Just an update….Better late than never. Turned out that despite my fettling mentioned further up in this post, The Minervas poor upbringing had caused considerable wear to the engine. I was in for a penny and a pound. Ended up giving it a refurb and another body came up at a good price rather...

:)Sorry won't be ready this year, will a bit of luck it will be a rolling chassis by the need of this week

Just an update ended up pulling it to bits completely, the body was completely shot when I took it off it basically crumbled into many tiny pieces due to alot of rust on the underside of the panels. Currently undergoing a bit of tlc will be back on the road in the next 12 months I hope

Wet n Windy

Cracking find you can be sure to have some fun doing that up, I'm in th middle of a similar rebuild of a Minerva which is basically a series 1 with a steel body and sloping wings.

I'm free Monday but not Tuesday

They looked great at Pentillie, did you manage to have a go around the off-road course ?

One thing I would never worry about is your Land Rover breaking down

I've just got the go ahead from the Mrs that I'm free that day you up for it turbo I'll drive ?

Yep I'll be able to go to that I hope, I'll speak to Turbo during the week and mention it to him then if you haven't already, I'm guessing Pentille is in north Cornwall somewhere

This picture sums it up in my mind Farmers Friend Workhorse Pleasure Vehicle Long live the defender

I took mine off and refitted it without the need to jack anything up

They are pretty boring all they do is smoke no flames or sparks

Yep I bought it from the local hardware store.

No it lasted for about a hour with. The doors closed I just opens them for the rest of the afternoon and the small was gone

Adhesive Foam tape from my local marine store and PU sealer works a treat

It worked very well I'll see tomorrow morning how successful it really is

Guess what happened here ?? I got fed up of wind squeezing in small gaps and rain trickling in, so today I bought some smoke bombs and it worked great. I could see lots of place where smoke could escape sealed them up and tried testing with water cured most leaks and stopped a lot of wind noise.

Unless your towing a heavy trailer or using a Pto and revving the engine a lot I'm told you can run a Tdi with no fan most of the year apart from the hottest days.

Looks a neat job you've done there, if my 200 tdi ever goes wrong I'll know where to look