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Paime's 90 TD5 Chassis Swap


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3 hours ago, Retroanaconda said:

 

If everything else is lined up okay and it’s only the larger gap at the bulkhead feet then I would just pack that out with washers and be done with it. 

This is the advice I was secretly hoping for!

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18 hours ago, paime said:

I've got the correct spacers for those bits so hopefully it should bolts together OK tomorrow. What I still don't understand is how I would elongate or shorten the door gap and keep it parallel. The bulkhead is attached to the rear tub via the sills and the floor pans so I can't see how I would alter it. I can alter the pitch of the bulkhead to make it more or less parallel to the B post but that's all?

It was definitely on the outside previously but probably wouldn't make much difference anyway.

 

Don't fit the sills till last, and the floor panels very last! As others say, attach the bulkhead feet bolts first, but keep the brackets to the front chassis rails slack. Sort out the door gap to the tub - parallel and also hinge side. Then tighten front chassis rail brackets, holes can be slotted further if needed, then fit sills with spacers on front rear end as/if needed (and fit floor panels).

Edited by simonb
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On 2/3/2021 at 10:42 PM, paime said:

Do you know how much of a gap you had between bulkhead and outrigger? I've had the chassis bulkhead brackets unbolted for all of the adjustment so far and if anything they could probably do with pushing the bulkhead back even further. Its as if I need to stretch everything out a bit but I can't see how that could happen.

3 Washers which equates to about 6-7mm 

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I think I might have been chasing a ghost with the alignment issues. First pic is the old chassis and second is the new one. The new chassis doesn't have the protrusion which measures about 10mm and it just so happens that the gap I'm trying to bridge is a shade over that. I think I'm going to try and use some stout tubing and washers rather than packing it full of just washers. I've lost about a fortnight trying to sort this and feeling a bit daft!

 

20210205_203542.jpg

20210205_203605.jpg

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Progress, progress and more progress! Managed to get the engine started today which feels like quite a large step forward given how much has happened to get to this stage. There's an intermittent start fault where the starter motor just rapidly clicks rather than turns but I think it might be a loose connection on the solenoid.

I noticed today that my rear axle isn't centred by about an inch to the drivers side. I've measured the body and all looks fine there and measured the distance from chassis rail to outside tyre wall and that's definitely where the discrepancy lies. Can you adjust the A frame to resolve this sort of thing? It was put on last after the weight of the body was on so I suspect its not quite true.

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17 minutes ago, paime said:

Progress, progress and more progress! Managed to get the engine started today which feels like quite a large step forward given how much has happened to get to this stage. There's an intermittent start fault where the starter motor just rapidly clicks rather than turns but I think it might be a loose connection on the solenoid.

I noticed today that my rear axle isn't centred by about an inch to the drivers side. I've measured the body and all looks fine there and measured the distance from chassis rail to outside tyre wall and that's definitely where the discrepancy lies. Can you adjust the A frame to resolve this sort of thing? It was put on last after the weight of the body was on so I suspect its not quite true.

You must have stolen my progress! :banned: :P . Glad someone has made progress today!

As Stephen says, the Aframe isn't adjustable. Is your chassis the one with the build in brackets or the bolt on ones?

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12 hours ago, landroversforever said:

You must have stolen my progress! :banned: :P . Glad someone has made progress today!

As Stephen says, the Aframe isn't adjustable. Is your chassis the one with the build in brackets or the bolt on ones?

Mine has the adjustable rear tub mount. It needed some fettling to get it centred to begin with but i've measured and re-measured and it's definitely centered. The issue seems to be with the axle being centered on the chassis from what i can tell and it also looks like my springs aren't perfectly vertical between the axle seat and the chassis top mount. I also have an unexplained 10mm difference between how far forward my front wings protrude which has me totally baffled as the bulkhead is plumb.

2 hours ago, Mo Murphy said:

I would wait to investigate the rear axle. See how it is after you've had your first drive, if it's still off centre then investigate.

Mo

I'm hoping this will settle everything down. It's difficult to get everything to line up without the weight of the body on the chassis but then it's difficult to do anything once the weight of the body is on the chassis! Catch 22!

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1 hour ago, landroversforever said:

I was meaning the A-frame chassis mounts. But bringing up the rear crossmember mount... Is it square to the chassis? and is the crossmember perpendicular to the chassis rails? 

Ah sorry, with you now. My chassis is the one with the bolt-on crows feet. I did notice when i was under there the other day that there was a couple mm more of the bushes showing on the LHS bracket than the right so maybe it will even itself out after i've driven about a bit.

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55 minutes ago, landroversforever said:

What bushes have you got in the chassis end of the Aframe? Are they OEM type metalastic ones? If so, are the pressed fully home in the arms? 

The amount of force i had to use to get the old metalastic ones out was insane so i've gone for poly bushes instead. They're all fully pressed home and i can't see any lateral movement even when i've got the crowbar on there to wiggle it around. The a-frame ball joint is done up tight but not torqued up yet so maybe that's causing the slight offset as well.

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1 minute ago, landroversforever said:

And they all sat nicely in the ends? I had some bearmach bushes which I lubed up and pressed in and they didn't sit very well at all so they'll be removed in the final assembly.

All that money on expensive shinies and bespoke parts and then you buy bearmach bushes ! 🥴

Mo

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Sounds like I'll be jump starting her again tomorrow then! I can't drive it around to properly charge the battery so I'll have to hook the trickle charger up to it for a while.

Tonight I managed to get the front end assembled with the grill back on and slam panel etc. Also got the bottom bolt on the front damper after what seemed like an eternity. Whoever invented the bottom bolt system on defender dampers needs to have a word with themselves. 

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Does anyone know if these bushes are expensive for a reason?

https://www.paddockspares.com/ftc1384-sensor-bush.html

The old copper bushes were seized into the bushes in the link and things went a bit downhill. I've got some steel pipe that luckily has the same OD/ID as the FTC1384 bush so I can bodge something but does it need to be a certain type of metal or anything like that?

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Those copper ones come with the ABS but there's another collar which fits into the axle flange on an interference fit. It just looks like a steel tube to me but I don't understand ABS so don't know if it makes much of a difference!

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Things have slowed to a crawl recently, mostly due to the excruciatingly difficult time I'm having trying to get my doors to fit properly. I'm having a bit of a strange issue. On a TD5 there is a fixed chassis/body bolt which is non adjustable and sits at the front of the seat box. Currently the body sits too far forward by about 10mm according to that bolt. The body, however, is lined up perfectly along the top of the rear cross member at point A and the seatbelt brackets on the tubular cross member at point B are fine as well. Meanwhile, at the front end, the wing mounts at point C are all the way forward. My door gap at point D is larger than E which is what's preventing the door closing properly. I need to make B-D wider then increase the width at E as well but I can't because A is perfectly lined up and I can't move the wings of bulkhead forward. Also, the footwell to chassis bracket is also too far forward. Ideally I'd move everything back but I can't because then the body will overhang the rear cross member. Help!

20210220_211816.png

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