Series 2a rebuild

"The box is crunchy in 2nd but I grew up dd clutching on a moggy thou so that doesn't bother me at present."

Hi Eddy

Just a thought, but that doesn't mean the box is bad. S2a of that age never had synchro on 1st and 2nd.

John

no, well aware of this. the 1st gear no syncro is fine but as usual the 2nd gear is crunchy because of the number of years people have been crash boxing from 3rd to 2nd. it doesn't jump out yet and probably has another 30 years in it if ddclutched properly. i tend to start in 2nd anyway and rarely use the gear after that. 3rd does fine for most purposes until I stop. thanks for this anyway.

x2 x3 whatever figure you came to!

Obviously didn't put enough fresh underseal on it ;-)

Mmm, galv bulkheads - depends on who does it! I think a lot of the warped ones are done by galv operators lacking in skill. Get a reputable firm to do it, ideally one who have done them before. We had a 110 bulkhead done by Highland Galvanisers and they did a good job. No frame involved. Will be having them do a IIa bulkhead in a month or two.

Again, Richards chassis make excellent chassis year specific, and in our 110 case it was beatifully finished and everything lined up perfectly. On the other hand I spent last Saturday getting one of these "generic" LR series chassis from Strathearn Engineering, near Perth (they make them for Britpart) as it was quite a bit cheaper than Richards and we could get it easily and quickly. Finish isn't as good, but it does look like the holes have been reamed out, don't think it has lugs for a tailgate but then we use a side hinged one instead. Does have a funny hole at the back that we haven't worked out what it is for yet...

Not seen that before.

Look on the gearbox seal as a rust preventative chassis lubrication device :-)

I'm a little jealous of the gang mowers...

Not really help but some of my brothers and I are doing the same on a

1970 11a over the next few months. Estimates vary from 3 months to 1 year for completion!

Regards

William MacLeod

In my view the main reason for changing the dynamo for an alternator is reliability. The dynamos tend to have a very short life, although this may be better in a non-dusty environment. I would at least be inclined to replace the bush at the end with a bearing, as this is what fails. Polarity change is a different matter, and simply needed if you want to run any modern electronic equipment.

Whether the bulkhead warps with galvanising will depend probably on the residual stresses in it, more likely on a repaired one, but luck of the draw even so. But I would think that you would be able to pull it into shape afterwards as they are pretty floppy anyway until installed. Should be no problem galvanising the front panel if it is in reasonable shape.

The problem will be that the powder coating will rapidly wear off the surfaces touching - which is what you really want to protect to stop rust. But if the vehicle does low mileage it might be worthwhile. The springs would need to be disassembled and done as individual leaves for it to be worthwhile. I would not worry about the powder coating being flexible enough - I am sure it is, the springs don't bend that much.

The box would have been crunchy in second from new. While it has constant mesh on second it does not have synchromesh. But the constant mesh arrangement will take an awful lot of mashing without problems as there are a number of teeth engaging at once.

Thanks everybody so far. please keep the thread running. I'll be sorting out a chassis from Richards asap next week. comments on budget are well founded, I'm working on a hard earned 2k budget! Willie MacLeod, fancy a double galvanising in July or can you advise further. what are your costings?

thanks all

Eddy

I'd really advise strongly against seriously costing a renovation - it'll never be accurate as you don't know what you're in for till it's done, and if you realise half of the cost you are up for you'd never start the project.

Just accept it's a labour of love, an act of insanity, and enjoy it :)

Karen

Whereabouts are you? If you're not in the Highlands then the cost of shipping will outweigh the cost of galv. Ours is being done on a similar (or less budget) as this is to be a hard working vehicle so no concours restoration here, we just want a long lasting functional vehicle.

Costings so far are:

chassis 620 (ours does have the tailgate brackets you mentioned earlier) stainless + high tensile nuts/bolts/washers 100 welding wire+gas+grinder disks 50 steel 20 alloy 20 wire+connectors+relays+fuses 100 brake bits 100 exhaust bits 40 shocks 45 paint+prep 80 door+door tops 150 carb rebuild 40 fuel tank 55 various hoses+belts 50 blast + galv 200

• lots of other little (and no doubt bigger) bits as well! But our costs are going to be skewed as we can salvage some parts from local wrecks and we have quite a lot of bits like brake line and so on lying around and don't need to hire tools, will rebuild the bulkhead ourselves etc. As far as galv prices go, last time we had

all rear tub cappings dixon bate adjustable tow hitch + brackets bulkhead rear door frame station wagon side frames bumper

• other assorted brakets or plates I can't recall now

and it came to under 200 for everything blasted + galved. Though they really wouldn't give much of an idea of how much it would be for a start, we only found that out when we went to pick it up, they charge by weight difference. HTH

Regards

William MacLeod

Just a warning to both of you - a couple of years ago I repainted my 2a, including complete removal and disassembly of the body so I could paint the chassis properly. The biggest single cost of the job was rubber! Door seals, window seals, windscreen top and bottom, bailey channel, dozens of plugs, plus I used adhesive neoprene foam tape to seal between panels. The prices of individual bits doesn't seem much, but they added up to many hundreds of dollars! JD

Good point JD, we were talking about this the other day, vehicle was fitted with new channels not that long ago but already they are looking past their best! Thinking about trying some plastic channel for the front doors, it already has defender door seals.

Regards

William MacLeod

On or around Fri, 24 Mar 2006 19:43:34 +1000, "Karen Gallagher" enlightened us thusly:

Besides which, It'll inevitably end up going 'way over budget.

On or around 24 Mar 2006 12:05:24 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@macleod-group.com" enlightened us thusly:

good tip from someone, I forget who, about door seals: if you cut off the lip at the edge of the bit that the rubber seals fit onto, you can fit seals from e.g. a Ford Sierra instead.

the series 2a gearbox will allways crunch in 2nd , 1st and 2nd gear is not synchro . usually its the 3rd gear synchro that goes in these boxes . best way to change gear is very quickly after using 1st gear and not with any speed .

if buying a new chassis some garages can get iffy now with the new MOT if the chassis doesnt carry the original number according to the DVLA and V5C .

i dont know if you can have youre original chassis number stamped into the new chassis before galvanising but it may be an idea to ask company to do this for you before they galv it , or you could cut out youre original number from youre chassis and have it welded into a new one before galvanising , then at least you have part of the old chassis on the vehicle .

in essence fitting a new chassis and body panels would render the vehicle as not being original , in effect a NEW vehicle .

i know people get away with all these cut and shut things but each year the dvlc clamp down on it more and more and of course landrovers are some of the vehicles that get new bodies put on old chassis and vice versa, or so say they do .

it would be better to have original chassis number stamped onto new chassis, in same place , and then galvanised , then this would probably satisfy any future MOT inspections and not pose problems for you .

after all if you have old badly corroded chassis you could take photos of it for reference , then because it is so badly corroded you repair almost all of it with new materials and get it galvanised at same time .

in theory you should retain the original part of chassis with number on , on the repaired chassis to enable you to claim it is somewhere near to being the original vehicle and not a new vehicle parading as an old one .

it doesnt bother me what anyone wants to do but forethought is a wonderfull thing isnt it ?.

Two things...

It's my understanding that the DVLA don't consider Land Rover bodywork to be a significant part of the vehicle. You may be confused by later unitary construction where it is.

Secondly, faking the chassis number is just asking for trouble. Documenting the change is fine, but cutting the number from the old chassis and welding it to the new just screams fraud.