Hi Guys,

I've just noticed something on my Defender 90 - it's wonky! The passenger's side is about an inch lower than the driver's side, and it's bugging the hell out of me...

I'd never noticed it before, but it caught my eye as I looked at it parked outside the office. I've dug out a few laning pictures from the other week and you can see it on there (attached). My gafa (who's into rallying) thinks it could be the body, whereas I'm hoping it could be something like a buggered shock or spring. Any ideas what it could be, and how it'd be fixable? Oh, and the bumper is bent up a little too, which doesn't help when looking at it!

Cheers,

Steve

Knackered suspension or bent outrigger by the looks.

park it on level ground, grab a tape and check the length of each spring, side to side thay should be the same, if not look for a wet shock, or a bent one,
if that all checks out, look at the out riggers, eather way if you handie with a spanner, not such a big job, once you know what the problem is.

I started a thread on this a while ago, I uncovered a few things.

Firstly the springs ARE one inch lower on the passenger side for a number of reasons.

1: On pre Td5 models the fuel tank was on the driver's side adding weight onto that side.

2: Most likely occupant is going to be the driver (obvious reasons) therefore making slightly heavier on the drivers side.

3: Torque from the engine: Rev it and you'll see what I mean. Lowers even further on the drivers side.

It bugged the hell out of me too, so I put a set of HD springs on the back, but putting the left on the right, and vica versa. It now sits more level on the flat, but get someone of average size to sit in it, and start it up, it sits the inch lower on the drivers side. So I'm going to have to swap the springs back and have it sitting slightly lower on the passenger side.

On some Defenders it's more noticable, but all that I look at lean down on the passenger side in someway.

Just to add,

As you said the bumper is bent slightly which makes it worse to look at, and the body panels aren't allways perfectly straight adding to the impression that it leans more than it actually does.

Get underneath and check the difference between the axles and the bump stops.

Here's my original thread, (quite alot of cr*p in there but some useful stuff if you dig through it)

www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f7/my-90s-leaning-40234.html

has your spring poped out at the high side? maybe the spring is out and sitting on the seat wrong at the back?-when replacing springs you are better to buy the same rating of spring front and back for both sides