Just to say, this is a great write up with good photo documentation too. Is it just me though, or do others get the impression that this takes 15 minutes to "knock it all together", when in reality it's hours of blood, sweat, blood, tea, blood and cussing? Looking forward to the next instalment
 
when in reality it's hours of blood, sweat, blood, tea, blood and cussing? Looking forward to the next instalment

You are absolutely correct, it's been weeks of late nights and weekends spent toiling in the workshop, followed by staring at my bank balance. And quite a lot of rocking forwards and backwards in the corner.

Made some brake lines and got them in with new clips. I used just a squidge of tiger seal at a few points where the lines come close to rubbing on the chassis.

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I thought I'd show the missus a good time today after work, it being valentines day and all. ;)

For some reason though, she didn't find coating the whole chassis with Tetrosyl Stone Chip very erotic and didn't even want to play with my new Sealey underbody coating gun. :oops:

She was also not amused when i got overspray in her hair and on her face (from a distance) and even less so when I offered a rag soaked in thinners to get it off again. Something about skincare?

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I tell you, women, never happy. o_O

In all seriousness though, I know that the best time to do this was before it was put back topgether, but the second best time is now. I wasn't happy with how soft the chassis paint was, you could easily scratch it off the primer if you weren't careful; hopefully this gives the chassis a fighting chance. And before you ask, yes I know there's overspray on the springs etc, but I don't care what it looks like if it stops the rust.

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Tomorrow or the next time I get an hour or two free I'll be Dinitrol cavity waxing the insides.

Any ideas as to how to get the dried mud out of the front half past all the reinforcing plates?
 
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Got some time to work on the car this evening, it's getting there.

Changed the CDL switch. It broke immediately. Cleaned the old one out and put it back in. Now it works. Yay.

Spent a good hour trying to hoover all the dried mud and stones out of the old section of chassis.

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This is the inside of the very front of the chassis leg, with most of the crap already removed.

Blowing the crap about with the air line and the hoover against one of the holes didn't work well at all so I fired up the lathe and made up a delrin adaptor (12mm air line to Henry Hoover) so i could get into all the nooks and crannies.

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Other than frequently needing to be unblocked, it worked well, until Henry suddenly died.

Henry II proved more resilient and I eventually got most of the crap out.

Then I sprayed everything internally with Dinitrol cavity wax, most of which ended up on the floor.

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I -think- I've only got a few things left to do before I can put the body back on; replace the new heater matrix hoses which were delivered today, run a new axle breather from the front axle to somewhere dry, and figure something out to actuate the CDL, although that's not critical I guess.

The extended rear axle breather I put in ended up coming up at the rear of the engine next to the transfer case and gearbox breathers so I might fire up the mill and/or lathe and make a manifold of sorts to consolidate them all into one pipe, then run that somewhere, the air filter housing perhaps.

Cheers!
 
My friends.

I have made a terrible discovery




















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Ahem. :D

I bet nobody's ever thought of that joke before...

Put in north of 14 hours today to get the old girl back together, with the kind help of one of my colleagues and latterly a length of 2x4, she went but there were some battles.

The body went back on with no dramas, The nice set of shiny bolts I bought worked in some of the mounts but didn't have enough thread for some of them, luckily I saved the old ones that were in good nick.

The brake lines were most of the battle; the old front flexi hoses did not want to be separated from the steel lines, and I had to cut one back and make up some intermediate bits from the leftover cupronickel stuff I used for the back brake lines where I couldn't save the fittings.

The real bastard was the snapped off fitting in one of the flexi lines that goes between the chassis and the body under the ABS modulator in the nearside wheelarch. Drilling out for an extractor wouldn't have been difficult if the stub of copper line hadn't broken loose and started to spin inside the fitting, stopping the drill bit from cutting.

In the end I managed to cheese it out but couldn't use an extractor so drilled out to 9mm so I could clean what was left of the threads out and attach to my new line. Turns out you can never find a M10 x 1.0 tap when you need one, but in a pinch i did find a tapered UNF tap that was really close and did the job ok. I'll keep an eye on that one, I'll probably end up replacing both flexible hoses in the near future as they're not too expensive.

The brakes bled up well once I'd remembered to go and buy some dot 4, but the clutch was an utter barsteward. Through a combination of bleeding at the slave cylinder and cracking the unions on the master cylinder and the fitting where the clutch pressure switch lives, we got it to a point where it's usable but it's all down at the bottom of the pedal travel.

The wisdom floating around the forums seems to be to do your best then wedge the pedal all the way down and leave it overnight so I've done that, we'll see.

Putting the cooling system and the wiring back together went mostly ok with only minor cursing, turns out (would you believe) that some previous owner fitted the wrong battery, it's supposed to fit the other way, with the terminals towards the cab, and the terminals need to be on the opposite sides for the wires to reach properly.

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You can see that the lug on the negative battery cable isn't anywhere near the grounding point on the inner wing. Long time viewers may recall that previously to this it had a length of maybe 2.5mm2 wire wrapped round it a few times and covered in electrical tape that was wedged behind one of the battery box bolts. No wonder the lights weren't up to much, that's the single ground for everything from the lights to the electric windows to the radio.

My temporary solution, on a Sunday and in the absence of any large cable or fittings, was to cut a strip of thin stainless sheet, slide shrink wrap tube over it, and bend and drill it to bridge the gap between the lug on the battery cable and the body grounding rail behind the ECU tray.

I'll make up a proper jumper wire when I can get hold of some terminals and cable, and ditch it entirely when the battery dies and I can get hold of the appropriate one. Interestingly, that also explains why one of the battery tie-down posts had been removed, as the battery is larger than it should be.

...farmers... :rolleyes:

Anyway, some more futzing about tomorrow evening, and it's insured from midnight tonight :D Should probably do something about the big hole between the seats where the gearlevers are.

The carpets won't be going back for a while I suspect, and I will be requiring access to put in a linkage for the CDL sooni i have a cunning plan for that, so most of the interior might stay in the boot for a while.

The MOT is due at the end of March so no rest for the wicked just yet, there's some holes in the body that need evicting, tie rod ends, the list goes on.

But I've got my Disco back :D:D:D
 
If the clutch has a soft flexi and not a plastic line , clamp the flexi, build up the pedal and maintain pressure on the line .( its a 2 man job) open the bleed nipple then unclamp the pipe , the rush of fluid will expel the air . do this a couple of times , and you should be good . Works for the series clutch bleed
 
I have some observations about your clutch and brake lines from my own experience of building Project Disco. Feel free to take or leave them.

Brake lines:
I deleted the body/chassis flexi hoses and ran the rear brake lines all the way along the top of the chassis rail direct to the ABS block. Much easier to maintain in future and much less hassle with multiple joints in the lines.

Clutch:
Bleeding the clutch is much easier if you do not have the clutch damper fitted. It only took me a few minutes to bleed mine when I reconnected it. Mine was deleted by a previous owner and I didn't feel the need to reinstate it. Again, simpler future maintenance and just one line between the master and slave. I don't notice any difference from my previous D2, which did still have one.
 
Ah. Is that installed in the cab permanently somewhere or just there for diagnostic purposes?

It's screwed into the top of the dash, next to the a pillar,just for information's sake, I'm not interested in tuning or anything

If the clutch has a soft flexi and not a plastic line , clamp the flexi, build up the pedal and maintain pressure on the line .( its a 2 man job) open the bleed nipple then unclamp the pipe , the rush of fluid will expel the air . do this a couple of times , and you should be good . Works for the series clutch bleed

Only got a plastic line here I'm afraid, but thanks.

I have some observations about your clutch and brake lines from my own experience of building Project Disco. Feel free to take or leave them.

Brake lines:
I deleted the body/chassis flexi hoses and ran the rear brake lines all the way along the top of the chassis rail direct to the ABS block. Much easier to maintain in future and much less hassle with multiple joints in the lines.

Clutch:
Bleeding the clutch is much easier if you do not have the clutch damper fitted. It only took me a few minutes to bleed mine when I reconnected it. Mine was deleted by a previous owner and I didn't feel the need to reinstate it. Again, simpler future maintenance and just one line between the master and slave. I don't notice any difference from my previous D2, which did still have one.

Thanks, I might make some solid lines to replace the flexis then, good idea.

As for the clutch damper, I had a google to see what they look like and I haven't seen one AFAIK. The wooden 2x4 seems to have done 90% of the job though.
 
She made it home, gents.

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Bare minimum at the moment though, no interior or carpets. I'll be working on a DIY CDL linkage in the coming week and I'm going to need access to the top of the transfer case.

Shortly after I left work I found I had bugger all brakes :eek: but I've discovered my Foxwell diagnostic scanner can control the ABS modulator to allow power bleeding of individual corners and of the ABS system itself, so tomorrow I'll give that a go assuming I don't die on the way to work.

SWMBO's car is in for MOT on wednesday, so she's going to drop it into the garage tomorrow night and I'll bring her back.
What do you think she's going to say about most of the interior being in the boot and no carpets? She hated it before it was noisy and uncomfortable lol :rolleyes:
 
Just tell her you're embracing the rustic side of Discovery's and it's all done for authenticity.

Then make sure you tell us where you are so we can send an ambulance to you!!
 
I'm not having much joy with these brakes. I've bled them on the pedal, and several rounds of power bleeding with my foxwell diagnostic tool.

I can get a fairly firm pedal but as soon as the engine is on/booster is working the pedal goes to **** and slowly creeps downwards.

Driving around and it gets worse and worse until you have to double pump the pedal to get much of anything.

I've fed the best part of a bottle of dot4 through it at this point, I initially had a few big bubbles in the back lines but now I'm getting lovely clear fluid with no bubbles straight out the bleed screws.

The brakes weren't great before I had everything apart, over time while driving you'd lose some pedal but it would be firm on the second pump.

Time for a new master cylinder and see what happens or has anyone got a better suggestion?

Cheers, here's some dog tax

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Well done on the swift turnaround.
Sounds like an internal cylinder weep. No loss of fluid but no braking.

I hope so, I've ordered the parts cannon to be fired.

Had an hour or two the other evening after work so instead of fixing the nunmerous and glaring issues with the body and the brakes I decided to make myself a poor man's CDL lever.

I milled a 10mm slot in some aluminium flat bar to go over the lower portion of the CDL stub shaft (not visible in the photo) and drilled and tapped M6 holes for the pivot to bolt into.

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The shaft is 4mm bright steel covered over with plastic truck air line so it doesn't rub or rust where it goes into the cabin. The pivot is some aluminium bar and there's a silicone sleeve on the bolt to allow the joint to flex vertically somewhat. The knob i turned from some larger aluminium.

It bolts straight onto the shaft on the top of the transfer case

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and the other end comes through the transmission tunnel via a nylon bushing that I turned that is just loose enough to allow it to swivel as well as slide

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I've left some extra shaft there for when (if) the carpets ever go back in.

The linkage engages and disengages using the detents built into the transfercase quite nicely, and the diff lock light even works on the dashboard.

I decided to forgo the pop rivets on the transmission tunnel cover, and went with those little metal clips that push over the edge of thin sheet material and accept a screw. Doubtless I'll need to get back in here and this makes it easier than drilling out a dozen rivets every time.

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And then on the way home, with one simple trick, i DOUBLED the value of the car

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to £140 or so. :D
 

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