INSTALLING THE POWERTRAIN

ON A visit to the Land Rover factory at Solihull, just before Defender production came to an end in 2016, I learned a number of very useful tips while watching Defenders being manufactured. The key one that has proved to be very useful in my work ever since, was how the engine and gearboxes are lowered into the new chassis.

I could see that there were three attachment points between the engine/ transmission assembly and the overhead rig which was used to fit the engine and gearboxes. Two of the lifting points were obvious – the lifting eye brackets at the front and rear of every engine. The third lifting point on the transfer gearbox was less obvious, but I made sure that I had a close look.

Previously, I had used various methods to attach the engine-gearboxes lump that I was currently working on to lift it back into the chassis. These could be fairly hit-or-miss: sometimes the lump would lift cleanly and level, while other times the first attempt would be somewhat unbalanced. Methods that were used ranged from chains wrapped around the transfer gearbox, straps, slings or ropes.

On the back of the main gearbox, one of the attachment points towards the top is an M10 stud. This stud helps with locating the transfer gearbox onto the main gearbox and an M10 nut is fitted to the stud to secure the two together – the other fixing points having conventional bolts. At the Land Rover factory, I saw this stud was also used as the third lifting point by the overhead rig.

I have since used a modified Land Rover lashing eye fitted to this stud (on Land Rover and Discovery lumps from early 12J engines onwards) to fit a chain through to create my third attachment point to the engine crane. This has consistently provided a reliable and safe, evenly-balanced method to lift heavy powertrains, albeit always remembering that the engine crane itself is not particularly stable at the reach required. Therefore the crane is never moved under this load – instead the chassis is moved to the correct position.

The Td5 powertrain is now in place on the rolling chassis and the engine crane with chains removed out of the way.

The crane is not moved, rather the rolling chassis is manoeuvred under the raised lump in order to make the operation as safe as possible.

With the chassis correctly located under the powertrain, the load is slowly lowered into place – being kept raised for the minimum amount of time.

The powertrain is lifted from the workshop floor using chains attached at three lifting points, using a correctly rated engine crane.