What have you done to your Landie today.

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My new MAF came today and I've put it on. Great, I can see air flow values on the Nanocom now and they go up and down with the engine revs. Running the air conditioning and turning it off again didn't give any error codes. I think a lot of the error codes I found at the weekend were connected with the MAF failing at speed and thus many of the sensor inputs would appear out of range. Interestingly, I have 'EGR valve stuck closed' which has come back twice now. I removed the EGR valve at the end of 2012. I see from other posts on here that this is not unusual when the EGR has been taken off, but it's taken my Land Rover eight years to notice!

Maybe the new MAF is more sensitive, or is somehow delivering values that activate this message whereas the old one didn't.
 
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I mostly played in the snow on my way to look at a broken landy
 

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Sump off the 300, and cleaned up, it had a ding in it too and thought I'd try straightening it up before ordering a new one. And to my surprise, it knocked out really well, just wish I had taken a pic before!
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I've been acquiring a few bits for me next job. A reconditioned gearbox came today:
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Looks nice and shiny and turns over smoothly by hand.
While I've got the gearbox out I might as well change the clutch. It is not really due, but I might as well. I'm trying one of these for a change:
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I thought I'd give this a go because the friction plate is all one piece. Some of them have a separate boss in the middle and I have had problems in the past with them coming loose. In some cases, like the Valeo ones the boss only appears to have been staked in. I'm not particularly aggressive with the clutch, and I'm not tuned in any way, but it seems to be a weak point. Anyway, no such problems are likely with this one, from local Leicestershire firm LOF Clutches.
 
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Before it got dark I started taking things to pieces to swap the gearbox. this weekend. Usual stuff - seats out, transmission tunnel up, floor pans out, that sort of thing:
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Not technically exciting, but it takes time. It's cold outside but I'm wearing plenty of layers. A little rodent has been eating the foam pad that goes on top of the gearbox.
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I wondered why bits of black sponge rubber material kept appearing in the cab. Now I know who the guilty party was. You can even see the teeth marks in it. I hope whoever it is hasn't been eating my wiring loom too. I wish it would find something cheaper to eat, those pads are nearly £25 new.
 
Done bit more on the gearbox job today. It's cold out but at least it is dry. A couple of curiosities. One is that the bellhousing is disappearing. It hasn't quite turned into a doily yet but it's on its way:
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Rear crossmembers, bulkheads, and now bellhousings. Is there anything a Land Rover can't make disappear before your eyes? Talking about stuff that's disappeared, look what's happened to the clutch release bearing:
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There's supposed to be a kind of 'nose', that presses against the clutch spring, but it has vanished. When people say 'the clutch release bearing has gone' they don't usually mean it has disappeared. It's not in the bellhousing, and I couldn't find it in among the clutch components. Maybe the dual mass flywheel has digested it. Disappointing because it was brand new in May 2019. Anyway, I've got past the point where you flick the switch on the ratchet from anticlockwise to clockwise. I've put the clutch on the flywheel, and put the bellhousing on the gearbox, installed the fork and a new release bearing. I've put it back under the car but haven't yet jacked it into position to offer up because I ran out of light. Time for tea. I shall have another session tomorrow.
 
I shall have another session tomorrow.

Providing rest of tratter hasn't "va-mooshed..." overnight ;)

Never seen a bell housing deteriorate quite like that before...wondering if previous owners have tried cleaning up with a brick type acid?? You could get the bell housing vapour blasted, then have the deterioration welded and cut back to original shape.
 
Providing rest of tratter hasn't "va-mooshed..." overnight ;)

Never seen a bell housing deteriorate quite like that before...wondering if previous owners have tried cleaning up with a brick type acid?? You could get the bell housing vapour blasted, then have the deterioration welded and cut back to original shape.
No, there wasn't much cleaning prior to me having it! The previous owner was a power station at Swansea, where it was mostly used on site. The underside was covered in a cementitious material, bit like that Tyrolean coating that was popular on external walls when we were young. I think it was power station ash that had got mixed up with water and solidified. Rather like the 'fly ash' that's sometimes used as a concrete ingredient. This can have weird pH values - less than 4 or over 12 in some studies. So it's quite an aggressive medium. Add that to a near-seaside location and I think that's what's eaten my alloy. Needless to say, the piece that the fuel filter attaches to, which is a common weak point on TD5s, crumbled away ages ago. Last time I looked, secondhand TD5 bellhousings were going for about £35 on Ebay so it'll be a while before I'm lovingly building up weld and meticulously shaping it to the original profile specified in the factory drawings. Maybe if it was Armstrong Siddeley or an Alvis Grey Lady and I was aiming for a Concourse prize!
 
I've had a somewhat frustrating day. This has been the longest it has ever taken me to put an engine and gearbox together. I've offered it up about three or four times, taking the clutch off and re-centering the friction plate with the clutch alignment tool each time, in case it was a millimetre or two off centre, but it wouldn't go in. Looking at the witness marks with a bright light, and trying the friction plate on the input shaft, suggested that the very sharp-cornered new input shaft was getting hung up on the way in, and the friction plate was rather tight on the splines. So in the end I put a little chamfer on the end of the input shaft and fettled the gearbox side of the hole in the friction plate out a little, and with a dab of the grease out of the LOF cutch kit it all went together. So with all that rigmarole I only got as far as putting the transfer box back on before it got dark. I think it's because everything is brand new and very tight and sharp-edged.
 
I may have sorted out or at least found the reason for an intermittent but ongoing issue with the starter motor (exDisco1 3.5V8).
Used to start on the first turn of the key, but has increasingly taken longer to start, has gone from 'whir-vroom' to 'whir-whir-whir-whir-vroom'! Today it went 'whir-tik-tik-tik-tik-shzzztbzpt' then nothing at all.
Popped the bonnet and looked at the starter, fiddled with the wires and noticed the whole thing was moveable and had moved up disengaging the gear.
As in the photo below (not my starter motor) the whole thing had moved clockwise about 90 degrees and the nut holding the starter was missing!
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It was raining when I sussed it so just pulled the starter back into position and she started on the key!
Will sort out the bolt and check everything again tomorrow weather permitting.
 
I always carry Loc-Tite in the Land Rover. You never know when something may rattle loose. Unfortunately one thing Loc-Tite doesn't work on is the lid of the Loc-Tite container itself. I bought the largest container of Loc-Tite I could find and most of it ran out in my tool box. This weekend I've been separating screwdrivers, drills and cold chisels that have become fused together in a solid blue mass.
 
@Brown, do you find when pressing down the sliding inner closing jobbie that it always spurts out a slug of Loctite in an uncontrollable fashion? I've lost count the number of Loctite spurts I've had to clear up from the Landy chassis, my overalls, my hair...this from both the 50ml and 250ml bottles o_O
 
Yes, I squeeze carefully and watch the blue liquid sliding gently down through the translucent nozzle and it all looks so innocent, but then as soon as it wins its freedom it goes off like an explosive fart. Some of it goes on the component, but there is often a fine spray over the surrounding environment. I was wondering why I couldn't see anything today and discovered that rather than just because I was growing older it was a film of Loc-Tite on my glasses.
 
Nearly got everything back together this evening after my gearbox swap. The Land Rover moves under its own steam in all forward gears and reverse. The gears are a bit notchy to push in, but they all engage. I think that's just because everything is very new and tight. The clutch bite point is nearer the floor than it was. I've blown a lot of clutch fluid through with a pressure bleeder, and it clearly separates the plates sufficiently to disengage the drive from engine to gearbox, so maybe it'll be alright. I haven't given it a road test yet, because I need some more top hat bushes for the centre diff lock linkage, so I'll wait for them to arrive before putting the transmission tunnel on and putting the seats back in and going for a run.
 
I may have sorted out or at least found the reason for an intermittent but ongoing issue with the starter motor (exDisco1 3.5V8).
Used to start on the first turn of the key, but has increasingly taken longer to start, has gone from 'whir-vroom' to 'whir-whir-whir-whir-vroom'! Today it went 'whir-tik-tik-tik-tik-shzzztbzpt' then nothing at all.
Popped the bonnet and looked at the starter, fiddled with the wires and noticed the whole thing was moveable and had moved up disengaging the gear.
As in the photo below (not my starter motor) the whole thing had moved clockwise about 90 degrees and the nut holding the starter was missing!
View attachment 230920
It was raining when I sussed it so just pulled the starter back into position and she started on the key!
Will sort out the bolt and check everything again tomorrow weather permitting.

Re the above, I tightened it all up and is now appears to be working properly.
However the solenoid moves on the starter motor body unless the nut on the end of the solenoid where the cables attach is fully tightened (red arrow).
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But the solenoid can be in a number of positions from 9-12 o/c as it were (yellow) until the nut is tightened.

My question does the position matter and if so what is best? The other day when I moved it during a roadside fix (didn't have a spanner to tighten it!) it was nearer 12 o/c and I'm sure it started quicker - 'whir-vroom' - than at 3 o/c which was more 'whir-whir-whir-vroom'!

Any suggestions gratefully appreciated.
 
Re the above, I tightened it all up and is now appears to be working properly.
However the solenoid moves on the starter motor body unless the nut on the end of the solenoid where the cables attach is fully tightened (red arrow).
View attachment 231103
But the solenoid can be in a number of positions from 9-12 o/c as it were (yellow) until the nut is tightened.

My question does the position matter and if so what is best? The other day when I moved it during a roadside fix (didn't have a spanner to tighten it!) it was nearer 12 o/c and I'm sure it started quicker - 'whir-vroom' - than at 3 o/c which was more 'whir-whir-whir-vroom'!

Any suggestions gratefully appreciated.
Seems that the first nut hasn’t been fitted on the stud before the supply terminal is fitted, as for the position the further away from the body of the starter or any other metal the better.
 
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