MISGUIDED ADVENTURES
Iventured out to the Malvern Autumn Show back in September, but left two days early so I could go to the Severn Valley Railway to see two of the most famous steam locomotives – the Flying Scotsman and Tornado – running together. Many of the landowners that bordered the railway lines had opened up their fields for parking, which usefully deterred people from blocking up the small country lanes, and I used a full tank of petrol chasing the locomotives in my 1992 Range Rover Classic… the joys of a V8!
The following day, my mate, who I was staying with at the Three Counties Showground event, also wanted to see the Flying Scotsman for the first time, so I headed off to the Severn Valley once again. While on the M5, I activated the kick down in an attempt to pass a lorry but as I did so, there was one almighty bang. With the needle nearly off the scale of the rev counter we were going nowhere; all gears had been lost, with no drive whatever, causing a queue northbound for quite some time. Luckily, another mate who was back at the showground had his low-loader with him. After a frantic phone call to him, and after what seemed like forever but was actually only about 30 minutes, he came to our rescue. The Range Rover was winched safely onto the trailer, and the traffic could resume to normal.
What we couldn’t believe while sat in the middle lane surrounded by nonstop traffic was that nobody offered to lend a hand to get the car out of the way, not even the two passing police officers! I always carry a strop and some shackles so we only needed someone to hook up to and tow us onto the hard shoulder. Sadly we couldn’t push it as the viscous coupling had seized solid, resulting in the car completely locking up, and the splines on the main shaft into the viscous coupling had totally worn away. Fortunately we were able to grab some cones from the nearby road works to surround the car, and it was only in the midst of loading it up that a Highways Officer asked if we were okay.
Once home, I ordered a recon transfer box from Ashcroft Transmissions and as you read this, I’m hoping the Range Rover will be back on the road once again.
I have also been busy browsing ebay for Range Rover Classics. A couple caught my eye, one of which was a spares car for one of my own, but it turned out all of the good parts had already been stripped off it.
However, it turned out that the same owner also had a 1972 two-door that had just flown through its MOT and was up for sale.
This was enough to get me to drive down to Aylesbury to take a closer inspection. I was very excited as it sounded like a good one from what he’d told me – tired outer panels but solid structurally and totally original. On arrival, though, I could see straight away there were problems. The bodyshell was way too late to be an original 1972, the front inner wings had been replaced and, in fact, it was only the front body mount, slam panel and outer wing holding it to the car. Neither of the inner wings was attached to the bulkhead and bulkhead body mounts had been done away with altogether. The sills had been replaced and were welded in only the odd place. As for the state of the welding in general it was awful! It was much the same throughout the rear end too. The interior consisted of two front seats, a steering wheel and a speedo binnacle. The whole dash had been removed leaving just the sharp edges of the bulkhead.
This was now the second car within the last month I had seen with a suspicious 12 months’ MOT but which looked very promising on paper. The other was a 1985 four-door and, again, I had asked the seller in detail about the condition and state of repairs before committing to a lengthy trip. Suffice to say I opened the rear doors to find the sill stopped an inch short of the bottom of the wheel arch, the arches had been badly welded, to the point if you got in the back seat you would probably rip your trousers! The front inner wings had been fibre-glassed, patched and plated badly. Every single body mount was rotten and the rear body crossmember ones had actually fallen off! Neither of these cars were exactly cheap, yet in my opinion both were too unsafe to be on the road.
As these cars keep increasing in value, people will jump on the bandwagon, and do what they can to make a few pounds out of them.
Sadly, some prospective buyers may not know what they are looking for and are very likely to get caught out, as from outside appearances they look great. I would recommend to anyone that any welding work is closely inspected – if it’s been done well you shouldn’t even notice it at all. You certainly need to know what you’re buying, especially on the early two-doors, with so many of them actually later cars. You’ve been warned.