SPEND £ 5000

Phil Webber lives for off-roading. He used to have an awesome 90 challenge truck, but recently arthritis and other ill health problems made it too uncomfortable for him to drive around in, so he had to sell it and look for something more comfortable. He decided that a decent Discovery would suit his needs, so he bought a 300Tdi Discovery 1. It came with a nifty light bar with decent lights, and work lamps on the rear as well, plus a snorkel and a CB radio. It had a decent set of road tyres on alloys, arch extensions and side bars, so a few basics were there. The chassis had been regularly Waxoyled as well.

Phil, who had been saving like mad, scoured the adverts in LRM and went on a shopping spree to get the goodies he needed to complete his off-roader. When I popped in to see him he had a house full of swag, with more on the way! This included a Winchmax 1300 winch, complete with plasma rope, which sits nicely in a bumper from World of Bumpers. He added new tree/ rock sliders from Shire Fabrications and a heavy-duty rear bumper plus, for better off-road performance, a set of 265/75/16 Insa Turbo tyress on 8J modular wheels.

He has opted for a 4in suspension lift using 2in blocks from RAC Parts, then a further two inches will be achieved with Terrafirma springs and dislocation cones at the front, plus Xeng’s Xsprings on the rear, which achieve great axle articulation without dislocation cones. Eight-stage Terrafirma remote reservoir shocks are also fitted. All the springs and shocks came from Tim Fry Land Rovers.

Brake hoses were replaced with Goodridge braided ones. After a trip to see Jim Marsden at Gigglepin, Phil came home with ultra-heavy-duty 32mm solid bar steering arms as he doesn't like underbody plate protection, which he says gets full of mud. Gigglepin also supplied heavy-duty greaseable track rod ends.

The rear trailing arms are rose jointed, and the front versions are 6 degrees castor-corrected, due to the raised suspension. The props are the wide-angled version with prop spacers, from Island 4X4. These suspension tweaks mean he can traverse ground that would be impassable in a standard vehicle.

Phil says: "The parts alone came to a shade over £4500, but on top of this I had consumables. For instance, every nut and bolt and screw that I undid was replaced, and with a little bit of labour I had to pay for people to help me, I have spent a shade over £5000 – but it was worth every penny!"