Kev@kenninghall
Well-Known Member
A few months ago I got rid of my work car as she was becoming troublesome and, as I no longer need a car for work, I decided that the time had come to put my Ninety back on the road. A new car was bought for the missus, can't rely on a 26 year old Ninety behaving itself 
At the time the Ninety had been off the road for a good 2 years as the gearbox had died and I was sick of changing them (6 now). So, naively, I thought stick a new box in, get an MOT and back on the road by the weekend.
A box that appeared to be a reconditioned LT77 was bought off ebay and we set to, this is the last time I'm doing this I thought as we jiggled it into place. Box fitted and I jumped in to reverse off the ramp. Wouldn't go into reverse! tried all the spare remotes we had, still no change. Bugger!
OK, time to bite the bullet as I'd now gone through 6 LT77 gearboxes in 9 years, nearly all from ebay. I wanted a R380 but I didn't want to dump the 200tdi so, I bought a short R380 from Mr Ashcroft and stuck that in. She lives I thought.
While doing all these gearbox changes I couldn't help notice the underside and the niggle that I really needed to take better care of the chassis. I also noticed that the cross member needed a bit of TLC. I few taps and scrapes and it quickly became obvious that it needed some serious welding. A sheet of steel was acquired and the angle grinder released from it's cage. Oh dear, nothing really left to weld to.
So, next job was round up a truck and trailer and get her down to Essex for Clive at Blacksheep to wave his magic wand over the back end.
From this
To this
While this was all going on I decided the passengers might appreciate a solid footwell rather than a view of the road. So the rust was cut out from the footwell and a new patch made up.
But wait, I can get at the top of the chassis here, lets scrape that down and paint it. We can get some more done if we take out the seat box, so out that came. New seat box ends were needed
Chassis rub down and paint showed rear shocks were rusted through and front turrets. New shocks all round and galvanised turrets fitted.
We also found a big rusty hole in the battery box, do I weld or buy a replacement? Quick check on the web, £300 for a replacement, decision made and old one patched up.
I wonder why the footwell went where it did? lets remove some of the dash to find out, big hole! more patching.
The electrics were a bag of nails and nothing worked at the backend so I finally fitted the LED lights I'd bought years ago.
The wipers only worked while the glass fusebox hung free in the breeze so replaced those with blade ones.
So, from a quick gearbox change we've done
Gearbox x 2
Crossmember
Batterybox refurb
Footwell
Chassis painted
Dampers all round
Replaced the turrets
New seatbox ends
Patched bulkhead
New fusebox to go from glass to blade fuses
Fitted LED lights to the rear (sick of replacing the LR ones)
New tyres all round as the old ones were cracking with all the sitting about they had done.
The end result? I need to book the MOT tomorrow so we shall see if they find something I missed. However, she still looks like a bag of **** and I still have a huge list of stuff to do. I just hope I can drive her to Peterborough at the weekend
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4511293/Forums/Landyzone/Long%20Road%20Back/like%20****.jpg
At the time the Ninety had been off the road for a good 2 years as the gearbox had died and I was sick of changing them (6 now). So, naively, I thought stick a new box in, get an MOT and back on the road by the weekend.
A box that appeared to be a reconditioned LT77 was bought off ebay and we set to, this is the last time I'm doing this I thought as we jiggled it into place. Box fitted and I jumped in to reverse off the ramp. Wouldn't go into reverse! tried all the spare remotes we had, still no change. Bugger!
OK, time to bite the bullet as I'd now gone through 6 LT77 gearboxes in 9 years, nearly all from ebay. I wanted a R380 but I didn't want to dump the 200tdi so, I bought a short R380 from Mr Ashcroft and stuck that in. She lives I thought.
While doing all these gearbox changes I couldn't help notice the underside and the niggle that I really needed to take better care of the chassis. I also noticed that the cross member needed a bit of TLC. I few taps and scrapes and it quickly became obvious that it needed some serious welding. A sheet of steel was acquired and the angle grinder released from it's cage. Oh dear, nothing really left to weld to.
So, next job was round up a truck and trailer and get her down to Essex for Clive at Blacksheep to wave his magic wand over the back end.
From this
To this
While this was all going on I decided the passengers might appreciate a solid footwell rather than a view of the road. So the rust was cut out from the footwell and a new patch made up.
But wait, I can get at the top of the chassis here, lets scrape that down and paint it. We can get some more done if we take out the seat box, so out that came. New seat box ends were needed
Chassis rub down and paint showed rear shocks were rusted through and front turrets. New shocks all round and galvanised turrets fitted.
We also found a big rusty hole in the battery box, do I weld or buy a replacement? Quick check on the web, £300 for a replacement, decision made and old one patched up.
I wonder why the footwell went where it did? lets remove some of the dash to find out, big hole! more patching.
The electrics were a bag of nails and nothing worked at the backend so I finally fitted the LED lights I'd bought years ago.
The wipers only worked while the glass fusebox hung free in the breeze so replaced those with blade ones.
So, from a quick gearbox change we've done
Gearbox x 2
Crossmember
Batterybox refurb
Footwell
Chassis painted
Dampers all round
Replaced the turrets
New seatbox ends
Patched bulkhead
New fusebox to go from glass to blade fuses
Fitted LED lights to the rear (sick of replacing the LR ones)
New tyres all round as the old ones were cracking with all the sitting about they had done.
The end result? I need to book the MOT tomorrow so we shall see if they find something I missed. However, she still looks like a bag of **** and I still have a huge list of stuff to do. I just hope I can drive her to Peterborough at the weekend
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4511293/Forums/Landyzone/Long%20Road%20Back/like%20****.jpg
