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1992 Range Rover - the economy vehicle


N Dentressangle

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, not much to report for the past week because the Range Rover's been at the garage. I'm happy these days to farm out the jobs that need extensive crawling about on my back, and the car's been making a bloody awful howling noise ever since I got it. As soon as you got past about walking pace, seeming to come from the rear. In fact, it sounded as if something like this might be happening:

 

ZfbjWuu.jpg

 

but my mechanic reckoned wheel bearing or diff were more likely than backseat wolves.

 

Wheel bearing was duly checked, found to be knackered and changed, but the howling persisted. Spare RR diff was found and fitted, and the wolves are now happily sleeping.

 

Here's the old diff:

 

lvkrqup.jpg

 

Obviously you can't see from the pic, but the pinion for the planet gears had spun and worn the carrier to the extent there was a good 1-2mm play side to side in it. Result: scrap diff, especially as the teeth were starting to show wear too.

 

It now drives like an RR should, and you can hold a conversation in it at normal levels. God knows how the guy I bought it from put up with it - I think it's been howling away for a long time.

 

Next job now it's back in my garage is to clean out the back arches and underside, repair and Vactan where needed and put some more paint / underseal on the vulnerable bits, ie all of it.

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Had an hour or two yesterday afternoon to start on the rear arches.

 

All wire brushed, hacked at with a screwdriver and Vactanned on the rusty bits:

 

5ZvpxLu.jpg

 

4MBIgN2.jpg

 

bDUOjfE.jpg

 

With the Vactan dry, you can see a couple of holes in the metal of the body either side of the spring:

 

SnBAhZH.jpg

 

BCivTHw.jpg

 

The one above the shocker is worst - I suspect some more digging around would make a nice little crater. It's soooo tempting to fill them with underseal, but I suppose I'd better get the welder out!

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The o/s wheelarch is now sorted and ready for underseal and potions.

 

The chisel and grinder opened up a good sized hole in the inner arch. A small gap had been left between arch and boot floor by rubbish LR seam sealing. The water had got in and the inevitable happened. I'd normally try and neatly let in metal and butt weld it, but in this case a lap welded patch seemed more sensible:

 

KkedaMp.jpg

 

Once painted and given a coat of underpoo it'll never show, and will be so drenched in Waxoyl it'll stay drier than the Kalahari:

 

cTFdCYG.jpg

 

The n/s was already in my mind as probably a different story.

 

At first, all looked OK, and I thought the welder might stay in cupboard. No fucking chance. A combination of thick underseal - the flaking, dry stuff from the factory plus a more recently applied layer of gunge - was hiding a lovely bit of rot to sort out. I especially enjoyed the approach to rust around the seatbelt mount - fill it with underseal and bathroom sealant! What could possibly go wrong. Ah well. Here's where I am so far, with a bit more stripping down to go before I start making up some bits of steel:

 

GLFlIda.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

If I were a real 'think of the children' type, I'd have been back to the place which Mot'd the RR and asked them how they didn't spot the distinctly mobile seatbelt mounting on the n/s rear.

 

However, I'm of an age where I can remember when inertia reel seatbelts were a costly optional extra, and wearing one in the back of a car still feels a bit belt n braces. So I couldn't care less.

 

Once the bolt holding* the belt to the wheelarch was removed, the carpet was peeled back, a line drawn back to vaguely sound metal, and we set to with the grinder, equipped with a sexy sounding "plasma disc". So a very thin cutting disc, in reality:

 

q46aBm7.jpg

 

I managed to cajole a mate to help, who's better with a welder than me (not hard), and we ended up with quite a big hole:

 

GBx8G9x.jpg

 

The metal was weird. Kind of almost soft and buttery, and even when cut back to 100% sound metal not something you'd want to hang from the edge of a skyscraper from. God knows where LR got it from - maybe given the recent fall of the iron curtain in 1992 Solihull had taken some deliveries from the East. Anyway, we set to making a template, cutting new 1.5mm steel and ended up with quite a nice job:

 

FsbVF8j.jpg

 

I put a couple of pieces in to sort the rot a bit further down the arch, and gunged the whole lot up full of Vactan, paint, roofing sealant, underseal and then Waxoyl. Now even more watertight than the govt's plans for Brexit  :shock:

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  • 2 weeks later...

It's an especially fine rust trap, even by the elevated standards of BL. To bolt on that nice thick spreader plate to the wheelarch, then spot weld it is the work of genius. There's no way the Brummies would ever have actually sealed it all properly, so all it takes is a little water between the two pieces of metal and I'm guessing it'll have rusted the arch through within a year. All whilst nicely hidden under the carpet on one side and some enthusiastic underseal on the other. Mine has been too rotten to have held in an accident for years, but has passed MoT's without comment.

 

I guess the RR was designed pre-seatbelts in the rear, and the rust trap of wonder was a cheap fix when the legislation changed. Or perhaps I'm being kind.

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Proper update in the next few days, but one of the 'issues' I have is the fixing of the instrument panel cowl.

 

When Billy the Bodger did the heater matrix, the dash didn't necessarily go back together the way Land Rover intended. Clips and screws were left out, bits of plastic broken etc. Much of it I've managed to fix, but the cowl for the back of the instrument cluster has no means of location of fixing I can see. It's basically just placed on top, and flaps about.

 

Here's the view through the windscreen of the bracket holding the instrument cluster to the dashboard top:

 

jW61p9n.jpg

 

I reckon there are some tabs of prongs missing here. The manual is bugger all help as usual. What am I missing here which holds the cowl on, and what do I need to buy to sort this out?

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I have done this job 4 times now. are you looking for how the instrument cluster fits to the dash frame?

 

bottom of instrument cluster has 4 threaded bolts to which nuts are fixed under the dash support panel to hold the dash top and instrument cluster tight to the metal frame underneath it. Similar approach to the blank plate on the passenger side 

 

both sides of the dash should have exactly the same fittings :)

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I have done this job 4 times now. are you looking for how the instrument cluster fits to the dash frame?

 

bottom of instrument cluster has 4 threaded bolts to which nuts are fixed under the dash support panel to hold the dash top and instrument cluster tight to the metal frame underneath it. Similar approach to the blank plate on the passenger side 

 

both sides of the dash should have exactly the same fittings :)

 

Thanks - it's the plastic cowl which covers the back of the instrument cluster which is causing me problems. I can't see what's supposed to hold it in place, or what might be missing from my frame. Make sense?

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ah the back cover bit of the instrument cluster.

 

often mangled because it cannot be removed without removing the windscreen or lower dash and 4 x nuts that hold the cluster to the dash. gah

 

there are two upward pointy lugs on the back of the instrument cluster metal baseplate that sits flat against the dash top. The cover fits into the front facia and then hinges down and has to be compressed to clip the cover behind the two lugs.

 

with the instrument cluster bolted into place or the screen fitted the above is impossible.

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there are two upward pointy lugs on the back of the instrument cluster metal baseplate that sits flat against the dash top. The cover fits into the front facia and then hinges down and has to be compressed to clip the cover behind the two lugs.

 

 

 

Ah, thought as much.

 

There's no trace of the lugs on my baseplate that I can see - you'd think if Billy had broken them off, there'd be traces of where they'd been.

 

New baseplate the thing to do, then?

 

Or perhaps I can engineer some kind of velcro based solution, for easy fixing and future maintenance...

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Cheers - looks like they're riveted on or similar. At least now I know why Billy probably just smashed it! Looks like he broke the prongs off the front surround (nr 2 in the pic) as well.

 

I'll think about a velcro alternative - seems a shame to go back to OE when it wasn't actually very good.

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  • 1 month later...

OK, so no updates for a while. Reason being:

 

THE LARGE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

 

No, not the dipsomaniac fuel consumption. That's like the room itself - pretty unavoidable with the whole V8 RR thing.

 

No, I mean the coolant probs. The guy I bought it off was topping up the coolant regularly, so I knew there were issues. But, during the couple of weeks I was driving it, it boiled up three times. Three times.

 

I'd taken the rad out, flushed it, checked everything, tightened all the hoses, but still problems. The last time I drove it, it shat all its coolant opposite a Tesco Metro, and I limped home cooled by Value Spring Water.

 

PM revealed a knackered expansion tank cap seal, but I was pretty sure there was more to it. Or that it was OMGHGF. Or slipped liners. Or a cracked block.

 

Shudder.

 

So, I had the rad re-cored. For £225, Gloucester Radiator Services did an excellent job.

I bought a new viscous coupling. £41, but might as well.

New thermostat, £5. On testing it, there was nothing wrong with the old one, but heyho.

New cap seal. Free from Bucklands with something else, from a Vauxhall cap of all things. Pikey, I know, but a complete new cap is £35!

Fresh blue coolant, the right kind for the car - £11.

 

You know that feeling of anxiety when you test drive a car after doing this kind of stuff. Every creak, every twitch of the temp gauge, every funny smell...

 

But, it made it up the motorway to Gloucester and back with no problems at all, and the rad feels much cooler when you pop the bonnet! And there's no smell of coolant any more!!!

 

So, fingers crossed, but I think it's sorted. Phew.

 

The air filter looked to have done duty in the funnel of a destroyer at some stage:

 

VLrWU0R.jpg

 

Maybe worth another 1 mpg, so about 7% improvement!

 

Now it's back up on the stands again for the front end to be scrubbed, de-rusted and waxoyled. Such fun.

 

Gz1D8WG.jpg

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The body's actually pretty good - everything from the front bulkhead backwards is now de-rusted, painted, undersealed and waxoyled where it needs it, so it shouldn't rot too badly in future.

 

The other job I did was the heater fan resistor - fan only worked on full, so that was the obvious culprit. On the year I have, it's very cleverlyhidden by Land Rover's expert vehicle designers under the air intakes at the rear of the bonnet, on the front decker panel. If you prise off one of the 3 grilles (the LH one, in a RHD car), you can see a sort of manky cigar type thing rusting gently under there:

 

resistorlocation.jpg

 

The best site for info on fitting the new resistor - remanufactured by Atlantic British, and available over here for about 40 quid - is this one:

 

http://www.okierover.com/fanresistor.htm

 

There wasn't enough wiring free on the dash side to pull through, so it was a case of splicing the new resistor pack into the existing wiring.

 

A fiddly job, requiring a bit of laparoscopic skill and some really long needle nose pliers as well as a selection of wobble drives, but sorted eventually, and we now have 3 fan speeds once more!

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A quick wire brush under the front wings this morning has confirmed what I thought already.

 

The O/S is sound, mostly because it's had a pretty extensive rebuild at some point in the past. It's solid enough, although I'll take the plastic liner out and see what lies beneath. The A pillar looks good, and I think it'll all survive with a good coat of Vactan, paint, waxoyl etc.

 

The N/S is crumbling. I knew the guy I bought it off had repairedthe holes in past with tape, so I figured there'd be some MIG action needed. I pulled the liner out of this side anyway, and this is what we're left with.

 

The A post end is OK, and will survive with waxoyl:

 

7fUekDY.jpg

 

The top of the arch and the curve down towards the front have plenty of metal missing:

 

Z0B43wx.jpg

 

piYyKky.jpg

 

I'll be stripping the coil and other gubbins off the top of the inner wing this afternoon with any luck. At least they're all flat panels which need making up, and most of the welding can be done from the top.

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crikey, that isnt rusty! that is the factory finish :D

 

re that resistor, the factory for some reason secure the multiconnector on the inside of the bulkhead (probably some in joke by ex union rep at Lode Lane) which means it is a bastard to pull through when changing. I gave mine a hearty good yank :) years ago and it came free. trapped I think behind the aircon unit in the passenger footwell.

 

New resistor doesnt look the same PRC8010 is the part number

 

New unit has a metal plate / heat soak that protects it from the environment. make sure also you have the filters installed behind the deck grills as that slows ingress of water into the top area of the bulkhead

 

old and new units side by side

 

PRC8010_RESISTOR_1.jpg

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crikey, that isnt rusty! that is the factory finish :D

 

re that resistor, the factory for some reason secure the multiconnector on the inside of the bulkhead (probably some in joke by ex union rep at Lode Lane) which means it is a bastard to pull through when changing. I gave mine a hearty good yank :) years ago and it came free. trapped I think behind the aircon unit in the passenger footwell.

 

New resistor doesnt look the same PRC8010 is the part number

 

 

Thanks - all sorted now.

 

Yes, bits like the plug behind the bulkhead, as well as the location of the sodding thing (I mean, it's not like there's nowhere else in the engine bay more accessible they could have put it, is it?) which make you wonder whether LR actually wanted to go bust.

 

Are there actually drain holes in that cavity under the decker panel? I'm guessing they're blocked by now, if there are...

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All the gubbins from the N/S wheelarch now removed:

 

Coil, inc suppressor so rusty it's comical

Big, over complicated air filter assembly (but hey, I've got a Series, so it's all relative)

Weird black plastic ballcock type thing. I think this has something to do with the cruise control, but who knows?

 

and here we are:

 

SRYTFCt.jpg

 

I can see why so many people succumb to the temptation to pop rivet some pieces of aluminium over the holes...

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I can see why so many people succumb to the temptation to pop rivet some pieces of aluminium over the holes...

 

Oi I resemble that comment*

 

Until I can get around to replacing both inner wings, probably early next year

 

the black ballcock thing is the vacuum reservoir for the heater fresh air flap

 

have you looked behind the indicator units and behind the headlamps yet?

 

Mine is fresh air. hence new inner wing rather than any more pissing about with patches

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Interesting to see they've used what looks astonishingly similar to a mains dropper resistor that was common place for current limiting the heater chain on valve based TVs and radios in the past...wonder if they got a good deal on them, imagine there would have been a LOT of surplus stock of this stuff floating around in the late 80s...

 

You can see a very similar one in the set below just to the left of the CRT...

 

post-21985-0-10899300-1538919832_thumb.jpg

 

It's a 1968 Kolster Brandes KV024 in case you wondered what the TV is...

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Doesn't surprise me that Land Rover went for the cheapo option. They also mounted it where it was guaranteed to get a bit damp, thus making sure it would rust enough to pack up in a few years, too. Muppets.

 

Anyway, obviously I wasn't about to chequer plate ally bits to the inner wings. I started poking and scraping, then did some chopping back to sound metal, and here's the first repair about to welded in:

 

DtLmwAe.jpg

 

Handily the next big rot hole in front of this one gave me somewhere to put that big red clamp through to hold the panel in place.

 

Next job was said big rot hole. I ended up chopping out a pretty big piece of 'steel' and decided the best / easiest fix was to cut back to sound and lap weld a piece over. With all the welding done and a coat of Vactan slapped onto everything in sight, it looked like this:

 

DeomSLR.jpg

 

Predictably, I suppose, once I started looking properly at things it became clear that the only really good way to repair this side is with a new inner wing, or at least a pretty good sized repair section. I'm not aiming for a proper restoration here - more a solid, usable everyday car - so I'm happy with letting in steel which keeps the water out and stops things flapping in the breeze.

 

There are two holes I haven't dealt with - one just to the right of the screenwash bottle I didn't spot, but which would have been a bugger to fix anyway, and another on the upstand for the wing which you can see in the first pic. I'm going to leave that one too. It's hidden by cabling for a start, but I can also use it to chuck waxoyl down inside the inner wing channel and hopefully prevent more rot.

 

Some folks don't seem to like the wheelarch liners, but I think they've probably prevented more rot than they've caused. If LR had actually bothered with any rustproofing to start with then that would have helped. They're both off now so I can drench all the accessible crannies in waxoyl, and I'll give them a wash before they go back on:

 

llbLaNA.jpg

 

As usual, they're fixed on with single use plastic rivet type things.

 

The correct ones seem to be MXC3119, which are obviously made of some incredibly posh plastic, given the price of them. I'll be using ANR2224 or similar, which are more or less the same dimensions and half the price, unless anyone can give me a good reason not to.

 

I've a feeling the Concours trophy at next summer's shows might be slipping from my grasp, anyway... 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, it's been a bit of a slog at times, but the first chunk of work needed to turn this into something usable is about done.

 

I treated the inner arches to Vactan, then Hammerite, then Hammerite underseal, and finally a coat of Waxoyl. No pictures: you'll just have to imagine some very, very black inner wheel arches.

 

To be honest, a few repairs to the metal was the best I could do. I think that ultimately the N/S will need a new inner wing to make a nice job of things, but it's all solid and watertight for the foreseeable. One of the main issues was the large number of holes - mostly drilled and intentional - which allowed the wheels to splash water up all over the coil on the N/S and the brake pump and M/C on the O/S. OK, there were a few which were down to rust, but I can't understand why LR left it this way (if they did). Anyway, all are now plugged with nut, bolt and washer, or a plastic rivet thing.

 

To rewardme for my efforts, some green stuff started dribbling down from inside the N/S wheelarch as I worked. The dribble got worse, and I worked out I'd obviously disturbed some of the washer bottle pipework as I moved things out of the way so I could weld and paint. The bottle didn't look as though it had been completely dry before, when I took it out, though:

 

MiKoGKs.jpg

 

The headlamp washers (big pump) didn't work anyway, and I can't be arsed with them, so I cleaned the bottle out properly, sealed all the areas of possible leakage with clear silicone, tested it for leaks (not any more!) and re-fitted it.

 

Finally I fitted the front bash plate I'd picked up for a tenner a few weeks ago. Although I was happy to see the back of the big, knackered, naff air dam type thing which LR decided was the height of 80's car design fashion, it kind of needed something under the front bumper. I'll also probably take the RR trialling, so I drilled and bolted a D ring I had lying around onto the bash plate.

 

Fitting was OK. Another pair of hands would have helped, but the main obstacle was the seized bolt through the Panhard rod mounting. I left if yesterday afternoon well dosed with WD40, and capable of being 1/8 turned with a 2' breaker bar. Experience has taught me that brute force leads to sheared bolts and a bigger, shittier creek than the one you were previously drifting up, so this morning I brought in the blowtorch, air impact driver and a brilliant trick with candle wax I read about once:

 

http://dsportmag.com/the-tech/education/the-art-of-removing-stuck-nuts-and-bolts/

 

tech-remove-stuck-nuts-bolts-88-004-350x

 

By lunchtime I had it all sorted, and was ready for a test drive.

 

Typical shite weather, but have a couple of pics:

 

EnK46ew.jpg

 

vvtdPGl.jpg

 

Not sure what the next job is. Don't worry - there is plenty of crap on this car which still doesn't work (it's an old Range, Rover and TADTS), but I'd quite like a few weeks of driving the thing, actually.

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