Bet Defender - Need some opinions

[Tiger]

Submitted too fast - Doh! Title should be "upgrade or swap"

Hello all, again (not logged in for ages)

Right time has come and my Defender needs some love. Rad leaks, heater not working, rear X member has a few small holes.

Now I could sell it and buy a newer 110 CSW LR man has an ex police TD5 that would cost me about 9-10k to swap ( I need rear seats now )

Or I could take my current 110 ( which is a great car all round really, last of the 300tdi's, Hardtop with rear windows, low miles and I'm 2nd owner )

Now I'm half thinking I could spend less and upgrade my current car and end up with something longer lasting?

New galv chassis

Galv bulkhead

Exmoor rear seats

New Suspension

What do we think?

[Maverik]

Police cars spend a LOOOOOOOT of time on the road, all year, I would want to have a very good look at it as its probably been exposed to a lot of salt and road crude, sometimes its best haveing a truck thats been offroaded then at least its "usually" been pressure washed semi regularly!

The things you've listed are not so difficult jobs if you've got some tools, the space and above all the interest and motivation to do the work yourself?! You have to be aware that if you go down the new chassis route you might find other things you want to replace, but if you;re very stricht and just replace the nuts and bolts and critical items you can stop yourself from going down the all out project strip down and re-build route, which defo does become expensive and time consuming.

Tricky question, me thinks you have to ask yourself, if you want to spend the time doing a re-build when you can be driving another truck around and having fun.... I ALWAYS fall into the re-build trap... it sucks, hopefully going to avoid it this time with me potential next purchase...

Mav

[Tiger]

Haven't got time, (or space) would have to pay for chassis swap

[Eightpot]

Better the devil you know.

And ex-police is no guarantee of quality or high standard. I used to drive police cars for a living and they all get the hell thrashed out of them. I doubt maintenance standards are a patch on what they used to be either.

Why not just get your rust patches attended to and spoodle it up a bit, should last a good while yet before anything drastic needs doing.

[simonr]

Alternatively, fix the problems with this one - which will make it worth more and then you have time to find a decent replacement. I've bought some real lemons when I've needed a truck quickly. I should have hired a car and spent more time looking!

Si

[Guest]

If you are needing rear seats I take it you need it for children? If the answer to that is yes then the rear inward facing seats are no good to you anyway as you need to go for the forward facing ones for small children, also consider your insurance as 9 seats costs a fortune in insurance, I downgraded mine to 5 seats which reduced my business insurance by £400!!

Also if you are using a 300tdi how does it sit with the LEZ charging? I see that you are in West London so this may have a big impact at £100 a go!! You may be better to go for a TD5 which in a CSW configuration is LEZ compliant, this time of year defenders are a better price and you may be able to get something better for your money, ex police is not always best as they often have a hard life, same as ex utility wagons they may have had good servicing but be rotten etc!!

Jason.

[Tiger]

Yep, need seats for kiddy winkles, was looking at the Exmoor lock n fold rear seats.

I've seen another CSW TD5 for just under 10k, decent miles, 2002.

Does anybody have a clue what mine might be worth?

98R 300tdi HT 88k 2 owners. Great Landy apart from the above.?.

[UdderlyOffroad]

Looks like I’m going to be in the minority here:

If you don’t have the time or space to do this yourself, and you have the cash for the trade-in, do it! Garage labour is expensive, and by the time you’ve paid for a chassis swap (which even at a specialist ain’t cheap) and the Exmoor seats are serious £££, you won’t be much better off. Also, once you’ve done all this, you still won’t have a truck with rear passenger doors, which will make using the rear seats a pain (assuming you’re talking about Exmoor forward facing fold-down jobs rather than inwards facing). Hence my suggestion of getting a ‘proper’ CSW.

Yes there is a lot to be said for ‘better the devil you know’ – but the thing is, you already know the 110 relatively well, so you’ll know what to look for. As for ex-police vehicles being thrashed…hmmm yes but they are very well maintained, and presumably if it’s a landie, then it will have been on a slightly more rural, quiet beat, than say a Ford Focus thrashed round the estates of Bristol in hot pursuit of pikeys on nicked mopeds.

I’ve just re-read your post and you’re also talking about a galv bulkhead…which is a complete strip-down and rebuild. Which is what I’m doing. But I’ve managed to source all the bits needed from a CSW (doors, tub, C pillars, etc) in order to turn my HT into a USW. I shudder to think how much it would cost to do that if I had to pay someone else to do it. There’s a link to my (stalled) build thread in my signature below.

[Eightpot]

ref the LEZ thing - not sure if this applies to you or not, but CSW's should be exempt. I believe the trigger for exemption is having vehicle type 'station wagon' on the V5,(which all CSW's should be registered as) rather than '4x4 utility' which many LR's are classed under.

[Tiger]

I had a good look at your thread and I'd love to do it all myself. I wish I could take mine and a dead CSW and could build a Defender better than new, all stainless bolts, copper grease everything. Isolate the ali from the steel. Glav chassis, bulkhead, cappings.

But...

With 2 small kids and full time job I just don't have the time.

I think I might just go buy this

http://vlcv.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=338

Or

http://www.landroverman.com/ (ex police 110 page2)

Or this

http://www.exmod.co.uk/stationwagons.html (ex MOD bottom of page)

All TD5s, I like my 300tdi but accept TD5s are maybe justbas good

[Maverik]

If you've not got the time or inclenation to do it yourself then I would say definatly sell it and get another, garage time is expensive especially when it comes to welding and such like, hence why I bought a welder!

I've driven a few Td5's not a I quite like them, its a very bjective thing with regard to who like what and for what reasons, any problems with Td5's have now been extensivly documented and are quite fixable in most cases.

Something to always remeber when buying a Landy is newer doesn;t always mean better, they are so dependant on how its been looked after in the past (as you probably know!)

Both those trucks look ok - I like the roll cage option, handy! - but its not got any rear seats...?

Defo get rid if you can't do the work yourself.

Mav

[Tiger]

Right, I've been um'ing and arrgh'ing and I had a good crawl underneath and it's in good nick really and the bulkhead is fine. I think I was just on a bit of a downer about it.

So I'm keeping it and I've set a budget of £2000 to spend on it, and if ends up looking nice I'll splash out on the Exmoor lock n fold seats.

[bishbosh]

What ever you do, be extremely cautious with any purchase from Landrover Man. I have some friends who are coppers and they have more than a passing interest in him shall we say...