110 defender rebuild project and v8 conversion

Brown said:

Congratulations - hope it's a good move.

Click to expand...

Me too! Haha! Yes it should be.

I have a feeling it's going to be a couple of months of mild chaos though! Still... These things are sent to try us.

I'm currently about half way through getting the 'end stuff' off the front axle.... Those 9/16ths bolts which hold the stub onto the main axle casing are an absolute pig! Pics and write up to follow!

Finally got some time for the landy today!

I decided to tackle the front axle stripping today, and I had hoped that I'd have the whole thing done by the end... sadly not!

I took a good few hours to tackle the "short-side" gubbins - brakes, hub assembly, swivel units, half shafts.... then about 2 hours to do the other side. Obviously I had photos to take during the first side, so that will have slowed me down a little. There were also quite a few bolts done up to the torque setting "all-of-the-torques"!!! bloomin things!

I started off with the radius arms. I undid the 4 x 24mm bolts with a couple of brakers, and then left the radius arms in place, with the bolts just fastened finger tight. The radius arms were invaluable in helping get some leverage on some of the tougher bolts. If you decide to take the radius arms off, then you're going to have to find a way to stop the axle rotating when you reach a tough nut.



Next I got on with the main job... pop off the rubber hub centre cover, and open up the circlip around the end of the half shaft. There were also a couple of shims behind the circlip... All photo'd & put somewhere safe.



Next it was on to the 5 bolts surrounding that area, which allow you to remove the plate:



straighten out the bent lock washer to give you access to the outer hub nut:

20150419_104911_zpsrcq8wcwu.jpg Photo by farmershort | Photobucket

try and use the poxy box spanner (52mm) to undo said outer hub nut:



Once you've realised that this is one of those nuts which had been done up with "all-of-the-torques", you will no doubt have something like this:



See the little nick in the hub nut? That's the answer! a bloody great hammer & chisel was the only way I could get the hub nut off.



Next I took out the lock washer, and the inner hub nut. The inner hub nut was only on finger tight, so much easier with that poxy box spanner. The bearing can then be drawn out, or left in till you take off those whole disc/hub assembly.



I then decided that It's time to do something about the brake calipers, as they were still attached. I undid the brake unions, and then split the calipers by undoing the 4 x bolts (after removing the pins and brake pads of course):



disc, pads, and half a caliper off:



Next came these 6 bolts:





The swively half-shaft was then taken out:





Next came these 2 half inch bolts to remove the rest of the caliper:



and I was left with this:



I then undid the 2 bolts on top of the swivel chamber bit (I have no idea of the proper name of half this stuff!)



Notice the shims underneath... I'd already read up a little about the dreaded swivel shimming, so I was expecting these luckily.



Same proceedure with the lower pin-module thingy, here's the upper & lower next to each other:



Then on to these poxy little 8mm bolts all the way around the rear oil seal retainer (I'm still making these names up btw!)



outer part removed:



Inner part looking all gunky and horrible:



Then it's on to the worst 7 bolts I've encountered so far! They're 9/16ths I think, and it seems that the really really needed to use up a whole lot of thread-lock glue when they put these in! It really was a total pain to get these out on both sides!



Then I put what I possibly could back together for safe keeping:




Obviously I then had to repeat the whole thing on the "long side"... Long half-shaft that is.


and today's small victory looks like this:




My "next jobs" list always seems to be moving sideways rather than forwards... here's the latest to-do list:

strip "ends stuff" off the rear axle
strip diff in front axle
strip diff in rear axle
send axles to shot blasters for clean-up
rebuild swivel ball units
new discs, bearings, pads, etc
clean up and refurb calipers
paint blasted axles
figure out what the hell I'm doing with these diffs!!
rebuild axles

I still need to get the t/box, g/box and engine out of the donor too.

Looks like a productive day. I can't see any bolts snapped off in their housings either, which is even better . I did this with the axles in situ on the vehicle just before Christmas - replacing bearings and seals - so it's all coming back to me. Here it is, back axle first: http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f16/axle-refurbishments-272149.html

Looks like you had a decent day bud, those swivel ball to axle tube bolts can be and absolute ****!
Looks like you made a lovely job of the drive too

Thanks both, and thanks for that link brown.

Yeah the drive came off fairly badly... Need to be a bit more careful with the waste fluids next time.

Just a quick update....

Were moving house over the next couple of week's, and I've just started my new job.

Obviously this has slowed the landy work down a bit, but this is why I am now:

Both axles stripped
Rear axle shot blasted
Rear axle primered with acid #8

Next jobs are to ship the rear axle and the front diff up to James martin for refurb. I'm planning on getting this all done before the move, then I can take receipt of the refurbed units in the new house.

The galv chassis is being delivered next week? And John Eales is progressing well with the engine



A return to form to follow as soon. As I'm able... Plus photos from where I left off.

Hope the new job is working out well - and better than the one you've left behind.

Great progress being made, I've just read through it all and thought I hope he puts some protection down before he dismantles those hubs, never mind if you're moving house anyway

Drop of Gunk and a pressure washer can work wonders.

Thanks for the comments folks... Yep have used the degreaser and pressure washer technique... Will give it another going over before moving out day.

Our local motor factors had sold out of gunk, so I had to go with the car plan degreaser... Seems to do a good job though.

Chassis porn arrived at 6am this morning!

It's upside down mate... ound:ound:

Lol. That's not the only problem!

Not bothered about it being 'in position' as it was 6am and I was trying not to annoy my new neighbours with the noise....

The bigger problem is that it is the wrong chassis! Haha! Richards rang me up an hour ago to see if I've inspected it closely (which I hadn't).... I've got another customer's 300tdi chassis! Hahaha!

I'm lucky that the other customer spotted that he'd got the v8 mounts, otherwise I'd have been stuffed during engine fitting day! Hahaha!

Looks like I'll have to meet their driver again this evening after work to do the swap.

Bloody hell. Lucky Richards wrong you up when they did..

I will be watching with interest as apparently some people have been having difficulty with getting rear tub lined up with their recently bought Richards chassis.

Oh god... Don't say that!

I did a tonne of thread reading before I went with Richards, and I'd come to the conclusion that most of the issues seemed to be historic. I hope that's true!

I'm now meeting the delivery van again this evening to swap the chassis over.

Sorry. Didn't mean to worry you.

From what I have gathered the chassis/engine mounts are fine. Any time I've read about problems has involved rear tub so maybe one of the first things to do is mock-fit the rear tub if possible. That way if everything is ok with that you can proceed with confidence?

Yeah dont worry... I'm always expecting something to go wrong!

Once all of the house move stuff is dealt with, I'll be able to crack on again. James martin should be in possession of my rear axle by now hopefully, so some work is still going on behind the scenes.

Ahhhh..... That's better... The correct chassis!

I have noticed, that most garages have very rough concrete floors. Why is that? Looks like it would be a chore to move a engine hoist or engine stand around, or use a creeper