Oh bugger.

[cpas]

I noticed on Sunday that both my rear spring hangers on my Defender 90 have parted from the chassis!!! I knew the chassis was bad but not that bad!! I've bought a cheap £1000 Disco to tide me over, but am now wondering if it's worth buying a new chassis, or just getting rid and keeping the Disco permanently. I rather enjoy trekking through trees at Yarwell and such places so I'm not sure if I would enjoy the Disco as much as the 90. Just thinking aloud to see what peoples' thoughts are!!

[sherman]

Buying a new landie 90 chassis is about £2000 fitted. Cheaper to keep the disco.

[Lefty]

It depends on a lot of other things. How is the rest of the chassis? You could just get it repaired and painted.

How's the resr of the 90? If the bulkhead, transmission, engine, body etc are all good then it's maybe worth putting a new chassis on.

[DrDeAtH]

you could back half the chassis with a repair crossmember section, comes with new chassis legs (if it is the rearmost spring hangers).

Or, new chassis as already mentioned. Richards or Marsland both do fitting.

[cpas]

The whole chassis looks pretty crap. A friend of mine is scrapping a Disco and we were thinking of cutting the section round the spring hangers out and putting them on mine, but I think the rest is pretty shot. The body is OK but fairly battered from of roading, and the mechanics seem OK and I have done a fair bit of work. My heart says to restore it completely but the sensible side of me says to sell it for parts!!

[DrDeAtH]

sell it for parts? now where is the fun in that?? hardly PH is it?

[cpas]

I'm pretty much determined to put it on a new chassis. The car has done me well for 3 years now and was fairly well under 'list' price when I bought it, so doesn't owe me much - and the cost of a new chassis is comparable to one year's depreciation on my recently sold 5 year old Mondeo!! Also, driving around in a 20 year old Disco doesn't have the same street cred as a 20 year old Defender IMHO! It's only money at the end of the day!!

[Lefty]

Quite right. Discos depreciate worse than an F14 in a flat-spin, with a galv chassis your defender will always be worth £3k.

[Vladimir]

I'm Waxoyling the hell out of my 57 reg 110's chassis! Probably won't work but at least I'll have tried.

A modern vehicle needs rustproofing? Don't be daft!

[cpas]

Lefty said:

Quite right. Discos depreciate worse than an F14 in a flat-spin, with a galv chassis your defender will always be worth £3k.

I don't think my £1000 Disco will depreciate much as it's got £500 or more worth of kit on it (and a 200TDI engine - LOL!!)

[NEAM]

If you've got the money to, replacing the chassis or the parts it needs, defenders are always going to hold value better

www.russelloffroad.co.uk do chassis changes and part chassis changes, but I'm guessing it's quite a distance from you

[cpas]

I'm not too worried about doing the job myself as I'm pretty handy with the spanners, and will bet to see the exact condition of everything on the car - even if it takes me a year. I'm just being tight and wondering if it's worth the investment - but as you say, Defenders with galvo chassis are fetching quite a bit at the moment.