A tale of three discoveries (4x4 and V8 content)
Discussion
Next update here. It's a big one so you may want a brew 
Earlier on the thread you'll have seen that I face lifted my old TD5. That's one modification I've always had planned for the V8, but I wanted to go a bit further and do something a bit different at the same time.
My BMW has Xenon lights and I wanted the same sort of light output from the Discovery, but the face lift headlights use reflector housings which IMO can never give an acceptable light beam pattern with a HID xenon conversion. For that you need projector lenses to focus the beam properly, so along with a set of new headlights and HID kit, I bought a Bi-xenon projector conversion kit to fit as well.
These would fit into the standard H4 light housing, and then take a H1 xenon bulb.
Wasted no time in splitting the headlight to test fit the projector units.
And test the light output
looking good, with a reasonable beam pattern which was much better than the Halogen housings would have given. But there was still a couple of small areas glare above the cut off line that may have dazzled other drivers so I wasn't 100% happy yet.
The glare was from stray light that had escaped from gaps in the back of the projector housings and then bounced off of the mirror reflector behind. To fit it I decided to make some blocking shrouds out of some spare perspex sheet I had.
Which were covered with some chrome effect Vinyl to fit in with the rest of the headlight.
Fitted behind the housings
And both lights back together, with the shrouds having the added benefit of making the projectors look a bit more factory fit.
And once again, the beam pattern was checked. MUCH better, with a perfect cut off and zero glare.
Happy with the beam pattern, the lights were almost ready to fit. But first I had to remedy another problem that all Discovery faceift headlights have, and that's their attractiveness to certain unsavoury types.
The first change to help stop these lights being nicked was to etch/engrave the Licence plate number onto the lense of the lights.
This was done on the inside of the lense, so the outer surface is still smooth.
Next was to sort the main reason they get nicked so easily, which because Land Rover decided to use rubbish plastic fixings to attach them to the vehicle, that simply snap clean off with a swift pull.
I decided the best fix was to forget about the plastic mounts all together, and make new metal ones.
All 3 new mounts bolt through the plastic headlight casing, to metal reinforcement plates bonded to the inside.
I very much doubt anyone would be able to pull them out now. And on the off chance they manage it, they would definatly not be in a sellable condition, which would make them think twice about going for the second one.
Finally after all that work, I was able to fit them.
And with the lower trim pieces painted, it was time for a celebratary wash and photos.
I'm VERY happy with how they came out, Thanks for reading as always
Earlier on the thread you'll have seen that I face lifted my old TD5. That's one modification I've always had planned for the V8, but I wanted to go a bit further and do something a bit different at the same time.
My BMW has Xenon lights and I wanted the same sort of light output from the Discovery, but the face lift headlights use reflector housings which IMO can never give an acceptable light beam pattern with a HID xenon conversion. For that you need projector lenses to focus the beam properly, so along with a set of new headlights and HID kit, I bought a Bi-xenon projector conversion kit to fit as well.
These would fit into the standard H4 light housing, and then take a H1 xenon bulb.
Wasted no time in splitting the headlight to test fit the projector units.
And test the light output
looking good, with a reasonable beam pattern which was much better than the Halogen housings would have given. But there was still a couple of small areas glare above the cut off line that may have dazzled other drivers so I wasn't 100% happy yet.
The glare was from stray light that had escaped from gaps in the back of the projector housings and then bounced off of the mirror reflector behind. To fit it I decided to make some blocking shrouds out of some spare perspex sheet I had.
Which were covered with some chrome effect Vinyl to fit in with the rest of the headlight.
Fitted behind the housings
And both lights back together, with the shrouds having the added benefit of making the projectors look a bit more factory fit.
And once again, the beam pattern was checked. MUCH better, with a perfect cut off and zero glare.
Happy with the beam pattern, the lights were almost ready to fit. But first I had to remedy another problem that all Discovery faceift headlights have, and that's their attractiveness to certain unsavoury types.
The first change to help stop these lights being nicked was to etch/engrave the Licence plate number onto the lense of the lights.
This was done on the inside of the lense, so the outer surface is still smooth.
Next was to sort the main reason they get nicked so easily, which because Land Rover decided to use rubbish plastic fixings to attach them to the vehicle, that simply snap clean off with a swift pull.
I decided the best fix was to forget about the plastic mounts all together, and make new metal ones.
All 3 new mounts bolt through the plastic headlight casing, to metal reinforcement plates bonded to the inside.
I very much doubt anyone would be able to pull them out now. And on the off chance they manage it, they would definatly not be in a sellable condition, which would make them think twice about going for the second one.
Finally after all that work, I was able to fit them.
And with the lower trim pieces painted, it was time for a celebratary wash and photos.
I'm VERY happy with how they came out, Thanks for reading as always
Here are the pictures of the light output and beam pattern now that the Bi-xenon lights are fitted.
Dipped beam pattern.
Dipped beam from outside.
Main beam from outside.
Dipped beam from the driver's seat.
Main beam from the driver's seat.
And for anyone worried what effect these will have on other road users. They are very bright with a clear white light, as expected.
But that is only below the cutoff line. Above that, the light output is much lower, and no brighter than normal headlights.
And these pictures again show that the cut off is nice and crisp, and means the bright half of the light beam stays nicely below the window line of other cars, with the area above almost black, so won't dazzle anyone
All in all, VERY good results in my opinion. Really happy with them.
Driving around at night is massively improved, and I think they look great too.
Dipped beam pattern.
Dipped beam from outside.
Main beam from outside.
Dipped beam from the driver's seat.
Main beam from the driver's seat.
And for anyone worried what effect these will have on other road users. They are very bright with a clear white light, as expected.
But that is only below the cutoff line. Above that, the light output is much lower, and no brighter than normal headlights.
And these pictures again show that the cut off is nice and crisp, and means the bright half of the light beam stays nicely below the window line of other cars, with the area above almost black, so won't dazzle anyone
All in all, VERY good results in my opinion. Really happy with them.
Driving around at night is massively improved, and I think they look great too.
Update time. 
Just a few small changes for this one. First of which was some more fiddling with the LPG system, this time involving the indicator which was just placed in the centre console by the lazy "professional" installer.
Does the job OK. But meant when ever the fold out cup holders were in use, you couldn't see how much fuel was in the tank.
So I decided it needed moving. And the new spot that took my fancy, was in the bank of 6 switches in the dash, just to the right of the climate control.
If you remember back to one of my previous updates, I removed the rear SLS system. Which meant the off road mode button was now redundant, and could be swapped for the LPG indicator, which just happens to be the perfect size.
Much better.
Next up, the battery.
The old one hadn't given up, but it was getting on a bit, the terminals were quite corroded, and I simply didn't want to run it through another winter.
So I got a new replacement, and decided to spend a little more and go for a TD5 spec battery. It's larger, with more amp/hours and cranking power, than the V8 comes with.
No pictures of it fitted, but I'm sure you can imagine what it looks like with two wires connected to the top.
Last change for this update was a bit of a fix, as fatty here managed to bend one of the side steps when I was getting in!
Here it is removed to inspect the damage.
Looking underneath, it was easy to see why it had given up. In typical Land Rover fasion, it had slowly disintigrated.
And the passenger side wasnt much better.
And yes, I had noticed this before when I did the body lift etc... but they had been put on the to-do list and forgotten about.
Anyway, it didn't take too long to cut out the rusted support (As let's face it, there wasnt much left to cut out! ) and weld in some spare box section from the garage.
And with a quick coat of etch primer and underseal, they are as good as new.
Thanks for reading.
Just a few small changes for this one. First of which was some more fiddling with the LPG system, this time involving the indicator which was just placed in the centre console by the lazy "professional" installer.
Does the job OK. But meant when ever the fold out cup holders were in use, you couldn't see how much fuel was in the tank.
So I decided it needed moving. And the new spot that took my fancy, was in the bank of 6 switches in the dash, just to the right of the climate control.
If you remember back to one of my previous updates, I removed the rear SLS system. Which meant the off road mode button was now redundant, and could be swapped for the LPG indicator, which just happens to be the perfect size.
Much better.
Next up, the battery.
The old one hadn't given up, but it was getting on a bit, the terminals were quite corroded, and I simply didn't want to run it through another winter.
So I got a new replacement, and decided to spend a little more and go for a TD5 spec battery. It's larger, with more amp/hours and cranking power, than the V8 comes with.
No pictures of it fitted, but I'm sure you can imagine what it looks like with two wires connected to the top.
Last change for this update was a bit of a fix, as fatty here managed to bend one of the side steps when I was getting in!
Here it is removed to inspect the damage.
Looking underneath, it was easy to see why it had given up. In typical Land Rover fasion, it had slowly disintigrated.
And the passenger side wasnt much better.
And yes, I had noticed this before when I did the body lift etc... but they had been put on the to-do list and forgotten about.
Anyway, it didn't take too long to cut out the rusted support (As let's face it, there wasnt much left to cut out!
) and weld in some spare box section from the garage.And with a quick coat of etch primer and underseal, they are as good as new.
Thanks for reading.
Edited by JordanTurbo on Friday 9th September 15:19
Edited by JordanTurbo on Friday 9th September 16:56
Oh, and I just had a look at my previous post about the headlight conversion. And realised I didn't mention anything about fitting the side marker strips.
Basically the facelift headlights have an amber reflector at the side of the light unit. North American Discoverys had a bulb behind it to illuminate it with the side lights but, for whatever reason, Land Rover decided not to include that feature on British and European models.
I wanted to include the markers in my headlights, and bought two LED strips. Which I fitted when I was doing the Xenon bits. You can just about see them illuminated in this picture:
At night they give a more general glow across the whole strip.
As far as wiring them up went, I wanted to something a little different. Something that probably won't come as a surprise to anyone who has seen the halo DRLs on my e36 328i.
As well as coming on with the side lights as normal, I also wanted them to work as indicators as well. So they are connected to both the side light and indicator circuits. With the indicator overriding the side light function whenever it is used. Here is a video to show the result:
CLICK ME
I'm very happy with the way they work. The only change I want to make is to convert the standard indicator bulb from halogen to LED, so that they light up instantly the same as the markers and get rid of the slight timing mismatch.
Thanks for reading (again )
Basically the facelift headlights have an amber reflector at the side of the light unit. North American Discoverys had a bulb behind it to illuminate it with the side lights but, for whatever reason, Land Rover decided not to include that feature on British and European models.
I wanted to include the markers in my headlights, and bought two LED strips. Which I fitted when I was doing the Xenon bits. You can just about see them illuminated in this picture:
At night they give a more general glow across the whole strip.
As far as wiring them up went, I wanted to something a little different. Something that probably won't come as a surprise to anyone who has seen the halo DRLs on my e36 328i.
As well as coming on with the side lights as normal, I also wanted them to work as indicators as well. So they are connected to both the side light and indicator circuits. With the indicator overriding the side light function whenever it is used. Here is a video to show the result:
CLICK ME
I'm very happy with the way they work. The only change I want to make is to convert the standard indicator bulb from halogen to LED, so that they light up instantly the same as the markers and get rid of the slight timing mismatch.
Thanks for reading (again
)Edited by JordanTurbo on Friday 9th September 23:16
Thanks guys
I shall get onto writing the next update ASAP. In the mean time, here's a teaser
The lense is held on with sealant and some plastic tabs. Just put it in the oven at about 100°c then, after 5-10 minutes take it out and gently try to prise the lense out. If it's still stuck pop it back in for a bit longer.
Be gentle with the lense when you pull it off as it's only plastic and can crack. And when it comes to refitting, use a Butyl based sealant so they can be split the same way in future if required.
I shall get onto writing the next update ASAP. In the mean time, here's a teaser
Lorne1 said:
Great work here. Can I ask how you split the headlights?
The oven when the wife was out The lense is held on with sealant and some plastic tabs. Just put it in the oven at about 100°c then, after 5-10 minutes take it out and gently try to prise the lense out. If it's still stuck pop it back in for a bit longer.
Be gentle with the lense when you pull it off as it's only plastic and can crack. And when it comes to refitting, use a Butyl based sealant so they can be split the same way in future if required.
Hi guys. Time for another large update.
This time fitting some tasty new bits, in the form of a set of Hedman long tube exhaust headers.
And a pair of braided flexi sections and clamps to get them fitted the way I wanted.
As you can imagine. I wasted no time in getting the Disco up in the air ready for surgery.
To reveal the old standard system.
Didn't take long to remove the old stuff. No rusty or stubborn studs/nuts as everything had been off at the engine rebuild. (Engine bay needs a clean though)
And old vs new.
As you can probably tell from the above pictures, the plan was to re-use the existing "Y" section from the standard exhaust, and mate it to the new manifolds/flexis.
So the old exhaust was cut just behind the standard cats, which would now be fully removed to make way for the larger aftermarket manifolds.
Now when I say "remove the cats"..... they hadn't really had any catalytic function for a while.
Before I decided to go for the Hedmans, I was tempted to fit a set of P38 Range Rover manifolds in place of the standard D2 ones. They are a better design than the standard cast efforts, but after buying a set I quickly realised they would not fit inbetween the Discovery chassis rails.
Here is a comparison pic between the Discovery cast manifolds, the P38 tubular "shorties" and the Hedman full long tube headers.
So, onto fitting.
Manifolds test fitted to check clearance.
No worries there, so moved onto joining them to the rest of the exhaust system. And quickly realised it would need some work to get them to meet nicely.
So after a couple of hours of measureing, marking, cutting and tack welding, I had something that would work well.
** please excuse the lense flare in some of the upcoming pictures. A stray spark from either my welder or grinder, had managed to land on the camera lense of my phone while it was sat on my the work bench, and cracked it. **
I decided to just use the slip joints and clamps on the flexi sections, and totally do away with the ball and socket arrangement on the headers.
So these were perminently welded at required angle.
And then the rest of the modified Y-section was welded up. To leave me with a finished exhaust ready to fit.
That was refitted properly with gaskets (sorry forgot to take pics) and then I thought I may as well move onto releasing some more sound from the rest of the system while I had the tools out.
The big center silencer was removed.
The front and rear flanges were then cut off, and the small standard rear silencer was removed too.
These three parts were then welded together. To create a new center section. :mrgreen:
And you may be wondering what silencer is fitted at the back.....
Ermm.....
So the exhaust system from front to back, currenty consists of:
> Hedman long tube headers
> Decat
> Standard Y-section
> Small centre silencer
> Turn down rear pipe in place of silencer.
So yer. It's quite loud.
Here is a quick phone vid of how it sounds at the moment. I do have another with the go-pro on the back, but it's on the laptop at home.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-du4rFcqxo
That's all for tonight.
As always thanks for reading, and all comments welcome.
This time fitting some tasty new bits, in the form of a set of Hedman long tube exhaust headers.
And a pair of braided flexi sections and clamps to get them fitted the way I wanted.
As you can imagine. I wasted no time in getting the Disco up in the air ready for surgery.
To reveal the old standard system.
Didn't take long to remove the old stuff. No rusty or stubborn studs/nuts as everything had been off at the engine rebuild. (Engine bay needs a clean though)
And old vs new.
As you can probably tell from the above pictures, the plan was to re-use the existing "Y" section from the standard exhaust, and mate it to the new manifolds/flexis.
So the old exhaust was cut just behind the standard cats, which would now be fully removed to make way for the larger aftermarket manifolds.
Now when I say "remove the cats"..... they hadn't really had any catalytic function for a while.
Before I decided to go for the Hedmans, I was tempted to fit a set of P38 Range Rover manifolds in place of the standard D2 ones. They are a better design than the standard cast efforts, but after buying a set I quickly realised they would not fit inbetween the Discovery chassis rails.
Here is a comparison pic between the Discovery cast manifolds, the P38 tubular "shorties" and the Hedman full long tube headers.
So, onto fitting.
Manifolds test fitted to check clearance.
No worries there, so moved onto joining them to the rest of the exhaust system. And quickly realised it would need some work to get them to meet nicely.
So after a couple of hours of measureing, marking, cutting and tack welding, I had something that would work well.
** please excuse the lense flare in some of the upcoming pictures. A stray spark from either my welder or grinder, had managed to land on the camera lense of my phone while it was sat on my the work bench, and cracked it.
**I decided to just use the slip joints and clamps on the flexi sections, and totally do away with the ball and socket arrangement on the headers.
So these were perminently welded at required angle.
And then the rest of the modified Y-section was welded up. To leave me with a finished exhaust ready to fit.
That was refitted properly with gaskets (sorry forgot to take pics) and then I thought I may as well move onto releasing some more sound from the rest of the system while I had the tools out.
The big center silencer was removed.
The front and rear flanges were then cut off, and the small standard rear silencer was removed too.
These three parts were then welded together. To create a new center section. :mrgreen:
And you may be wondering what silencer is fitted at the back.....
Ermm.....
So the exhaust system from front to back, currenty consists of:
> Hedman long tube headers
> Decat
> Standard Y-section
> Small centre silencer
> Turn down rear pipe in place of silencer.
So yer. It's quite loud.
Here is a quick phone vid of how it sounds at the moment. I do have another with the go-pro on the back, but it's on the laptop at home.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-du4rFcqxo
That's all for tonight.
As always thanks for reading, and all comments welcome.
Edited by JordanTurbo on Wednesday 14th September 10:32
Better late than never. Here's the other video that I mentioned.
It's from my Gopro and outside the car, so much better quality than the first mobile phone one above.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsgzLhtlOro
It's from my Gopro and outside the car, so much better quality than the first mobile phone one above.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsgzLhtlOro
Cheers guys.
I'm really pleased with it, although I do have a slightly larger volume aftermarket silencer (still straight through) to swap for the little Land Rover one.
Not to make it too much quieter. Just to hopfully give the sound a bit more depth and tone, as at the moment it's quite raw and unrefined, if that makes sense.
I'm really pleased with it, although I do have a slightly larger volume aftermarket silencer (still straight through) to swap for the little Land Rover one.
Not to make it too much quieter. Just to hopfully give the sound a bit more depth and tone, as at the moment it's quite raw and unrefined, if that makes sense.
Update time.
Done a couple of bits recently. First one to replace the power steering box, as it was weeping a bit from the bottom seal. Got a good used box from a Landy forum member, and some new genuine fluid lines to go on at the same time while I had the system drained.
Old corroded pipes out.
New shiney pipes in.
Also decided to re-use the rubber mounts from the old pipes. Put them round a few spots where the pipes are prone to chaffing, so I have no issues later on.
While I was in there, I gave the arches a good jet wash out. Very happy with how my suspension parts are holding out, even with the off road use that my Disco gets whenever we have the chance. The Terrafirma dampers in the center are 3+ years old, and the coils are about a year old, still looking and performing good as new.
Since everything at the front end was apart, I took the chance to do a mod that I had been meaning to do for a while. Upgrading the standard Discovery air con fan, to the larger twin setup from the P38 shape Range Rover.
Won't make much difference over winter, but should help keep the engine temps nice and stable when the weather warms back up.
First up was to make some brackets to it could attach to the original fan mounts.
Then it just slotted in nicely with a little fettling of the air con dryer mounts.
Lastly, was a more fun mod at the other end.
As I've posted before, I have a 2" box reciever hitch in place of the original "farm plough" style tow bar and step. Which is normally fitted with a big tailgating deterrent.... I mean tow hook
Works great off road pulling people around, but less so for Ashton my 6 year old son, who normally uses the 6/7th row seats and struggled to climb in and out.
I wanted to make a removable step that would live in the hitch day to day, but still give the option of swapping back to the hook when we go playing. So I got had a measure up, and go some steel box to suit. Then set about cutting it into the appropriate parts.
Which would slot together something like so.
And out came Mr Mig.
Some more cutting/welding/grinding done. To remove the angle at the top and box in the ends of the step.
Happy with the shape, it had a couple of coats of zinc primer
Then a top coat of satin black and some grip tape on the treading surface. Finished.
And fitted.
Really happy with how it's turned out. Fits spot on and does exactly as it should, no more lifting the boy in and out any more.
That's all for now. Thanks for reading, and comments welcome as always.
Done a couple of bits recently. First one to replace the power steering box, as it was weeping a bit from the bottom seal. Got a good used box from a Landy forum member, and some new genuine fluid lines to go on at the same time while I had the system drained.
Old corroded pipes out.
New shiney pipes in.
Also decided to re-use the rubber mounts from the old pipes. Put them round a few spots where the pipes are prone to chaffing, so I have no issues later on.
While I was in there, I gave the arches a good jet wash out. Very happy with how my suspension parts are holding out, even with the off road use that my Disco gets whenever we have the chance. The Terrafirma dampers in the center are 3+ years old, and the coils are about a year old, still looking and performing good as new.
Since everything at the front end was apart, I took the chance to do a mod that I had been meaning to do for a while. Upgrading the standard Discovery air con fan, to the larger twin setup from the P38 shape Range Rover.
Won't make much difference over winter, but should help keep the engine temps nice and stable when the weather warms back up.
First up was to make some brackets to it could attach to the original fan mounts.
Then it just slotted in nicely with a little fettling of the air con dryer mounts.
Lastly, was a more fun mod at the other end.
As I've posted before, I have a 2" box reciever hitch in place of the original "farm plough" style tow bar and step. Which is normally fitted with a big tailgating deterrent.... I mean tow hook
Works great off road pulling people around, but less so for Ashton my 6 year old son, who normally uses the 6/7th row seats and struggled to climb in and out.
I wanted to make a removable step that would live in the hitch day to day, but still give the option of swapping back to the hook when we go playing. So I got had a measure up, and go some steel box to suit. Then set about cutting it into the appropriate parts.
Which would slot together something like so.
And out came Mr Mig.
Some more cutting/welding/grinding done. To remove the angle at the top and box in the ends of the step.
Happy with the shape, it had a couple of coats of zinc primer
Then a top coat of satin black and some grip tape on the treading surface. Finished.
And fitted.
Really happy with how it's turned out. Fits spot on and does exactly as it should, no more lifting the boy in and out any more.
That's all for now. Thanks for reading, and comments welcome as always.
Slashmb said:
Just read from the start.
Epic thread. Well done that man.
Wish I had the knowledge to do something like this.
Any idea what you have spent in total on the current one?
Thankyou. Epic thread. Well done that man.
Wish I had the knowledge to do something like this.
Any idea what you have spent in total on the current one?
Not sure how much I've spent in total on the current Discovery, I normally try to ignore that side of my projects
Obviously there is a good chunk in the engine build, but I don't mind that. Being a common Rover V8, I see it as a bit of an investment that I can keep for future projects.
My plan is to run the Disco until I've had enough of it, then break it for spares. Sell all the good bits that I've fitted over the years, but not the engine.
The V8 can then be partialy rebuilt to suit use in a car - new Inlet manifold with shorter runners, probably individual throttle bodies, fast road spec cam, aftermarket management etc... Then the plan is to slot it into a kit car
Currently top of the list is somthing like a Fisher Fury or Sylva Phoenix
HarryW said:
And perhaps a different cam as I don't doubt the Disco one is a stump puller for more low down torque that sports car revvy...
JordanTurbo said:
The V8 can then be partialy rebuilt to suit use in a car - new Inlet manifold with shorter runners, probably individual throttle bodies, fast road spec cam aftermarket management etc... Then the plan is to slot it into a kit car
Yes, the current cam is very much aimed at low down grunt.
I would definatly swap it for something more suited to a sports car application
Update time. Done some more exhaust work recently.
As you'll probably remember from previous posts. When I fitted my Hedmans, I fitted the old rear box in place of the centre silencer.
It was only temporary though, and I bought a new silencer to replace it. Still a straight through design, but with a bit more volume for a slightly more refined tone.
With the old box removed, the new one could be mocked up.
Happy with fittment, it was taken off to be welded properly.
Along with the new silencer, I also bought a Wideband AFR gauge and sensor to keep an eye on the fueling since fitting the long tubes.
The only problem was that the illumination was yellow which wouldn't match the factory Land Rover green.
I couldn't have that now, so I got some green acetate film to lay over the display.
The standard tinted dial was cut out
And the green was stick to the back.
With the view from the front like so.
So when powered back up. The gauge looks like this.
With that done it was back onto the exhaust to sort out fittment of the O2 sensor.
A hole was drilled ready for the threaded bung to be welded on.
The bung itself was shortened and contoured, to match the exhaust tubing and set the correct depth of the sensor.
And with that welded up, the two parts of the exhaust were ready to be refitted.
But before that there was some work to be done on the transmission, but that's an update for tomorrow.
Thanks for reading
As you'll probably remember from previous posts. When I fitted my Hedmans, I fitted the old rear box in place of the centre silencer.
It was only temporary though, and I bought a new silencer to replace it. Still a straight through design, but with a bit more volume for a slightly more refined tone.
With the old box removed, the new one could be mocked up.
Happy with fittment, it was taken off to be welded properly.
Along with the new silencer, I also bought a Wideband AFR gauge and sensor to keep an eye on the fueling since fitting the long tubes.
The only problem was that the illumination was yellow which wouldn't match the factory Land Rover green.
I couldn't have that now, so I got some green acetate film to lay over the display.
The standard tinted dial was cut out
And the green was stick to the back.
With the view from the front like so.
So when powered back up. The gauge looks like this.
With that done it was back onto the exhaust to sort out fittment of the O2 sensor.
A hole was drilled ready for the threaded bung to be welded on.
The bung itself was shortened and contoured, to match the exhaust tubing and set the correct depth of the sensor.
And with that welded up, the two parts of the exhaust were ready to be refitted.
But before that there was some work to be done on the transmission, but that's an update for tomorrow.
Thanks for reading
So, onto that drivetrain work.
Those who like the meaty nuts & bolts posts should like this one. It's a bit of a long one.
A little while ago I picked up a new transfer box.
This was another LT230, the same as fitted to the Disco already, but from a Defender. So this new one has a 1.4:1 gear ratio instead of the standard D2 1.2:1 ratio.
The reason for the change is the 33" tyres that I have fitted. The larger circumference had the result of effectivly lengthening the gearing, which meant the Disco was now geared to cruise in top gear at 100mph plus.
The engine could do it, but at anything past 70mph the rest of the Disco (suspension, brakes, steering, aerodynamics etc...) starts to get out of it's comfort zone. So the extra top speed was largely pointless. The new transfer box ratio would cancel out the larger tyres and return the gearing to near standard, meaning the extra V8 grunt could be used for more useful acceleration.
I picked up this box reasonably cheap, because it had a common issue - The splines on the inside that mate with the output shaft from the gearbox were well worn.
That didn't bother me though, as I'm happy to do a quick refurb and swiftly ordered the appropriate bits.
OEM Timkin bearings
And a new input gear with nice straight splines. (Still covered in storage wax)
Got the box into the garage and onto my bench.
God knows why my camera made the next few pictures look really dark, the lighting in my garage is reasonably good.
Rear bearing housing removed and the input gear comes straight out.
Unfortunately the two housing retaining screws were past it. They rounded straight away and needed to be it drilled out.
So I got some stainless allen head replacements.
So on with the rebuild, and the front and rear outer races were removed along with the bearing preload shim
Mating faces of the bearing housing and box casing needed to be cleaned up.
After
The sump plate got the same treatment (no after pic though)
The new input gear was then cleaned of all it's storage wax.
The new inner races were then pressed on at each end.
The front outer race was fitted to the gearbox case.
And the rear one fitted into the bearing housing, WITHOUT the preload shim at first.
The bearings were then given a quick squirt of gear oil.
And fitted to the transfer box.
The bearing housing was then fitted (with the gasket as it's thickness is included in the preload) and the play was measured with a DTI.
Play was measured at 3.65mm, plus 0.05 preload gave a required shim of 3.7mm. Exactly what the existing shim was, so no dramas there.
The housing was removed, race pressed out, shim fitted and then everything put back together and correctly torqued. (Forgot to take a pic again. )
Lastly a new input seal was fitted to the casing. One of the inner races from the old input gear was just right to press it in. :tup:
Next I wanted to do some preventative maintenance prior to fitting. This is the intermediate shaft, which is a common spot for the LT230 to leak from
The retaining plate was removed and shaft was pushed forward to reveal the two o-rings, which were both replaced.
With that, the new box was pretty much ready to go.
The old one was removed
Before the new one could be refitted, the output flanges had to be swapped over as they are different sizes between the Defender and Discovery.
This gave me a chance to do the output seals too.
Including the little white felt ones which seal the splines
And there we go, ready for fittment. Old (left) and new (right) boxes together
No pics of refittment as it started to get dark quickly and I wanted to get finished.
The new box is lovely to drive with. As expected, it's like having the standars wheels back on. She picks up and accelerates much quicker than before.
An added bonus is also that the shift points on the automatic gearbox are right where they should be - something I hadn't noticed was off before, because I'd fitted the bigger wheels straight away when I bought this Disco. But having driven It now I couldn't go back to how it was before.
For those who made it through to the end of that post. Thanks for reading.
As always, comments welcome.
Those who like the meaty nuts & bolts posts should like this one. It's a bit of a long one.
A little while ago I picked up a new transfer box.
This was another LT230, the same as fitted to the Disco already, but from a Defender. So this new one has a 1.4:1 gear ratio instead of the standard D2 1.2:1 ratio.
The reason for the change is the 33" tyres that I have fitted. The larger circumference had the result of effectivly lengthening the gearing, which meant the Disco was now geared to cruise in top gear at 100mph plus.
The engine could do it, but at anything past 70mph the rest of the Disco (suspension, brakes, steering, aerodynamics etc...) starts to get out of it's comfort zone. So the extra top speed was largely pointless. The new transfer box ratio would cancel out the larger tyres and return the gearing to near standard, meaning the extra V8 grunt could be used for more useful acceleration.
I picked up this box reasonably cheap, because it had a common issue - The splines on the inside that mate with the output shaft from the gearbox were well worn.
That didn't bother me though, as I'm happy to do a quick refurb and swiftly ordered the appropriate bits.
OEM Timkin bearings
And a new input gear with nice straight splines. (Still covered in storage wax)
Got the box into the garage and onto my bench.
God knows why my camera made the next few pictures look really dark, the lighting in my garage is reasonably good.
Rear bearing housing removed and the input gear comes straight out.
Unfortunately the two housing retaining screws were past it. They rounded straight away and needed to be it drilled out.
So I got some stainless allen head replacements.
So on with the rebuild, and the front and rear outer races were removed along with the bearing preload shim
Mating faces of the bearing housing and box casing needed to be cleaned up.
After
The sump plate got the same treatment (no after pic though)
The new input gear was then cleaned of all it's storage wax.
The new inner races were then pressed on at each end.
The front outer race was fitted to the gearbox case.
And the rear one fitted into the bearing housing, WITHOUT the preload shim at first.
The bearings were then given a quick squirt of gear oil.
And fitted to the transfer box.
The bearing housing was then fitted (with the gasket as it's thickness is included in the preload) and the play was measured with a DTI.
Play was measured at 3.65mm, plus 0.05 preload gave a required shim of 3.7mm. Exactly what the existing shim was, so no dramas there.
The housing was removed, race pressed out, shim fitted and then everything put back together and correctly torqued. (Forgot to take a pic again.
)Lastly a new input seal was fitted to the casing. One of the inner races from the old input gear was just right to press it in. :tup:
Next I wanted to do some preventative maintenance prior to fitting. This is the intermediate shaft, which is a common spot for the LT230 to leak from
The retaining plate was removed and shaft was pushed forward to reveal the two o-rings, which were both replaced.
With that, the new box was pretty much ready to go.
The old one was removed
Before the new one could be refitted, the output flanges had to be swapped over as they are different sizes between the Defender and Discovery.
This gave me a chance to do the output seals too.
Including the little white felt ones which seal the splines
And there we go, ready for fittment. Old (left) and new (right) boxes together
No pics of refittment as it started to get dark quickly and I wanted to get finished.
The new box is lovely to drive with. As expected, it's like having the standars wheels back on. She picks up and accelerates much quicker than before.
An added bonus is also that the shift points on the automatic gearbox are right where they should be - something I hadn't noticed was off before, because I'd fitted the bigger wheels straight away when I bought this Disco. But having driven It now I couldn't go back to how it was before.
For those who made it through to the end of that post. Thanks for reading.
As always, comments welcome.
Edited by JordanTurbo on Sunday 25th December 21:25
So next mod.
Back at the start of the thread, you'll see that I fitted a Discovery 1 linkage to my old TD5, to activate the Diff lock internals in the transfer box.
I always thought that having the use of the traction control and the diff lock at the same time was one of the best modifications I ever did to that D2, but I hadn't yet sorted out similar for this one.
With the change of transfer box I thought I better pull my finger out and fit something, but I wanted wanted to do something a bit more than my previous effort.
I decided I wanted it to be switched electronically on the dash instead of using the tranfer lever. So sourced an electronic actuator.
The actuator is fully environmentally sealed so should be fine living under the Disco and has a strong 100kg pull rating which is more than enough for engaging the CDL.
The only problem I found after some playing about in the garage, was that the 2" stroke length was a bit longer than I required. So I took the actuator apart to look at moving the internal micro switches to reduce the travel.
All done and shortened to about 1" stroke.
Next up was making a support bracket to mount it to the gearbox. This was reasonably easy using the end brackets supplied with the actuator, and some suitable angle steel I already had.
The diff lever end had some steel welded on to allow it to correctly engage with the spigot on top of the transfer box.
And here it is all fitted for testing on the old Disco box.
CLICK ME FOR VIDEO
I then sorted out the wiring to switch it between locked and unlocked positions from an OEM switch on the dash.
CLICK ME FOR VIDEO
The factory tell tale LED in the switch shows the current selection of the actuator but not the CDL lock/unlock status - the factory dash symbol is still used for that and lights up as normal.
I'll sort out changing the fog light symbol on the switch for the correct CDL picture at a later date, just currently working out the best way to do it.
For now just I got everything fitted up properly so it can be used, but first the bracket needed a lick of paint.
And then onto the Disco
I used a factory plug for the actuator wiring so that it could be cliped in neatly with the rest of the Transfer box wiring.
And that's that. It all works as it should, can't wait to get off road again and test it out.
Thanks for reading.
Back at the start of the thread, you'll see that I fitted a Discovery 1 linkage to my old TD5, to activate the Diff lock internals in the transfer box.
I always thought that having the use of the traction control and the diff lock at the same time was one of the best modifications I ever did to that D2, but I hadn't yet sorted out similar for this one.
With the change of transfer box I thought I better pull my finger out and fit something, but I wanted wanted to do something a bit more than my previous effort.
I decided I wanted it to be switched electronically on the dash instead of using the tranfer lever. So sourced an electronic actuator.
The actuator is fully environmentally sealed so should be fine living under the Disco and has a strong 100kg pull rating which is more than enough for engaging the CDL.
The only problem I found after some playing about in the garage, was that the 2" stroke length was a bit longer than I required. So I took the actuator apart to look at moving the internal micro switches to reduce the travel.
All done and shortened to about 1" stroke.
Next up was making a support bracket to mount it to the gearbox. This was reasonably easy using the end brackets supplied with the actuator, and some suitable angle steel I already had.
The diff lever end had some steel welded on to allow it to correctly engage with the spigot on top of the transfer box.
And here it is all fitted for testing on the old Disco box.
CLICK ME FOR VIDEO
I then sorted out the wiring to switch it between locked and unlocked positions from an OEM switch on the dash.
CLICK ME FOR VIDEO
The factory tell tale LED in the switch shows the current selection of the actuator but not the CDL lock/unlock status - the factory dash symbol is still used for that and lights up as normal.
I'll sort out changing the fog light symbol on the switch for the correct CDL picture at a later date, just currently working out the best way to do it.
For now just I got everything fitted up properly so it can be used, but first the bracket needed a lick of paint.
And then onto the Disco
I used a factory plug for the actuator wiring so that it could be cliped in neatly with the rest of the Transfer box wiring.
And that's that. It all works as it should, can't wait to get off road again and test it out.
Thanks for reading.
Edited by JordanTurbo on Tuesday 27th December 20:09
Tinkshusband said:
the only thing i can think of is buy a spare switch from a wrecked disco and put it in a blank location , and get a custom sticker made up to make it look factory ( or wipe the factory icon off with some acetone and then stencil a new icon on with some white airfix paint)
I have plenty of spare switches to experiment with.The issue is that the factory switches illuminate at night, and I want to keep that when I relabel this one.
The switch front is actually translucent and then covered in black leaving the icon showing. I need to get the black off, then work out how to make a tidy stencil to redo it.
Gassing Station | Readers' Cars | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff