Brisbane Garage
I’M typing this with hands caked in oil and remembering it’s my turn to make dinner tonight. I wonder how many of you are reading this month’s LRM with hands in a similar state? I think it’s part and parcel of owning an older car. Now that I’m working on Land Rovers on a daily basis I recently made the sensible step of buying a large box of nitrile gloves, but of course keep forgetting to put them on (and before you know it, it’s too late).
Thoughts for this month... Parts! I recently bought a new project, it is a 109 Series IIA and what excited me most was the box of new old stock (NOS) parts it came with. There is something rather special about old packaging and parts that have remained unopened for over 50 years. Included were two clutch friction plates which are definitely made from asbestos containing material (apparently a far superior product than that of modern clutches), various oil seals made from leather and with nice strong steel inserts, a speedometer cable and an assortment of bearings. Why do all of these products feel superior to their modern counterparts? Hub oil seals are a good example: most of the ones you buy now are flimsy and leak within weeks of fitting. It is frustrating and I am sure people would be willing to pay more if it meant they got something that was fit for purpose. Whilst part of me wants to keep all the NOS parts I am going to use them and see how they perform. I have snapped multiple new speedometer cables so I am eager to see how my NOS one performs.
Continuing with parts, I have been working on a Defender 110 Double Cab this week. It is a rare vehicle here. They were never in dealership showrooms, you had to order them in if you wanted one. The one I am working on has had various aftermarket additions including front grille, headlight surrounds, fibreglass Puma-style bonnet and LEDS. The combination of poor installation and quality of parts has been really quite shocking and lets this poor Land Rover down. It has come to me to rectify the issues. Starting with the bonnet, it has no structural reinforcement so the whole thing flops about and does not sit square. Not only did it look terrible, it also meant that the paint on the wing tops has rubbed through to bare metal. The issue was compounded by the absence of the two rubber buffers that should sit either side and allow adjustment. Then there is the ‘DEFENDER’ lettering, I suppose it would have been straight when the bonnet was not sat level.
Lots of people like to put LEDS on their Defenders and I think it’s a good idea – the old units do not give out much light and regularly suffer from poor connections. This Land Rover has had all its lights replaced with LEDS and it has also gained some driving lights in the front bumper, they look great until on closer inspection you can see large cables trailing down between the bumper and front wings. Part of my job has been to re-route the cables so you cannot see them and in doing that I found where they had been spliced into the main loom behind the headlights. All the connections were held together with electrical tape. Considering this work was carried out by a Land Rover specialist I have been really quite shocked by the lack of thought and consideration.
My advice for those of you looking to get aftermarket additions put on your Land Rover? Exercise caution! Whilst a garage might be fantastic at mechanical repairs, this does not necessarily translate across to bodywork and wiring. You might be better off getting that sort of stuff done by a specialist bodyshop and / or auto electrician.
I now want to talk about front grilles. Who else remembers that hideous SVX edition that Land Rover released for the 60th? The SVX was characterised by a protruding silver headlight surrounds and grille, that look terrible. Have you noticed how many aftermarket suppliers now make similar grilles? Whilst they might not be bright silver, they still look cheap and nasty. Why are people doing this to their handsome Defenders? I would love to know the attraction. For the record, I do not think all aftermarket grilles look bad – some of the metal ones look pretty good and may even be an improvement over the stock, standard style (had to cover myself there since I am fitting a metal grille on the Defender 130 I am working on).
You know when you buy an older Land Rover and start doing work on it? A common criticism is wiring. We will say things like, “What was the previous owner thinking?!”... “There are wires everywhere, it’s a real rat’s nest...” Well, it is confession time for when it comes to ‘Old Girl’, my 109 IIA, for I am the guilty party. The wiring is a combination of old and new, naturally all wires are the same colour and I admit, there is a certain amount of electrical tape holding it all together. I feel I can confess to my sins because I have just ordered a new loom from Autosparks. By the next column, who knows, perhaps I will be driving around with fully functioning headlights?
“There is something rather special about old packaging and parts that have remained unopened for 50 years”