New owner. What's all these knobs and switches?

[Speeedy6]

I'm a first time Land rover owner. It's a Series IIa 1967 2 door 109'' diesel.First, I found the glow plug button but, how long do I hold it in? It's on the rt bottom of the instrument panel with another button on the lower left side, what's that one for? And , is it positive ground?I think it originally had two 6v batteries and has one 12v now is that ok ? Will someone explain the shift pattern please? And the lights inside the gauges and anything else I've left out. It seems like a great vehicle ,is it?

Thank you for your help, Mark

[David Sparkes]

"It seems like a great vehicle ,is it?"

The answer to that depends very much on the writers preference, and also what you want out of the vehicle. In a single post there isn't enough information to base a judgement on, unless the writer really REALLY like's 109" Diesel engined Series 2's.

From other comment's I've read, 109"'s are not as common as 88" versions, and original diesels are probably an even smaller subset, so you will be encouraged to keep it to it's original spec, as well as roadworthy.

The standard dashboard layout is in the owners manual, and I suggest you take advantage of the offer in this 60th anniversary year from BMIHT at Gaydon. Their Land Rover Technical Publication CDs are reduced from £17.50 to £10.00 (+ £2.50 handling) and they will get you Workshop, Parts, and Owners handbooks. You want LHP21. Not the easiest CDs to use, but cheap, and you can look for paper versions at your leisure. Oh, They may be out of stock at the moment, but place an order anyway, even if you have to phone them up, so they know there is demand. These CD's are heavily copy protected, so people can't just run off a copy for you.

Some pointers:

The International forum is generally the busiest on here, so any post quickly falls off the bottom of the page, unless it generates a flow of responses. I lot of viewers are not Series people, so can't answer your queries.

If you post into the less busy Series forum the advantage is that your post stays on the first page for longer, and more readers are likely to be interested & knowledgeable about the Series 2 detail.

Secondly, the Series 2 Club will be more focused on this model, they deal with dashboard layout queries on a regular basis, so you might find it more rewarding to post on their web forum. Reading and I think Searching are 'free', but obviously you will have to Register on the Forum before you can post. However, joining the Club is NOT mandatory, although the club membership is not excessive, when taken as part of the yearly costs of running your car.

Thirdly, wherever you post, queries about dashboard layouts are much easier to understand, and resolve if there is a picture. An advantage of both this Forum, and the Series 2 club forum, is that you can post pictures directly into your query, you don't have to host them elsewhere. Both have limits on file size, but that's universal. You probably have a software program that will reduce jpg quality to a 'web' setting.

Fourthly, wherever you post, please put your location in your profile. No-one is going to call round un-announced, but at least they can offer to give direct advice, or suggest you visit them, or suggest a local 'good place to go', depending on your query.

Good Luck.

[andyb]

To follow up David excellent post....

...the Series 2 club forum is to be found here http://www.s2cforum.com/forum/index.php