy good time doing it!! We were still laughing at some of the 'episodes' we had on our way to West Harptree!! Last year's main aim was to get progressively higher points at each round through the year. That happened with the exception of round 4 where we blew a CV and didn't want to risk the spare what with having to drive the truck home again at the end of the day. Our secondary aim was to ensure reliability... We attended all 6 events and only retired early from Round 4, so I think we got there... I'm sure Paul and Lucy will be glad to read your little report and relish in the fact that the series is doing what it was designed to do. I am also fairly sure that the AWDC team would be interested in it for the next edition of the club magazine... See you at round 2........with some bigger tyres........maybe!!! :D:P Adrian Team 4

You don't need to spend hundreds on a CB set-up. Previously I've used a Team MC8 and that was a nice small unit that did everything I ever needed to... I currently use a Midland as it was fitted to the truck already. Have a look at http://www.thunderpole.co.uk and you'll see a few options for starter packs that come with everything you need... As for the dash, I have no direct experience of either, but from having a poke around them at the Indoor 4x4 show, the Raptor one feels like it's a bit more solid. I'm not sure what the options are like on the Raptor one, but I would suggest buying one with most of the cut-outs you need, then adding more as time goes on... I would also recommend that you don't fit relays behind the dash. Better in the battery box, or under the bonnet. This way, they are easy to get to when they fail and you don't have lots of power feeds running up to the dash. It's easy to get a small feed up there to supply all of the switches, but better to have the larger power side of things out of the way.

As it's 'only LR parts' you could connect the water supply from a large water butt/IBC/other rainwater collection device. This removes the need to connect water from the house into the garage... And, if you are on a water meter, reduces the cost of running it!!

Never for a second assume that a company selling something means it's legal to use/fit...

Oooh, yes please Si. Will arrange to come over one day next week, I expect... Just to find out what's in them would be a good starting point. We can work on it from there... And for my next dumb@ss question...... Will they have to be emptied before adding the argoshield?? I obviously don't want to create a mixture of gasses which could cause problems!!

I would strongly recommend looking on e-bay or around your local commercial vehicle breakers/scrapyard to see if you can find a small tank off of a lorry (Ford Cargos used to have 2 small tanks rather than 1 big one) or from a bus. Or, as I said, convert an old fire extinguisher and build it in to your set-up.

My 90 currently runs the Scrapiron Extreme Suspension Kit, which is a blatant copy of the Equipe 4x4 system. I'm not proud, but it was on there when I bought it and it really does impress with its flexibility. Equipe really did their homework!! Anyway, the only thing that currently lets the set-up down a bit is the softness of the adjustable shock absorbers. I'd really like to add a couple more PSI in order to firm it up a bit for the occasional fast sections and special stages that we do. My only issue is that I'm unsure what they would have inside them... I'm guessing I can't just attach the compressor and give them a top-up!! Has anyone had experience with these shocks and, more to the point, setting them up/playing with the bump/rebound rates?? I'm not entirely sure my terminology is right, but I hope you get my drift... TIA Adrian

Hmmm... Not sure, But... There is a big space in front of that crossmember (from memory) that you could mount a proper air tank, or adapted fire extinguisher into and use that instead. Probably easier than trying to make do with the existing chassis... You may also want to investigate the T-Max twin cylinder compressors. They are a very neat solution and can be strripped of all of the unnecessary plastic and hard-wired/mounted beneath the drivers seat... As shown HERE This set-up is regularly used to air up 35" Simex so we know it works. Given a reservoir, it would be even better. HTH Adrian

Another great event from the Challenger team. Many thanks to all of the organisers and marshalls. After a frustrating morning where we wrecked the ground anchor and suffered with a knackered split-charge relay, the afternoon went much smoother and saw us rattle through twice as many punches as we managed in the morning. Special Stage was excellent... More of those, please!! A very difficult site to master and, I guess, even more difficult to set out to keep all levels of entrants happy, but judging by the smiling faces at the end of the day, the team managed to do that. Good to see some new trucks and faces around and nice to see some old familiars. Looking forward to some more pics and Round 2 up at Coney Green Farm. Cheers Adrian

A supplier that never supplies Britpart............ Bearmach. The only decision I ever have to make is whether I want genuine or not. Even the staff at Bearmach refer to Britpart as S##tpart!! Ring them up, ask for what you want and it'll be in the post ASAP. I deal with the Maidstone branch as I can just pop in there, but I have no hesitation in recommending them. As for Britpart being OEM.................Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!! There wouldn't be 75% (or whatever the figure is) of Landrovers ever produced still on the road if they were!!

Ta! I guess it's just us that's ready then............ Or maybe it's just me that's sitting around at home with no job??!!

2 things left to do - put the front rope on and get to West Harptree........ He says........famously.......with everything crossed!! I even had time to give the interior a quick dust out from all of the grinding debris!! Lucy/Paul - will you have a stock of Winch sails with you at the weekend as usual?? Having added another winch, it seems sensible to have another one...

If you are competing, all of the stickers that you need should be provided when you sign on at event control. You will need them on your truck before scrutineering. Scrutineering starts at 8 (I believe) and the actual event will start at 10 and finish at 4.

Sounds exactly like the noise mine has made for the last few years. It hasn't got any better or worse. It was still there even after I had the clutch and flywheel changed by LR themselves... When I asked the dealer about it (at the time of the clutch/flywheel change) they said that it's fairly common. They didn't report any problems with the first motion shaft, or the old release bearing... Just keep an ear on it and see if it gets any worse. Mine was worse during the couple of really cold snaps we had and has now gone back to doing it for the first few minutes, then it disappears completely.

You may already be planning to do so, but if you are starting from scratch, I would recommend making the cage MSA spec (or better) from the outset. Far easier than having to modify the cage later on.

We're in!! Team 4 Adrian Catchpole and Mark Catchpole

We had exactly the same query when we fitted a soft top to a friends 90 last summer... The heel clamps and the springy bits all fit together (with a roll pin) and hold the front windscreen bar in place. This means that the windscreen bar is springloaded to allow the top to be removed completely. There should be 4 of them if memory serves me right and you will have to drill some new holes for them... We worked it out from a drawing that Exmoor Trim supplied. They might be able to supply the drawing/exploded diagram if you give them a ring...

Not necessarily advice, but this thread shows how we did it on mine... Tech Archive link