New arrival - and advice needed for local specialist
Discussion
Hello all - I'm a recent addition to the Defender fold, with this little chap.
It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior. While I could do the servicing myself, I would rather the history showed a reputable (and not too expensive!) specialist. I live in South East London, so have access to London and (inner) Kent pretty easily. Any ideas for someone who could take care of the car for me?
Some pics for you - I've driven a 200 mile each way trip on the motorway (very civilised at 80 due to uprated turbo/intercooler/ecu, long gearing transfer box, steering damper, adjustable suspension, noise proofing and big brakes - amazing what it takes to make a Defender motorway friendly!). And I have spent a weekend in muddy hills, shooting. It behaved perfectly in both environments - very happy with it!
Spec, for those interested:
2004 Defender TD5, fully rebuilt in December 2011.
Drivetrain
- Uprated Intercooler, high pressure tubing and silicone hoses, EGR blank, hybrid Turbo, bespoke engine management
- Bilstein adjustable suspension and steering damper
- AP Racing big brakes
- Long ratio touring transfer box
Exterior
- 16 Zu inch alloys and BFG mud terrain tyres
- roof rack
- tinted and heated glass
- spotlights
- tubular bumpers
- rock slider
- side steps
- chequer plate
- NATO Green respray
- corrosion-proofed chassis
Interior
- all new trim panels
- interior bulkhead removed, strut brace replacement
- vehicle disassembled and soundproofed
- 4 x Sparco 333 bucket seats
- interior retrim in alcantara and felt (looks like a Discovery, not a Defender!)
- £5k worth of Dynaudio, Morel and Kenwood hifi with satnav, TV etc
- lots and lots of security, including mechanical and electronic measures
It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior. While I could do the servicing myself, I would rather the history showed a reputable (and not too expensive!) specialist. I live in South East London, so have access to London and (inner) Kent pretty easily. Any ideas for someone who could take care of the car for me?
Some pics for you - I've driven a 200 mile each way trip on the motorway (very civilised at 80 due to uprated turbo/intercooler/ecu, long gearing transfer box, steering damper, adjustable suspension, noise proofing and big brakes - amazing what it takes to make a Defender motorway friendly!). And I have spent a weekend in muddy hills, shooting. It behaved perfectly in both environments - very happy with it!
Spec, for those interested:
2004 Defender TD5, fully rebuilt in December 2011.
Drivetrain
- Uprated Intercooler, high pressure tubing and silicone hoses, EGR blank, hybrid Turbo, bespoke engine management
- Bilstein adjustable suspension and steering damper
- AP Racing big brakes
- Long ratio touring transfer box
Exterior
- 16 Zu inch alloys and BFG mud terrain tyres
- roof rack
- tinted and heated glass
- spotlights
- tubular bumpers
- rock slider
- side steps
- chequer plate
- NATO Green respray
- corrosion-proofed chassis
Interior
- all new trim panels
- interior bulkhead removed, strut brace replacement
- vehicle disassembled and soundproofed
- 4 x Sparco 333 bucket seats
- interior retrim in alcantara and felt (looks like a Discovery, not a Defender!)
- £5k worth of Dynaudio, Morel and Kenwood hifi with satnav, TV etc
- lots and lots of security, including mechanical and electronic measures
Edited by Harry Flashman on Tuesday 25th September 18:34
It's Nato green satin (pics below showing colour and interior!). Mechanical upgrades done by Nene Overland (or whomever they use for their tuning), and interior/hi fi done by an interior/stereo specialist the previous owner uses for his whole fleet. He sold this because he's getting a 110 7 seater by Twisted so he can fit all 3 kids in.
Edited by Harry Flashman on Wednesday 26th September 09:19
Edited by Harry Flashman on Wednesday 26th September 09:29
Harry Flashman said:
Hello all - I'm a recent addition to the Defender fold, with this little chap.
It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior.
Nice Defender, although looking at the specs and pics I can't see any evidence of being heavily modified? It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior.
certainly not drivetrain.Harry Flashman said:
While I could do the servicing myself, I would rather the history showed a reputable (and not too expensive!) specialist. I live in South East London, so have access to London and (inner) Kent pretty easily. Any ideas for someone who could take care of the car for me?
These are simple common vehicles. Seriously you do not need a specialist to change the oil or grease the props. And chances are you won't likely find a mechanic in the UK who hasn't worked on a Landy at some point. There are millions of Landy's on the road.Harry Flashman said:
2004 Defender TD5, fully rebuilt in December 2011.
Was it really "fully" rebuilt? As in body off engine out? Nice if it was.300bhp/ton said:
Harry Flashman said:
Hello all - I'm a recent addition to the Defender fold, with this little chap.
It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior.
Nice Defender, although looking at the specs and pics I can't see any evidence of being heavily modified? It is fairly heavily modified - drivetrain, exterior and interior.
certainly not drivetrain.Harry Flashman said:
While I could do the servicing myself, I would rather the history showed a reputable (and not too expensive!) specialist. I live in South East London, so have access to London and (inner) Kent pretty easily. Any ideas for someone who could take care of the car for me?
These are simple common vehicles. Seriously you do not need a specialist to change the oil or grease the props. And chances are you won't likely find a mechanic in the UK who hasn't worked on a Landy at some point. There are millions of Landy's on the road.Harry Flashman said:
2004 Defender TD5, fully rebuilt in December 2011.
Was it really "fully" rebuilt? As in body off engine out? Nice if it was.I'm sure it's not "heavily modified" in terms of the serious off road trucks you see in theLand Rover world, but it's quite a long way from standard spec. I suppose it depends on your reference points. If I did all of that improvement work to another vehicle, I'd regard it as heavily modified. As opposed to just sticking some nice wheels and a performance filter on...
Fully rebuilt in that it was taken to pieces, soundproofed, engine rebuilt with some improved internals and externals, chassis galvanised, everything refurbished/replaced. Which is nice.
As for servicing - I could do it myself: used to work on all of my cars myself before I moved to London. However, suspect that another buyer like me (town dweller, buys it as a toy/shooting/skiing truck, not a serious off-road enthusiast) would prefer to see a history should I choose to move it on. Local garage is perfectly possible, but I'd prefer a recognised 4x4 or Land Rover specialist. It has a nice history file - I would like to keep it that way!
Edited by Harry Flashman on Wednesday 26th September 11:42
Morning all! Just spoke to Quadretech (all of about a mile and a half from my house) - nice people. Sadly not open on a Saturday for me to go and just chat for a bit, so will need to drop the car off during the week for them to have a good poke around and let me know if anything needs tightening/fixing/replacing - would be surprising if it did, apart from the broken bonnet catch.
Nene did the mechanical work on the car - but it was comissioned by the previous owner. Car was originally a Td5 90 County Station Wagon, so no LEZ issues - I checked before buying: living in London, LEZ compliance is vital...
The seats are indeed bolted to a cross bench thing, so they can be taken out. My objection to the interior is one of utility - all that carpet means that it is a pig to clean after the average shoot, involving dogs, wellies and lots of mud. Thinking of having it de-carpeted actually. Won't look as nice, but will be easier to clean. I'd like to keep the sound deadening matting, but overlay it with rubber instead of carpet, so that I can literally hose the thing out I when I need to. Some removeable carpet mats can be made up if I want it to feel a bit more luxurious, I suppose.
Nene did the mechanical work on the car - but it was comissioned by the previous owner. Car was originally a Td5 90 County Station Wagon, so no LEZ issues - I checked before buying: living in London, LEZ compliance is vital...
The seats are indeed bolted to a cross bench thing, so they can be taken out. My objection to the interior is one of utility - all that carpet means that it is a pig to clean after the average shoot, involving dogs, wellies and lots of mud. Thinking of having it de-carpeted actually. Won't look as nice, but will be easier to clean. I'd like to keep the sound deadening matting, but overlay it with rubber instead of carpet, so that I can literally hose the thing out I when I need to. Some removeable carpet mats can be made up if I want it to feel a bit more luxurious, I suppose.
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