2003

This page is intended as a historical/hysterical record of the the past breakages/new breakages and soon to be breakages....and other bits that have happened to Cartman (and fallen off) since we first adopted him. This record is in the order of most recent happenings at the top to the past at the bottom.

Work still on Cartman's on-going 'to do' list....!!!!!

Re-centre the steering and self-cancelling. Rear cross-member corners to be chopped and weld in new sections. Guards to be fitted around seatbelt recoil units for protection from loads in rear. Acquire a military spec rear roll hoop/bar. Waxoyl the whole chassis after a steam clean.

Updated 14-01-2004

December

• The Series 3 has to be finished so we can get on with the new project - the Mini !!!!!!

• New antenna mount fitted to the rear door of the S3 behind the spare tyre.

• While the hubs were rebuilt the flexible brake hoses on the front and rear were replaced with Goodrich braided type; the mud 'guard' on the drivers side was replaced with an aluminium one that I had had sitting around for some time (the original was rusted out and the other side had been done already) and the foot-well cleaned and coated with Smoothrite and Waxoyl; new brake shoes fitted on both sides of course; and finally the steering box was drained of 25 year old gung and refilled with semi synth EP80/90. Well they did look nice and shiney before I dunked them on the plain ;)

• Front hubs dismantled and first the drivers side then the passenger side swivels were replaced. The original one on the drivers side is shown below and was very corroded and had almost no preload on the top Railko bearing (no wonder there was a lot of kick-back and wander!). The new one was set for 10-11lb as per the Haynes manual/'green bible'. What was also unusual was that the top Railko bearing on the original swivel was a phosphor bronze material unlike the new one which is the more common black friction material? A major job and due to work and personal commitments was staggered over 2-3 weeks of odd evenings and weekends.

NOTE:- That the small taper head Allen socketed screws (6 off) (cad plated steel?) that secure the selector section of the Superwinch FWH (alloy casting) to the main cast steel section are 6 UNC thread with a 1 5/8" OAL (42mm). These get damaged very easily if the key fitted into the head gets even slightly rounded with use/age, as mentioned previously in this log. I have yet to locate a source though.

November

• In preparation for the hubs to be re-built I bought the complete 'kit' from Paddocks at £160 including the leather gaiters to fit around the swivels. The reason being that out here on Salisbury Plain the granite chippings will probably cause more damage to the chromed finish on the swivels and I would like them to last another 25 years if poss? Including the swivel re-build I'll include the braided hoses,ally mud 'guard' and new front brake shoes at the same time. Fitting the Railko bearing and lower bottom bearing race in the swivel was interesting though as 1500-2000 psi pressure was required to get them into the swivel (the swivel was seen to even deform with that pressure!). Someone has mentioned using a section of tube and a mallet - my arse !!!?? Geezzze! The shock loading from that sort of impact would probably cause internal stress fractures more than anything else?

October

• Gearbox refilled with Difflock supplied Trojan fully synthetic gear oil. Not cheap at about £5 per litre but as this is the one box that doesn't leak much and it has made it a tad quieter it seemed the way to go. I was buying some for the rear diff on the G33 anyway so what the hey?

• Ammo box aquired from the Sodbury Sortout and with the dab of the welder to attach a shackle, some blue paint (and some wooden lining) it now resides in the back of S3. Bolted down of course. After getting back from the olde sod I noticed that the drivers side hub seal has gotten so bad that the liquid grease is now starting to leak out! It has to be fixed soon but has been topped up for now.

• Rear door finished once a new angle grinder had arrived from Difflock on next day delivery! Phoned on the Monday to say the 8 month old one had failed and a new one arrived Wednesday morning FOC. Now that's service. All that's left is to get the piece of stainless capping made to drop on top. All hood fixing now attached and shock cord inserted in the rear flap to ease opening. The door is now so strong that I can sit on the end when its open and the only thing that moves is the rear suspension. Check out the images. But don't look too closely at the weld quality. It's not pretty, but its sound!

• Started to work on the rebuild of the rear door to support the weight of the spare wheel. 'Tonk' had given me a length of 35x35 3mm wall square tube and I had another length of 30x30 3mm wall tube to hand as well. First day at it and the angle grinder dies half way through the first chop. Arse! I'll get back to that later.

• I haven't really used the S3 that much in the weeks after the MOT and Liz had mentioned that the steering seemed a trifle stiff/not self-centering as it did/vibration through the vehicle under heavy braking. After an 80 miles round trip during the week I have to agree that it is. Now as the TRE's have been replaced on the steering box rod and they replaced another on the drop arm to nearside hub rod and the problem started from then it has to be related? Well after lots of ideas of steering box adjusted too tight etc. I located it. The fault was due to an original TRE that had been forced to the limit of its travel due to the installation of a new TRE at the other end of the rod. Fixed and hunky dory ;) Just goes to show that sometimes paying someone to do a job you could have done yourself is false economy?

September

•  Cartman went in for the annual MOT test and failed! But only on the track rod end on the rod between the steering box and the steering relay. This was one of those that I had never looked at before as they were a bit of a pain to get at, of course. Looking at them they were probably original and as I had no time available I soaked them in WD40 for two days and left it with the garage to replace. I had spare TRE's anyway so I gave them those to fit. £50 all in and passed.

• Also realised that Cartman has only done 1200 miles in that last 12 months !

• New heater control valve arrived/fitted but the screw that holds the control wire to it wasn't there and I had lost the old one a year or so ago when I took the other one off. Made one from a 6mm screw and a bit of ingenuity.

August

• Not a lot !!!

July (80077 miles 31/7/03)

• Fitted the new rear LH half-shaft. The old one didn't look bad at least the spline ends didn't show any sign of damage.

• Replaced the faulty track rod end. Out of all of them only one was split so I limited myself to just this one. Much easier than the whole lot? It came off without hassle which is thanks to the fact that when they were replaced two years ago I applied liberal amounts of Coppaslip to the threads.

• Not had a great deal of use this month but I did get hold of a LH rear half shaft to fit. I have been meaning to do that ohhhh since a year ago ;) Still, half way there. At least I have the shaft. The rest of the available month has been spent looking at Ginetta's. And we may have found one now 0-60mph in sub 6 seconds!

• Engine still running well.

• Difflock are now selling Series spec. fully synthetic gearbox box which will NOT damage bronze bushes such as the synchro!  But £5 per litre.?!

June (79808 miles on 25/6/03)

• Still running sweet a week later! So hopefully it was ignition?

• Last weekend the engine started to have a funny five minutes and started popping loudly on overrun and idling erratically. Under load it ran fine and when the engine was cooler it was OK, so the concensus of opinion was that it was ignition related? So as the plugs are at least 2 years old (Probably closer to 3 years and were Bosch 4 electrode) these were replaced with new Champion RN12YC (opened up to 0.9mm for the electronic ignition and uprated coil); a new distrib cap fitted (over a year old) and a new set of leads (they were 3 years old). Total cost about £17 from Bearmach in Ashford as I was passing. Also chucked about 100mL Redex in the fuel tank (holy water, Monsignor) with the half a tank of gas that was in there anyway . Has it made a difference? Well since then it hasn't done the popping thing etc., but then I haven't been running around as much as I was that previous weekend ?! Watch these posts to see if the prob re-occurs. I will also get the valve clearances checked over the next couple of days.

• The front chrome hub ball joint is now leaking around the seal. This was especially noticeable after it had been left stationary in the garage for 3 days and a 2" x 2" puddle of EP90 was then found by the front wheel. On investigation a section of the hard chromed face had stripped off, probably due to a stone strike. This left a sharp edge which can damage the seal, and has damaged the seal (Ed). The hub was drained and refilled with LR liquid graphite hub grease. After another week no leaks were found. The chrome ball is probably original and has a lot of surface pitting so it will need to be done soon. Another job for the list.

• The original recoil seatbelts have been relocated to get them working now that the hard-top has been removed along with the original upper seat-belt mounts. When I have sourced a military roll hoop the mounts will be moved again. The roll hoop/bar is a good move IMHO for safety anyway. The recoil unit has been mounted on a 5mm thick steel plate on the bulkhead behind the driver and the guide-ring fitted directly above it. All the other fixings remain as they were (std. mounting point on the floor by the base of the seat-box and in the middle of the seat-box, as they were before). See images below.

• The new Exmoor Trim canvas is fitted over the new hood frame. Now as Cartman was always a station wagon so very few of the hood fittings existed. Referring to the 'Green bible' or any of the Series Haynes manuals was of little help. Luckily the power of the 'net' and the LRE forum pointed us in the right direction and we found the type and positions in the end. It would be useful if I provided a page showing where they should all go and how to fit the canvas maybe after several goes and trying to suss it out - may be? :)  Two of the sites used to see how other enthusiasts attached the hood fixings can be seen at either http://www.militarylandrover.34sp.com/ltwt or Craig McAteers site.

• Ohhh deeeaarrr !!!!!!!!! - Due to trying to update the site with a text editor I have managed to screw up the whole of the 2003 diary page ! :( So now I will have to start again - A**E ! I hope I learn from this....Always maintain a current backup !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

May 

• Original roof is now off and has made way for a set of new LR hood-sticks and fittings supplied by Paddocks. I had hunted around for some time for a second-hand set but it seems that sellers seem to believe that a) they are rare so they are worth £140> or b) they will supply the sticks and no fittings (though you will only find that out when you go to try to fit it !). So buying a new set with everything I needed for £220 seemed the way to go, and that was a delivered price which removed the need to traipse all over the country, which I do not have time to do anyway. Even managed to fit the one piece door seals again! Result!

• Instead of fitting a tail gate we are going to modify the rear door to still carry the spare tyre. Now it will need reinforcing so the top rail will be a piece of 35mm steel box section let into the existing frame with a stainless steel capping fitted over the top instead of galv (as you cannot buy the galv capping it seems). The rear of the door will then be fitted with a 5mm sheet of tread plate to give even more stiffness.

March/April

• After 'umming' and 'arring' about vehicles for the past 6 months and wondering whether to sell the SIII and the Triumph T-Bird and buy a Discovery and later a Ginetta G27. Now we have actually make a decision. The Thunderbird has been sold (no bike,boo hoo) and will be replaced with a G27 (or G33 with a Range Rover sourced 3.9 V8) when we find one (probably a 2 litre Zetec). the SIII is being kept as I have spent sooo much time on it it would be a pity to pass that onto some one else (and I would eventually buy another Series anyway). So Cartman is getting a bit of a 'makeover' with the soft-top and some other jobs that need to be done.

• Now as I have screwed up the page with my HTML editing fumblings (blame the computer - always blame the computer !) the previous few months events can be summarised as -

 

A) Clutch master and slave had to be replaced after an attempt to fix the leaking m/c turned out to be slightly more involved and resulted in pipe-work and slave having to be changed out. Old components rebuilt with new seals and kept as spares.

B) Alternator bearing died/very 'rumbly' and was replaced with a cheap foreign non-Lucas offering for <£25 new. The original bearing will be changed when I get around to it and the old alternator kept as a spare.

C) The gear-stick snapped off at the gearbox selector ball. The only real solution (as it had been 'welded' back before) was to replace the whole assembly. At the same time the vent on the cover of the gearbox assy. was fitted as the one installed last year was mounted too far back and would not vent sufficiently.

D) Kenlowe stopped working and the thermostat was replaced with a standard RS thermostat and relay. At the same time the spot relay was relocated along with the fan one in a waterproof housing in the engine bay. The Kenlowe 'stat seems to be a common problem and is not really suitable for us in an Land Rover with its 'usual' exposure to mud/water etc. The RS unit look far more substantial and at only £12 to.

E) Probably loads more but I cannot remember at the mo.

Any comments regarding manufacturers or suppliers parts or services are only from my personal experience. Those items I find to be less than satisfactory I will state that they are not up to scratch, and if they're good then I will say so. I am not associated my marriage, employ, or money (unfortunately) with any of those companies mentioned.

Paul Maidment - 11 June 2000

This page was updated on 14 January 2004

me at pjboomer_removefirst_@freeuk.com