No shooting necessary, it's a very valid question, and you're right - a F2 is perfectly capable and indeed we have a guy going in a F2.
Other than Mark rebuilding every aspect of his D1 because it is his passion and needed doing (well... maybe) - preparation is simple, you need a well maintained, reliable vehicle, descent set of A/T tyres, potentially a bit of underbody protection and ideally a snorkel, though, neither are essential.
There are some other useful things - twin batteries will allow you to keep a fridge running all night long in the desert, quite useful, a roof tent gives you some advantages, but, also some disadvantages, etc.
That's it really. The main thing is reliability. Wheel bearings are an obvious point - they're going to take
some serious hammering - they're cheap items, it would be silly to not replace them before you go. A good service by any garage isn't going to be cheap, but, you are putting the vehicle through a lot mileage and terrain wise, so, you want it
running at its best.
I wouldn't say I have done anything overly unnecessary - i've gone with performance brakes, but, i'd have done that anyway for UK driving. It's had a proper service which was expensive as it's a D3 and instead of saying to leave a few bits as we'd probably squeeze another year out of them, i've had them done - they're not like D1's and 'fenders, parts actually cost money! The other PPrchasesare standard holiday things - descent chairs, descent camera, etc.
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Cheers for that Bump
Like I said couldnt really understand marks kind of 6million dollar man approach ( you have to be a certain age to get this...we can rebuild him
) and couldn't work out if that was necessary to complete a trip like that...makes sense now when you explained it as you did. It makes sense as a passion/hobby thing more than like you say an absolute requirement. I get it now. I have to say .not my cup of tea tbh driving in a 110 in a hot dusty country .....give me wet damp wales anydayor somewhere snowy....but I can see the photos from other trips look amazing.