minn200

[h=2]Fuel Lines & Fiddling.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Sat, December 03, 2016 12:54:51 December has arrived. That means, in my house anyway, all of the decorations that have lain boxed up in a dusty loft for eleven months of the year now see the light of day once more. What that means for me is a great deal of work putting up decorations, hanging lights on trees and this year it comes with the new experience of putting lights up on the outside of the house. The only problem with hanging lights up on the outside of your home is the fact that you have to get right up the outside wall balancing on a ladder whilst holding onto the long length of dormant lighting simultaneously hammering in the wall clips to keep it all in place. Ten years ago this would not of bothered me but these days I am not overly keen on balancing on one foot on the top rung reaching as far as I can with a hammer wondering why I don't have two pairs of hands because that would make the job so much easier. My daughter asked "Are you scared of heights Dad?" to which I answered "The heights don't bother me kid, it's the falling from them that does" Funny how as you get older you realise you would much rather not do some of the things you used to do without thinking. I recall running up and down the same extended ladder cleaning windows on three storey Victorian houses in the wind without batting an eyelid. You literally could not pay me enough to do that now! Still the lights are up and it will be at least a month before I have to climb the ladder again to take them down again, or I could just leave them up until next year... Progress is being made again on The 110. This week has seen me still focusing on the 200tdi lump I popped in earlier. I decided to have a stab at re-piping the fuel lines and it is here that I must admit that I got it completely wrong. It looked good with all bases covered but there was just one snag, I had not run in the from and returning to the fuel tank. This may have caused the odd running issue so I posted my bad pipe work online with a big help attached to it and quickly got a large number of responses. I seemed to keep getting this relatively simple task tangled up in my head so I popped around to have a look at a friends motor and as soon as I saw underneath the bonnet I had a "Of course you tool" moment. It was a tad dark and cold when I got home so the following morning I rearranged the spaghetti pipework and it all now proudly sits where it is supposed to. I could not find a diagram to easily explain it so I have tried to make one up. Feel free to tell me I have got it wrong! As I stood with my wolly hat on drinking a brew convincing myself that it was not quite as chilly as my body was trying to tell me I was getting I thought I may as well tackle plumbing the the meagre heater once again. Lets face it some heat is better than no heat at all! I knew I did not have the correct 200tdi pipework but what I did have was a tub full of old pipework, so I dug that out and soon mackled together a system that would work. Its not the prettiest looking set up and I no doubt will return to it in the future to redo the whole system but for now it is functional and lets face it, you don't look under the bonnet when you are driving along. That and this old beast is not going to be winning any beauty contests any time soon. The only thing left to do really on this engine is to change the cambelt over. Now I have never done this before and there have been offers of help that I will happily accept as not to bugger up the lump before I begin using it. First up though was to remove the water pump and those swine bolts that like to snap off inside the engine. Lessons have been learnt in the past of trying to force rusted bolts then ending up weeping quietly in the corner before having to drill out and re-tap the threads, so caution was the buzzword of the day. Nearly all of the bolts cracked off and out easily enough but there was of course the two that did not want to move, at all. Off I toddled into the garage to get the long bars and with more force put onto the bolt heads than I ever wanted to use they started to move slowly. I then kept gently moving them back and forward clearing their threads of the rusty crud that was helping to keep them in situ. Patience was the name of the game even when I started to get a little bored with this game but I was rewarded ten minutes later with every bolt having come cleanly out of the water pump! A rarity indeed! I did put all of the different length bolts in a piece of cardboard so as to recall where they all go back into so as not to repeat the transfer bolt mix up! The ease of teh bolts coming out and the fact there is no play at all in the water I have just removed leads me to think it could not have been on the engine for too long before the whole lump was removed. I will still replace it with the shiny new one I have bought though just to be on the safe side. It really is nice to be on the service and put back together side of things now. It feels like the project is running towards getting an MOT which should only be a few months away... nickysmith.me

[h=2]Stats & Pumps.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Sat, November 26, 2016 18:26:57 My youngest was at work. Wifey was out Christmas shopping with her friend for the day, so what does a chap do when the day that lays before him is his own to do with as he pleases? Well what he does is go and grab his friend who's Mrs was out shopping with mine and head off to look at boys stuff all morning! We hit an Army surplus store then headed off to get the bugs for my Dragon looking at all the other impressive reptiles while we were there of course and to top it off we headed to KFC to have a fat git bucket meal for one as lunch! We were home soon enough though so my attention was soon attracted back to the 110. There are a pile of parts kicking about so in the continued fashion of working from the front backwards I dug out some of the easier parts to fit to the engine. First up was the thermostat change over. It has been known in the past that anytime I touch the bolts on a thermostat housing, they tend to just snap off leaving half the stud behind. Today though was a good day! They all came lose with a satisfying crack! I soon had them out and the thermostat looked a little past its best. While this was off I took out the Discovery temperature thermostat then cleaned up the whole area scraping off the area to give a good surface to mate up too. It is nice when you line up and look at the new and old bits you are about to fit... Or is that just me? Everything soon dropped back into place so job one was finished. Next up was the old fuel pump. I don't know what was going there before I bought the engine but an old style series engine fuel pump was loosely bolted into place. Off that came and I quickly fitted a shiny new 200tdi one. I found the easiest way to do this believe it or not was to stand on top of the bumper with one foot on the front wheel reaching in with the spanner and socket from above. Now seemed like a good time to start to reattach all of the wiring to the engine so I steadily worked my way through them adding the odd new end here and there to tally things up nicely. I have come across one problem though. You see I meticulously put tape onto each wire and wrote on it where that wire went to so as to save confusion much much later on when I came to refit them all. Well there is just one left over on the nearside that still does indeed have its hand written label on it but the problem is that it has got more than a little mucky. I cannot know read what it says so feel free to have a look at the picture and see if you can decipher it. I will be needing an alternator plug for the loom as well because the old one disintegrated when I took it off of the old engine. As I sat back warming myself with a well earned brew I decided I may as well hook up a battery and see if the old unit would turn over. So I removed the seat then opened up the battery box, in dropped the battery and I pushed the keys into the ignition. At this point I thought how disappointed I would be if nothing happened here. It would mean that I had done something wrong with the wiring or the starter was past it's best. With a shrug of my shoulders to myself I turned the key around. To my immense delight the engine turned over without hesitation, what a sound! I don't think I have ever been so pleased to here an engine not starting before! This feels like a huge milestone to me. I have had this motors guts out and replaced them with the spec I wanted and blow me it seems to be working! I am so much closer to the end of this project than the beginning it is starting to feel like it may be finished sometime soon... nickysmith.me

[h=2]Doors & Dampers.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, November 24, 2016 23:18:33 Unfortunately The 110 is not my only project, you see Wifey did insist that we bought a house now so we could hopefully grow old and grey in it as the years go by. The thing is that she does insist on putting her own mark upon this new home we shall spend out autumn years in so there is now a "list" of improvements that need to be done. She is one in a million though and is in no great rush to get it all done particularly quickly. That said would not want to impose upon her good nature and just focus upon my own toys all of the time so this afternoon I set to taking down the last pair of 1970's dark brown and shiny doors off of the living room and study. I wish I had taken a picture of them in situ but I forgot if I am honest and trust me here you are not missing anything at all. These types of cheap formica doors were all of the rage with their highly modern smooth mass produced surfaces. The ones in this house have been here since the place was first built. It didn't take long to get to get them down and in all fairness it was no time at all before the replacements were up in place. As always it took longer to sort out the catches and door furniture than the time to hang the actual doors but the overall effect is quite pleasing, even if I do say so myself. It is nice to keep doing these little jobs putting our own stamp on the new home. That done along with a hearty dinner in my belly and I sat down to chill out for the evening. Yea that lasted all of thirty minutes. I am not one to sit around just looking at the TV so I pondered what to do next. Well I have had some shiny sun shine bright LED lights fitted under the car port so I could work on The 110 these long dark evenings. Best try them out then eh! If you recall I was about half way through sorting the steering out on the Land Rover so why not get on with getting it finished? I had popped out at lunchtime to pick up the steering damper so best get on with it eh! I grabbed the front steering bar, fitted it then attached the damper. I had to go back around all of the front end including the replacement steering box to make sure I had tightened all of the bolts and fitted all of the split pins. Would not want any nasty surprises once we get the old bugger back on the road. The only drawback I can see at the moment with working outside in the evening in Winter is that it is damned chilly to say the least! Best dig out that thick old babygrow of mine eh! nickysmith.me

[h=2]Wheel Alignment.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Fri, November 18, 2016 16:38:31 After feeling sorry for myself for a while after realising that I was going to have to make some structural alterations to the passenger foot well so the 200tdi's exhaust does not hit it constantly I wandered back outside to have a look at the motor that seems to be the project destined to last for ever. The steering is sort of half replaced so I took a closer look at what was left to do. As I was hunkered down I recalled that the front wheels needed setting up straight before I would be able to do a great deal. This would save me having to take off/adjust the track rod ends later on in the rebuild. Now I do not own any fancy wheel alignment equipment but what I do own is a long length of rope. I tied this around the rear axle then ran it down the side from wheel to wheel which showed me which way to adjust it. With the first side done and wedged into position I made short work of the other. Afterwards I did a quick double check and great stuff they are both nice, straight and in line now. Then I set the steering box to its centre position and started to fit on the new drop arm. I was advised to do a bit of a mod here so the drop arm is a Discovery one and the new front steering bar I bought did not have any fittings for the steering damper. A quick search on the internet showed that although opinions are split on whether a damper is needed or not it does make the drive a bit better when hitting pot holes etc. Looks like a trip will be needed to exchange some parts that have already been bought but there was a niggling at the back of my mind to check the spares shed out. A quick rummage through a shelf full of junk and a heavy duty front steering bar that came as part of a job lot of stuff was soon found complete with a damper mount already welded on! A quick rub down, removal of the old tired track rod ends then a coat of black paint and shiny new ends is problem solved for me. I do still need to pick up a Discovery 1 steering Damper to fit but the parts I have to return to Paddocks will more than cover the cost of that! All in all it has been a productive day on the old boy.

"Like a Glacier" Probably the best description of a Land Rover rebuild ever! Our first trip would like to be the Coastal 500 around Scotland. We shall see eh

Thank you for the feedback Dan I have to admit I regularly daydream of the travels we will take in it once the rebuild and conversion to an overlander is complete! It, at times, feels like it is taking an eternity to complete but I will literally know every nut and bolt in it! What Land Rover do you have and what are you doing with it?

[h=2]Tow bars & Technicalities.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Fri, November 18, 2016 13:00:06 Isn't life a strange thing. You head off in one direction thinking that a small job will take no time at all but within moments of starting you realise that now it's going to head off in a completely different direction taking up hours of time stood outside in the cold. I headed off this morning to Paddocks to buy a single nut for the steering box so I could get the front end finished only to find that that one singular bit from the hole of a Land Rover is not in stock. A quick change of mind and plans saw me buying the whole of the 200tdi exhaust system as that should be an easy job to chuck on seeing as the conversion down pipe was already purchased and sat on a shelf at home. It was not until I got home that I realised that I had not bought the manifold to down pipe gasket but figured "hey ho" lets get it all offered up to make it fit. I did not get past the conversion down pipe in this. When this pipe is flush to the manifold it still rests on the passenger foot well which will not bode well when I am driving along, so what to do? Well it bloody well looks like I will have to modify the foot well then. I will have cut it out and then make up some new shaped box that will give some clearance for the pipe work when the engines running and moving on its mounts under acceleration. On a more positive note I had a tow bar fitted to my daily runaround by the tow bar chap (because I needed an invoice to keep up the warranty) and this was done in ninety minutes with no fuss at all. I didn't have to lie under it in the rain like he did getting cold as well as soaked to the skin. So what I have done in light of this is buy a ticket for the Euromillions in the hope that I win enough money to either get someone else to finish the rebuild or so I can go and buy an already finished motor and then take great pleasure in burning this one. nickysmith.me

[h=2]Steering Boxes & Seats.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, November 17, 2016 10:51:58 As you can all see from my delays in writing anything I have been more than a little busy of late with life in general as well as family illness including my own, that bug that's doing the rounds is a doozy! Whilst lounging around the house generally feeling a bit rough and sorry for myself I became aware once again of the odd moaning and creaking noises it makes. These sounds worried me sick when we first bought the place as I was so damned sure inside of my crazy head that something would fall down or break but now it is a different story. Those sounds are just the house itself as it warms up and cools down. It's about the same age as me so it's bound to have the odd moan here and there, I mean the poor bugger is getting on now you know! But now those sounds that once sent me into a quiet worried despair thinking I had bought a lemon now bring a quiet sense of homely comfort. They go mostly unnoticed as such but when they do reach the surface of my mind, I know I am home. There has been the odd hour here and there on the 110 though so some progress is being made with my main focus being on the steering box. This really is a straight forward swapping over procedure. Firstly I removed the nut and bolt from the steering column UJ. Then came off the front steering bar on the box's drop arm. Four bolts that run through the chassis came undone without too much of a fight and the box then literally dropped off. I slid the replacement power steering unit on and much to my surprise it bolted straight into place without any messing around with the holes on the chassis. I do need to go and pick up a new bolt to hold the steering box arm in place though. It will be nice to have power steering on the motor. Seeing as it will be our camper/overlander I want it to have as many of life's little creature comforts as I can fit! There has been a great deal of pondering on what I would like to do seat wise. I have gone from outlandish captain seats through to RX-8 seats in my mind, but after even more contemplation I decided why mess with design and started a bit of a hunt for some standard Defender seats. What I did come across in the end was two separate pairs of seats. One had a good drivers seat and the other a good condition passenger one. The money was right on both sets so I bought them and made myself a good pair. They are not fixed in place yet as there is still far too much to do on the inside but once recovered they will be spot on. It is damned good to see a pair of seats in the old boy once again though!

[h=2]Propshafts Revisited.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Fri, November 04, 2016 13:02:29 Well I am a man who is happy to put his hands up and admit when I got it wrong. And I did get it wrong. When i refitted the rear propshaft yesterday I put the damned thing on the wrong way round and to say I got a few emails about it would be an understatement! Happily though all were in a good natured tone and none were mean enough to call me outright stupid! This morning then was spent doing my favourite job of taking off then putting back on the fiddly little propshaft nuts. In the end it took about forty minutes of messing around but happy days it now sits correctly as it should! Seeing as I was dressed up in my mucky clothes I then set to removing the pan hard rod on the front, treating the metal whilst it was exposed then refitting the replacement one with the new bushes in. Not a bad potter for a Friday morning before heading off to work. This is the way I like it, two little jobs done instead of just hanging around waiting to start the work that we have to do to pay the bills. Hopefully I can carry on in the same vain...

[h=2]Propshafts & Parcels.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, November 03, 2016 19:16:50 It has been an interesting sort of few days. The Disco has gone which has left me to focus just upon the 110 which is a good thing really. You see I have been stretching myself rather on the thin side. The problem with pushing yourself too far with too many things is that you start to lose your focus, my perspective has shifted between too many things like keeping several motors running as well as doing up the house. Add to that the hours at work well things just mounted up. With the disco gone it's one less issue to look at and I do feel a damned site better for it if I am honest. The next thing though is that my focus has turned towards the 110. I hopped back on board yesterday morning with a pair of spanners in hand to get the propshafts reattached after the engine and transfer box swap. The front one just kind of fell into place and was soon all tightened up. For the rear I dragged it all into place along with myself to offer it up and wondering why it was all of a sudden too spacey? I lay there on back trying to figure out why the bolts met both ends but what was that space??? Then the penny dropped. I suppose I had better put the handbrake drum back into place first. That didn't take long either but doing the nuts and bolts up seemed to take an age with me ended up jacking up one side on the front and rear so I could turn propshaft around making access a little easier. With that done it was time to write a big list of what I needed to buy to get this project up to MOT status. The list was indeed a long one. A trip to Paddocks it was then because I have sold a few bits this week so the kitty was sitting pretty, well until I got there. My poor little car was weighed down with a full boot as well as the back seat being covered. I have a great deal of parts now that will take me almost until the end of the build. There are still a few things like an exhaust system that needs to be modified and fitted along with the pipework for the coolant system but I will get to that. I also need a pair of seats and I will go with the RX8 ones I think. There's a few things coming in the post as well so I have no excuse not to pull my finger out now. The jobs that are ahead are all smaller in nature, which I like. It means I can potter about with different jobs that have different timescales. Nothing else will be really forced to completion, I can step up and step out at any point so hopefully the build will be plodding along nicely now... nickysmith.me

[h=2]Crossmembers & Weeping[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Tue, November 01, 2016 09:05:31 Being a father to four kids I am not easily surprised these days to see one of them sporting the latest trend in fashion or head wear styling. I have learnt over the years to keep my inner thoughts to myself so as to not upset the little dears or sound all old and grown up like my parents did. Well, hang on a moment I am being unfair here to my parents because my Dad just used to rip the mickey out of me for sporting the latest trend with literally no holds barred. Maybe I am just a little more diplomatic with my children... No that's a lie as well I do tend to rip the mickey out of them just not to the soul destroying level Dad did it to me. I think the official term is character building. So to see something several times in one day that makes me stop stop and think "What on earth is that on your head?" is unusual. When I first noticed this new fad I was walking down a corridor at work when a young chap with reasonably long hair came bouncing towards me from the other direction. I did a second snap of the head look take at his head because he was wearing a plastic hair band keeping his mid length locks back in place. Straight away the Dad in me wanted to take over with a dozen, in my eyes, witty quips but as soon they nearly came out I realised I was at work so I had to hold them back. This though did not stop me staring and grinning at the poor lad like some lunatic keeping back the roars of laughter that wanted to escape my insides. Now this young fellow is not alone in his funky personal styling with a £1.99 plastic Alice band. Oh no I have now seen at least a dozen pillocks I mean young men wearing these. I may well be into my forties now but I don't think I am that "Old". I am all for living life and expressing yourself but come on guys you are really letting the side down here I mean, this must be on a par stupidity wise as the "Man Bun" where you stuck a fresh roll on the back of your heads and covered it with hair! Still each to their own I suppose and many will think me mad for wearing a babygrow then working on a motor that should of hit the scrap heap many years ago. Speaking of the scrap heap I have spent a little time playing on the 110. The stage that I am still at is the putting it back together one from the engine and gearbox swap but headway is slowly being made when I get the time. First up was fitting the shiny new clutch slave cylinder I bought just because I was changing the clutch over and the old one looked pretty damned tired. It was soon set into place after a few frantic minutes of scrabbling around looking for the bolts only to find this nice expensive branded part leaks. I have nipped it up as far as it will go but nothing will stop the drip of clutch fluid until the reservoir ran dry. It could be the old pipework or the new part but what I will do is replace the pipe first then strip the part out if a good seal cannot be made to swiftly return it to where it was bought from. It was then onto popping the crossmember back into place. This is an easy job providing you do a couple of things before trying otherwise it becomes a struggle you will not win. Firstly try to just fit it back into place without any prep work. Secondly get the damned thing stuck dry metal to dry metal after hitting it with a large hammer to try to make it move upwards. Thirdly hit it with a hammer and large piece of wood from the top to get it to drop back onto the floor. After removing it from under the truck give it a good rub down removing any rust build up and grease the hell out of it. Do the same thing to the chassis it is supposed to fit onto. Then my friends it will be able to be gently knocked into place with no struggling, swearing or pulling of shoulder muscles when trying to swing a large lump hammer whilst lying down underneath it. Next job will be refitting the propshafts now I have pressure washed the 30 years or so of muck build up off of them. Then I best get the transfer box linkages put back together if I can figure out how to do it!

I have a few folks wanting bits already but that will leave it a runner so I may go down that route. I also have someone who wants the axles so I am telling him he needs to take to the whole motor! A few pounds should be coming towards the 110 rebuild either way

[h=2]The Discovery's Dying.[/h]The Discovery Project...Posted by Nicky Smith Mon, October 24, 2016 15:53:44 Today I found myself running the Dad errand of taking my youngest daughter to her first job interview. Seeing as the old Disco that has been sat for a week that was my chariot of choice for this small run. All was going well, in fact the old girl was running just fine as I sat there chatting with the baby of my family, until something caught my eye in the rear view mirror. There were plumes of thick blue smoke pouring out of the exhaust. Hmm that shouldn't have been happening of course so I looked down at the temperature gauge which was sitting quite unhappily in the red. At this point I had two choices. On the one hand if I kept driving I doubt much good could come from whatever was happening to the engine but on the other if I stop now in what is essentially my back up motor that has been slowly falling apart my daughter would miss her interview. No brainer really, I kept going. It was only a few more miles and the old boy made it no problem. As she trotted off to see if she could get a job I popped the bonnet and had a look to see if it was anything obvious. The coolant was low so I topped it up after the engine had cooled down. With a shoulder shrug to myself I dropped the bonnet down and decided not to worry about it. When my daughter returned with a smile and a "It went alright" we started to head home. It ran hot once more but to add insult to injury the nearside front brakes started to play up again. Every time I braked the Disco tried to shake itself apart. If you imagine a warped disc that had cracked and each time the pads go over that crack the wheel tries to break free of its nuts...yea it feels just like that. This would be coming from the side that has been rebuilt several times now so that along with the now warm engine means I am done with it. No more money will be spent on an old Discovery because I now have to make a choice. I can spend my money on trying to fix an ancient Discovery that has done over 200,000 miles or on the 110 that is months away from completion but any further delay will in all honesty will leave me with such a distinct lack of enthusiasm that the project may never be completed. So now I own two Land Rovers that don't really work. Typical eh...you have to love the green oval reliability. Now then do I strip it or sell it scrap??? nickysmith.me

[h=2]Fumbling & Filters[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Mon, October 17, 2016 19:18:53 My new approach is definitely "Do a bit when you can" where the 110 is concerned. There is still so much to do on it that the only way I do not get fed up with it all ending up selling the damned thing is to look at one job at a time. I fell into the frame of thinking that when I worked on the Land Rover it had to be a whole day at a time. But I find myself just getting back into the pottering type of do a bit at a time type of progress. Today I had a spare hour so I started with popping a bracket into place between the alternator and fuel pump bracket making sure that I had all of the bits that were needed... With that done in a few minutes I set to popping the wiring back into place on the starter motor... Then last but not least for the day was swapping over the old type of fuel filter housing for a 300tdi one that will make it easier to change over and service as and when needed... As I looked at all of the fuel pipes that are littered around the engine bay I realised that I have absolutely no idea where they are all supposed to do. That goes for the linkage on the gear/transfer box as well. If anyone has any pictures please feel free to pop them up! I did try to adjust the accelerator cable to fit the 200tdi but the outer casing disintegrated so I guess that will now get added to the parts list! A few more little jobs down now though which makes it just a little bit closer to being finished. nickysmith.me

[h=2]Slowly Slowy...[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Sun, October 16, 2016 11:23:06 Wouldn't it be great to have a tail. I was sat last night with my family enjoying a tipple when I got around to watching the dog. She seems to be able to express all of her emotions just using her tail! I just said her name quietly and received a quick flick of the end of the tail that seemed to express a little hope that she had heard right from where she was lying down but not sure enough to yet come running. I repeated her name loudly and she literally grinned jumped up with her tail wagging happily generating enough wind force to run a small wind farm. Admittedly everyone would know what we are thinking most of the time if we had one ourselves but I bet there is something immensely satisfying when you get to wag one! Back to the 110 then. With these 12 hour shifts at work I am finding it hard to get any sort of decent time in on the rebuild at all but I managed to get an hour in yesterday just pottering around. Seeing as we are at the putting it back together stage an hour here and there can make a fair bit of difference. The gearbox got earthed, the reverse switch put back in then I confused myself as how to make the speedo cable stay in place. One job I wanted to get out of the way was putting all of the studs and bolts back on around the bell housing. This is where it started to get a little weird. If you think of the circle of the bell housing, the top half of that circle has the threads in place for the studs and bolts but the bottom half has no threads at all, as in none. They have never been tapped!? Is anyone else's 200tdi like this? I wish I had noticed before we put it back into the 110 but hey ho it wouldn't be a Land Rover if I didn't have to sacrifice some more blood and skin whilst lying underneath it in a contorted position...

[h=2]Decision Made.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Mon, October 10, 2016 18:18:32 After a great deal of pondering about what type of wheels I want to go with on the 110 I decided to go with the 16x7 Black modulars. 2 bought with my birthday money and three to go as and when I have the cash! nickysmith.me

Yep that would have indeed been a little annoying!!

[h=2]Pick Ups & Put Downs.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Tue, October 04, 2016 14:58:52 There were great big heavy lumps of metal everywhere underneath the 110. In fact there was no large metal lumps left at all in the 110 and this left me a little miffed with what lay ahead. But as with all insurmountable chores that lye ahead you really just need to chose a point to begin then take it from there. An old friend was up for the day to give me a hand in what was meant to be a quick change over of the transfer box before popping it back into position. Easy eh? But the best laid plans never go to plan. It didn't take long to separate the transfer from the gearbox and that really was the easiest part of the day! With that done my friend, who is a mechanic by trade, piped up with "Well lets get the engine in then." "What!?" I said. "Lets get the replacement lump in, then pop the gearbox on and finish with the replacement transfer box." "Err ok then" I replied. So with that very short conversation the afternoon had changed from a quick swap and lift into place of the gearbox end into a lets get all the big bloody metal lumps back into where they are supposed to be sort of affair. This I was not expecting at all. Out came the engine crane along with the 200tdi attached and in what felt like a matter of minutes it was dropped straight into position with minimal wiggling. Before we popped it in I replaced the rear seal behind the fly wheel (I forget what it is called) because I did not fancy having to pull the whole thing out again to change it later and seeing as the engine has been sat around for a couple of years I figured prevention is better than cure. Then I scrubbed up the fly wheel itself before we fitted the new clutch. It was now time to refit the gearbox but would it just drop into place? Nope. We twisted we wiggled I even called a friend in case I was missing something obvious but after a bit more jiggling as well as turning the engine over by hand slightly we had the whole thing in place. It was at this point that my friend said "Oh you are not going to be happy with this" then he pointed to the clutch release bearing that had somehow dropped out when he was manoeuvring the gearbox around on his legs. So off came the newly fitted gearbox once more and the merry go round started again! It was all good though and before we knew it the transfer box was refitted to boot (along with replacement seals first of course). After a quick meal we were back out popping on the replacement gearbox mounts. I made that sound easy didn't I but it was a pig of a job to do. At this point we were both getting to the "more than had enough of this point" but we pushed on until they were in place. It was now that we realised that we really should have kept the transfer box bolts in order because they are all different lengths. This still needs to be sorted but we had had enough so seeing as the whole lot was now securely in place we both walked away to get washed up. I am now a damned site further ahead than I planned to be around now and I thank my friend for that. I do need to try and find some enthusiasm for the project again though because I am still pig sick to my back teeth of it! Having said that I am now once again at the point that I can just go out and potter from time to time on little easier bits. So forward we go folks pushing just a little further each week to get this old beast back onto the road... nickysmith.me

[h=2]Films & Fumbling.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, September 29, 2016 16:14:27 As I sit here writing this I have popped the TV on for a change, I fancied some background noise for a change. The programme I managed to find is an old 1950's B movie about a Plasticine monster from Venus that is set to rampage around Rome whist the rather well spoken Army folks chase it around generally making things worse whilst trying to kill the poor bugger using whatever the biggest weapons they can find. Our poor women though, bless them because all they can do is stare straight ahead at the danger raising their hands to their faces and scream at the top of their lungs at the horror of it all! I mean it might mess up their lipstick or hair styles for goodness sake...where are all of the strong men to deal with the issue?? You have to love it. I often look back at the simplicity of the past compared to the present. Then I get to wondering if our grandchildren will be doing the same in another 70 years? Still I waffle on a bit too much about this so as the polystyrene boulders fall I shall make my way back to the 110 and it's gearbox removal. It's out. It's just lying there on the ground looking at me laughing at how long it took to come out and now knowing I am shattered so it will sit right there under the 110 waiting to be dragged out by me and a friend later. Then I will get to fitting the replacement transfer box that I am collecting later this evening. I got the bugger out using two large trolley jacks in the end. Up went one end then the other. Out came a big crowbar that was used to lever the lot to the left then the right getting clearance to drop it down. Add into the mix some large bits of wood to protect it from the jacks themselves and after thirty long fumbling minutes the damned thing finally hit the deck...out...done. The 110 then got jacked up on the nearside to give me easier access to try to drag it all out and this led to a bit of an annoying revelation. You see now that its all jacked up on one side I think I will be able to get the engine crane in through the door...that'll make life a little easier getting the whole lot back into place eh. Oh and if you are wondering what happened in the film, the beast from Venus could not be killed by any weapons but the clumsy bugger fell off of the top of the Colosseum in Rome and killed itself. You would think after travelling all that way from Venus it would pay a little more attention to it's surroundings but the 50's women all climbed into their men's chests for happy reassurance that the world was right once again. nickysmith.me

[h=2]Not Much Left In.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Mon, September 26, 2016 14:18:30 Honestly I have been crazy busy with life of late. Family have been coming and going, in fact I have had more family along with friends visit lately than ever before so with all of that good company along with trying to fit in a bit of walking and other hobbies, time has really been tight. Now I will readily admit here that I am on the "Little bit fed up" side of the rebuild at the moment but I still try to get at least a few hours in once a week if I can. Without reading back through my blog entries I cannot recall if I have said what ratio transfer box I was going to go with. It will be the Discovery 1:2 ratio and the box is already bought. The reason I have gone for that ratio s the 110 will be my cruiser/camper that is going to rack up the road miles like nothing else. There will be no off roading with it apart from where it will be parked up for the night. So with that in mind I have started to remove the gearbox so the transfer box can be changed over and the gearbox mounts replaced. This is not a five minute process. First things to be tackled were the propshafts and the challenge of getting the very rusty nuts and bolts off. These off course are quite easy to get to from underneath but what I would not recommend is the following when tackling them. As you lie on your back with spanners in hand do not, I repeat do not put so much pressure on the said spanners that when they ultimately round off and slip off of the nut you are trying to loosen you get to smack yourself with a full force punch square in the middle of your face. Then after the tears have passed and the pain has subsided enough that you can once again see reasonably clearly do not then realise you were wearing your last pair of good glasses that now sit splayed bent outwards on themselves with two broken arms. After weeping quietly to myself in the corner of the garage for a few minutes I went and got my reading glasses so I could see what I was doing when trying to repair my now rather sorry looking specs. A bend here and a couple of strips of black electrical tape later and voila! A nicely repaired set of bins. Back to the bonded bolts then. After some muttering along with lots of lubrication both propshafts were soon removed. Once the handbrake, reversing light wires and accelerator cable were removed I drained off all of the fluids from both boxes. But that was the end of my day. I was tired and funnily enough had a headache/faceache coming on in earnest so removing the cross member and then dropping the box out will have to wait until later in the week. Quite honestly I don't think there is anything else mechanical that I have not removed now! But I can rest easy knowing that once i have put the better engine and transfer box back in and popped the front end back into place, it will look like I have done sod all for the last couple of months! nickysmith.me

Happy Days chap!! I am looking forward to getting mine on the road and burning up a few miles of tarmac

[h=2]Parts & Panels.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Wed, September 14, 2016 16:57:26 When you take an engine out of any motor it gives you the opportunity to get to otherwise unreachable places. So with that in mind I decided that now would be a good time to scrape off all of the years and years worth of accumulated dirt and oil from the front chassis. This sticky dirty mess has done a superb job of keeping any form of rust at bay but at around 10mm thick was now getting a bit on the thick side. Placing some cardboard along with an old shower curtain underneath to catch the mess as it fell, I set to with a shiny new wallpaper scraper getting the muck off. It literally ended up everywhere! I was covered in the stuff including the back of my head...I mean seriously how the hell did I get it on the back of my head when the scraper was an arms length away all of the time?? Still it's all a means to an end and when i had nice cleanish metal in front of me I set to with the underseal giving liberal coatings everywhere I could including the whole of the bulkhead as who knows when I could be getting back into there again! I was working on the prevention is better than cure line. Once finished I stood back happily perusing all that looked clean and decided the heater box needed a coat of Hammerite as well while it sat exposed. The results are very pleasing. Is it just me that gets a geeky kind of pleasure when you have done this sort of thing? When we bought this house one of the larger things that had been started but not finished was the conservatory at the back. All of the hard graft had been done on the groundworks side of things but the outer skin wall was where it all ended. Seeing as this was all at the top of the damp course level of the bricks it was top of the list of priorities to get done before the Winter sets in. Now this is probably beyond my capabilities so I have had a chap in to complete the plastics works who was recommended by a few different friends and it is indeed coming along nicely now. I had to be in yesterday as he was here for most of the afternoon and evening needing the odd hand with a more awkward part which left me with lots of time for pottering on the 110. Seeing as parts are at a premium I set onto getting one side of where the tub meets the chassis patched as it was corroded. Should of been an easy job but as these bloody fiddly jobs tend to do it took nearly three hours. I ground off the old nuts and bolts then measured up for a new panel to make. That was then set into place and riveted along with the four nuts and bolts re-added. I was going to underseal it but it had got that hot in the afternoon the seal had melted in the tin to a runny mess so no hope of it sticking to anything then! Still I must of been cooler than the poor bugger that was fitting the conservatory because the sun sat high in the sky beating down on him all afternoon! I then managed to sell a couple of unwanted Disco bits to a chap who came round giving me just enough to go and buy the clutch for the 200tdi engine today! That's now one step closer to going in than it was before. It was then onto the final potter of the day painting up replacement pan hard arm and fitting the new bushes. Am I going over the top painting these new bits that are going to be fitted? Maybe but just once I want the whole thing to look nice before the rust fights back through or the weather takes its toll. You have to admit it to yourselves though that car parts always look better when painted. Possibly the funniest thing I have seen today though is my dog sitting next to the conservatory doors waiting to be let in through them...they have not been glazed yet. nickysmith.me

Evening John, Sorry for the delay in replying I have not had much internet time lately! It should drop straight in without any modifications. Dependant on the gearbox there may be a hole or two to drill but hopefully not! A 300 tdi would be a different kettle of fish altogether though!

[h=2]The Crane Works.[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, September 08, 2016 19:30:10 Well I have talked the talk, now I am happy to say I have walked the walk. Yes folks I am past the point of no return where the engine is concerned you see it is finally out. Now I have two choices I can either put the original back in or get on with the 200tdi conversion...I bet you can guess which way I am going. It was just a couple pf days ago that Wifey told me to "Get the 110 under the car port so you can work on it properly". So it was quickly parked up then the strip down began. Off with the bonnet and wings then I had to drain down the coolant, which was very clean and new so someone has looked after this at some point, and then out with the old tar like engine oil. That was the easy bit done now I stood back slowing myself down a touch so I could put things bacl in the right place when the 200tdi goes in. I decided that the easiest way to do this was to use masking tape around the wiring/cables I removed as I removed them so they could be easily identified. Feeling glad I had made this early save I plodded on systematically removing wiring marking it up then taking off the pipework putting it into boxes along with tying it back out of place. In short order I realised I had disconnected everything from the engine itself so that only left undoing all of the bolts from the bell housing and to get to that I would have to remove the floor pans I had painstakingly fitted months ago way before I decided on an engine swap. With the floor pans out along with the tunnel itself, much to my surprise the nuts came away from the gearbox easily. Within the space of a mere few hours I was now ready to remove the engine but the day had grown long so I enlisted a friend to give me a hand to remove it. The following lunchtime saw us digging the engine crane out of the garage along with a some rope to lift the lump clear. Now here in lies a tale of caution for you because we got away with it with nothing more than a little luck but you may not be so lucky. This particular bit of rope was rather old and even though seemed up to the task we only had the engine up a couple of inches before it snapped clean and the lump dropped perfectly back into place onto its mounts. Literally the luck of the Devil there because even though we were standing clear at the time the engine could of done a deal of damage to the 110 itself not to mention the driveway! After a couple of "did that really just happen?" moments I dug out a much stronger strap and we had another more tentative go at getting it out. This time it was much better with it all coming out easily. It was soon dropped down into the corner out of the way leaving me with the job of scraping clean the chassis and while I have the access I will underseal the whole of the bulkhead as well. As soon as payday comes around I will order a new clutch kit and look to get the 200tdi into place asap. nickysmith.me

[h=2]Rear Trailing Arms...[/h]The 110Posted by Nicky Smith Thu, September 01, 2016 08:19:20 If I never ever ever see another rear trailing arm bush it will be a day too soon! Right then I best calm down as I still have a headache from lying on my back all day yesterday in weird contorted positions and I would not want to burst a blood vessel now it's all over, if there were ever a time to do it that would have been yesterday afternoon about 5pm. Let's start at the beginning. After my happy day of changing the front brakes over I decided that seeing as I had another all to myself free day I would make some real headway on the 110 by changing the trailing arm bushes. "Shouldn't be a hard job" I thought to myself as I had a shiny new hydraulic press in the garage. It was about ten minutes after that thought I began to wish I had not started. The old bushes were completely shot and as in everything else I have done on the 100 so far it was all covered in a good layer of rust. Happily the nuts along with the bolts came undone easily leaving me feeling that this was a good omen for the rest of the job to come. I was mistaken. The grinder had to come out to make short work of the bolts that held on the main bush to the chassis towards the front (seriously don't bother messing around with those little rusty buggers just go an get your grinder out and save yourself the hassle) and with that the whole arm came away with both of the old bushes still intact. Keep your grinder out here because if yours are anything like mine you will need to cut off the front metal spacer here to then remove the old bush but this is just the start of the hell that is coming your way and is the rear bush... I cleaned up the back end around the bush and confidently popped it into the hydraulic press. Soon enough I had it wound up way past its maximum pressure and that happy little bush just sat there not moving a millimetre. No problem I thought to myself so I turned it over to rinse and repeat from the other side. No joy there either so I dug out my drill and set to removing the rubber from the bush with that. What a lovely smell burning rubber makes in a confined space but it was soon out (about fifteen minutes) so out came my hacksaw to cut through the metal bush outer before hammering the hell out of it to make it leave it's comfy nest. A quick clean up after it was gone and the polybush was quickly put into place. Now thankfully putting the whole thing back into place on the 110 was an easy enough affair that came with a nice warm feeling of satisfaction that I had beat the bloody thing, I had won! Then I realised that there was still the other side to do! The arms need a lick of paint but that will be in a while and now the 110 is sat the right way around facing the garage waiting for me to start stripping the front end down to remove the old N/A engine so I can drop in the 200tdi I have sat waiting. Things are about to get interesting... nickysmith.me