Supersize Defender
Is this the best-looking super-sized Defender 110 double cab in the UK?
Meet the man who reckons he can improve the Defender’s off-road ability by going large
His name is Kill, Chris Kill and he is definitely no ordinary 21-one-year-old. While most lads his age are chasing girls or trying to look cool, he has only one thing on his mind – Land Rovers. In October 2010, the then 16-year-old Chris became the youngest-everLRMcover model. That specific feature was about his first car, a Defender 90, which he rebuilt with the help of dad Steve. So what if he was too young to legally drive it?
His love affair with Land Rovers began long before that when he went to an off-road session at the Devil’s Pit Pay and Play site just outside of Bedford. As I flick through that yellowing October 2010 issue of LRM it becomes all too apparent that even back then, Chris was already showing a unique talent for making ordinary Land Rovers look extraordinary. He had taken a tatty and tired H-reg Defender 90 and turned it into something really desirable.
Fast forward five years and Chris has done it again by building something worthy of another LRM cover feature. Only this time he has taken a 2015 Santorini Black Defender 110 double cab and turned it into the mother of all monster trucks, blowing £20,000 along the way. Life must be good at the moment.
I have to say that over the last few months I have realised that the type of person or business involved in these type of bespoke builds, definitely has a thing for black Defenders. Maybe they are following in the footsteps of Land Rover who also used this colour for their most recent Defender anniversary models? Black is not the best colour for a Defender if driving it along a scratchy lane. Sadly most of these types of Defenders are doomed to a life spent on tar roads, so they probably have no idea about the problem of thorns making their mark on shiny paintwork. The Wilkes brothers will be turning in their graves at the thought of only driving a Defender on Tarmac.
Chris is one of those people some love to hate; after first appearing on the cover of LRM, he somehow managed to turn his new-found passion into a regular job. He spent the next four years working for Foley Specialist Vehicles, an independent Land Rover garage, recognised both locally and internationally as true Defender experts. Now the time had come for Chris to leave the nest and fly solo. His dad Chris helped him set up his own business, CSK Land Rover Specialists, based in Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire. They have only been at it for three years and Chris is extremely happy with how things have gone so far. “Most of our business comes from referals and recommendations. Defenders make up the bulk of our business but we also work on all Land Rovers. We
recently had a chap come from Spain in his Evoque for a remap as we are an Alive tuning agent,” says Chris.
CSK Land Rover specialists have quickly built a reputation for delivering quality Land Rover work. This includes soundproofing, rust prevention treatments, general servicing, specialist mechanical work, custom builds, refurbishments, remaps, galavanised chassis installs, overland vehicle prep and extreme off-roading vehicle prep. They are a small family business with only Chris and his dad Steve as the only full-time employees.
“Sometimes things get a little busy. We recently had 18 cars in at the same time. We have kept things small, that way when something goes wrong, we know who to blame, it was either Dad or me,” chuckles Chris. He also feels that his newly-built monster truck Defender 110 double cab will help to pull in even more business as it's impossible to not to notice it due to the big tyres and a massive lift.
We have decided to put it through its paces at Experience the Country, just outside Milton Keynes, as they have a pretty extreme off-road track. Chris arrives in his monster truck while mum, Elysia, is in a Defender 90. Chris plans to use it as his daily drive and when parked next to a standard Defender it’s like having a baby giraffe standing next to its taller mother. We are all speechless when we see it in the flesh for the first time. Pictures can only show you so much about a car – you have to see it, smell it, touch it, hear it and drive it of course. That is exactly what we plan on doing.
So how and why does one go about creating a monster truck like Chris has? It all started with a simple mock-up drawing based on the popular sixwheeler Mercedes Benz G Wagon that was recently featured on a TV motor show presented by a now unemployed chap called Jeremy Clarkson. Despite the fact that you will struggle to find something as off the wall as this, it does sort of grow on you and it will most definitely be turning heads at Land Rover shows this summer.
“I wanted to create something that would make for a comfortable commute while still retaining the Defender’s off-road capability,” says Chris. There is only one way to find out: take it for a test drive.
I was lucky enough to once upon a time own a new Defender 110 Td5 double cab. I decided to go for the expedition look instead and had someone build me a customised aluminium canopy. It contained a kitchen on one side and all my recovery gear on the other. There was not much space left to pack things in the load area, as this is where the spare wheel was housed.
Most see this space restriction in the load area as a debilitating factor in Defender double cabs. I took the second row of seats out and put a massive fridge there instead. Just like the double cab Defenders in the new James Bond movie, Chris has instead gone the luxury monster truck route.
Building a monster truck is not rocket science. A good place to start would be with the suspension,
“It's more than just big tyres and shocks with super-duper travel”
tyres and wheels. To give it that monstrous presence that Chris so craves, he installed a new heavy-duty suspension kit that included five inch travel shocks and a four inch lift kit. To cope with life in the clouds he put in heavy-duty cranked front radius arms and rear trailing arms, upgraded the bump stops and installed double Cardan propshafts. An adjustable heavy-duty Panhard rod was used to ensure the lateral location of the axle. As looks are important some of the suspension bits were powdercoated red.
Only the correct choice of rubber would help complete the monster look. We have to applaud his choice of 37-inch MAXXIS Trepador tyres on some pretty good-looking bead locked modular wheels. To see if it all worked the way it should we went and found the gnarliest cross-axle we could find. Chris looked a little apprehensive, but I wanted to see if the shocks really had five inches of travel. Chris slowly inched his way into the cross axle while the suspension set about doing its thing. As springs and shocks extended towards the heavens the tyres started to stand at unnatural angles. This was turning into a rather impressive demonstration until rubber met sills and I gestured for Chris to halt. No use ripping the sills off for the sake of half an inch.
To protect the sills Chris took a short reverse before proceeding forward again. There were one or two loud twangs, which is common when doing extreme stuff like this. The suspension definitely did its job and we were able to proceed without any damage.
I had to ask Chris about the drive up on the motorway. Surely bigger and higher is not better when heading out on the highway? “Believe it or not but I was able to comfortably sit at 70mph on the drive down here. Yes you can hear the tyres but that is normal with this type,” explains Chris. Admittedly this was not always the case. Initially it did not pull that well, but thanks to an Alive Tuning remap he no longer has to cruise at 50 or 60 mph.
This truck is more than just big tyres and shocks with super-duper travel. I hopped in for the short drive to our next shooting location. I asked Chris why he had gone this route? “Everyone is lowering them at the moment and so I decided to raise mine and not just two inches,” explains Chris.
From the second I climbed in all I could see was red. It was literally everywhere. The dashboard, handbrake, gearstick, door cards, seats and raised lid of the cubby had all been given a full retrim in red Italian leather. It reminded me of this club in Amsterdam where women did unspeakable things. I decided to look up for some respite as the roof had been covered in (yes you guessed it) black Alcantara headlining. Was it safe to look down yet?
Chris has fully soundproofed his monster truck and for good reason. You can’t drive around looking like a gangster without a decent sound system and Chris has
spared no expense. The CSK sound system package he installed includes front Focal speakers, tweeters and a twin amp setup fitted under the cubby box, this raises the cubby for more drive comfort. My favourite part of the sound system is the JL Audio twin eight inch subwoofer. The bass that it produces is just insane. The sounds are not the only changes to the interior. As has become the norm with these type of builds, the poor original seats have been discarded and replaced with Recaro CS front seats, the back of these new seats have been retrimmed in Alcantara. The standard Defender steering wheel too has been replaced with the smaller Momo Nero. As is befitting a Defender of this level of specification it has also been given a reverse camera and a decent sized screen for the satnav and audio readings. There are many other smaller cosmetic interior tweaks, in fact Chris has changed just about everything except the pedals.
The exterior too has received the full treatment of added accessories. One straightaway notices the SVX grille and JW Evo 2 headlights. In the event of a real blackout Chris has put a 40 inch LED light bar on the roof. Even the must-have 10 mm steering guard has been colour-coded black. So as the DRL bumper, mirror covers, rear NAS step and SVX side steps. This truck is blacker than an ace of spades. When you throw some of the external red finishes into the mix, then it does start to move into the good-looking category. I did have a moan earlier about the lack of space in the load box of a double cab. Chris has overcome this little problem by building a customised bike stand for his 1.7 metre long Supermoto 125cc bike. For this to properly work the tailgate has to be flat.
I have a certain appreciation for what Chris has created, as we spent the best part of a day with his monster Defender. I can see that loads of thought, planning, time and money has gone into it. This truck certainly showcases some of the services that CSK Land Rover Specialists can deliver. However, once the dust has settled from our day out I tried to make sense of it all. There are not many people that can afford to throw an additional £20,000 at a new Defender double cab. However when you consider that Twisted have just announced that they have ordered 240 new Defenders from JLR at a cost of £7million and Urban Truck sold a hundred new Defenders in their first year of business, then you are left in no doubt that there is a growing market for this sort of thing. For a youngster like Chris to produce a monster truck of real quality after only a few years in the business, is nothing short of remarkable. We have seen some of the other work he has done and it too is impressive. At this rate we won’t have to wait another five years until he produces our next cover model. I look forward to that.