Project '88' (last updated 14/8/05)
Part One: The hazards of Ebay...
After I sold my Stage One pickup, ORT 155W, in May 2002, I was depressed. I bought a Ninety turbodiesel in marvellously distressed 'ex farm' condition, but it just wasn't the same. From time to time I would see Stage Ones advertised: I actually bid on a really lovely low mileage example in Java Green which turned up on Ebay, but the final asking price was too high.
Ever since I first fell in love with Land Rovers, living in the Middle East in the early 1980s, there was one vehicle I had always really wanted - a short wheelbase Stage One. No point in looking for an original one of course - only 29 short wheelbase vehicles were made, and all but five went to Trinidad. But I had always thought it would be easy enough to rebuild a standard LWB Stage One onto a modified four cylinder 88" chassis - the main differences being the front crossmember, steering relay mounting points, and engine/gearbox mounts.
Recently I managed to rent storage space in a large barn, and for the first time a Land Rover project looked a real possibility. All I needed was a Stage One, with decent mechanicals but a rotten rear chassis, at a sensible price. And then I spotted this on Ebay:
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Land Rover V8 STAGE ONE
"X" reg. 1982. MOT expires 16/07/04. TAX 31/07/04
Location..... Near Camberley, Surrey.. motorway- M3 Junction 4 or M4 Junction 10.
Wheel & Tyres..... Standard Land Rover rims fitted with healthy Goodyear 750/R16 G90 tyres, & non-matching spare.
Engine & Gearbox.... 3.5 L V8 petrol engine . New cam and followers, head gaskets and seals fitted a year ago. A single double choke Webber carb. mounted on a 8 into 1 manifold. 4 speed gear box, believed to be a recon unit 4 years old covering about 10k miles. Both engine & G/box, smooth and free of nasty noises, but has some typical " Land Rover oil leaks"!
Running gear & Brakes..... Basically it is range rover set up ( original ) Permanent 4x4, with centre diff lock, but note it is Leaf springs all round. Front swivels are in good condition but the seals really need changing . Brakes are servo assisted 11inch drums.
Chassis...... This is original and of being this age has been welded & plated up in various places, a new rear "X" member being fitted some time ago.
Even More.... Believed to have been an Airport " follow me " vehicle it was originally painted yellow. Must have been respayed a long time ago with the colour you see now. But in a few places chipping & scuffs has made yellow visible. Some aluminium corrosion on side quarters and rear body to "X" member. Doors have seen better days. Seat covers , good but not perfect. Fitted with a Safari roof with loading platform above.
A pre-MOT report indicates the following will require fixing for an MOT; Fog light not working - Headlamp aim needs adjusting - 2 indicators showing white light - Front wheel bearings excessive play - Chassis requires welding around r/o/s & r/n/s suspension mounts - corrosion on bake pipes and cracked hoses - stone chip to windscreen - n/s exhaust manifold leaking - door mirror cracked.
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That looked like an absolutely perfect base for an 88 inch conversion. So I bid for it, and after a flurry of last minute bidding, I secured it for a very reasonable £561. Only one problem - it was 150 miles away, it had only done 250 miles in the last year, and now I had to drive it home. Around the M25 in the evening rush hour. Suddenly my AA membership was starting to look like a wise investment.
Meanwhile, when I wasn't breaking out in a cold sweat at the thought of blocking the M25/M1 interchange at 6pm on a weekday evening, I started planning the project. I reckoned that if there was one lesson to be learned from my ill-fated Locost project it was this: plan the project, in detail, before you start, decide on the specification at the beginning, and don't muck about with it unless you have to. So after a lot of thinking, researching and measuring, I came up with:
Chassis - 88 inch, brand new, fitted with Stage One front crossmember, engine and transmission mounts recovered from the old LWB chassis.
Body - standard Stage One as far as the rear of the doors, 88 inch rear tub from a Series 2 or 3. Side panels recovered from the old Station Wagon body (they panels are the same length on the 88 and 109 Wagon), plain SWB roof panel, safari door. Colour - to be decided, definitely one of the factory original colours. Galvanised cappings, factory 'Land-Rover V8' decals to sides and rear. Aluminium doortops from Rocky Mountain (already bought these at Billing, slightly imperfect, £40 the pair. Bargain.)
Axles - standard Stage One front, SWB with 3.54 differential rear.
Engine/transmission - standard Stage One, Rover V8 coupled to an LT95 gearbox. I thought about fitting high ratio transfer gears, but having driven the donor vehicle for a week I reckon the standard gearing is about right for 7.50 tyres. My previous Stage One had high ratio gears, and although it cruised quietly at 60 and gave me 23mpg on a long run, it always felt a bit slow away from a standstill. I may fit a Range Rover overdrive unit if I can find one at a sensible price. Standard front propshaft, custom made rear (unless I can find a standard Land Rover type the right length).
Brakes - Stage One drums front, late Series 3 drums (11 inch) rear. Standard master cylinder and servo.
Steering - here's where it gets interesting. The Stage One uses the same combined steering column/box as other Series 3s, but the steering relay is bolted to the drivers side front chassis leg with four bolts. The front crossmember is several inches further forward than on a four cylinder Series vehicle, on which the steering relay sits in a tube which passes through the crossmember. The mounting looks similar to that on some Defenders. So I'm going to get hold of a Defender steering box, together with a 90/110 column and mounts, and see if I can fit power steering to my Stage One. This will make a huge difference to its useability. If that doesn't work, it's back to the standard system. As it happens, this vehicle has about the nicest steering of any Series vehicle I have driven, so I can live without the power steering.
Suspension - the other area where this vehicle will be transformed from a standard Series vehicle. Parabolic leaf springs with matching gas dampers. I've driven an 88 inch with parabolics and it was a revelation. (Oddly, this vehicle was a bone-standard, very late Series 3 on an 'A' plate, owned by a non-enthusiast who had bought it from a farmer, and I drove it back in 1993, several years before parabolics became generally available in the UK. I didn't even know what the springs were - just spotted the lack of leaves and thought 'that's odd, wonder where those springs came from." Was this Landie used by Land Rover to evaluate the parabolic springs which had been developed by Santana?)
Interior - factory standard 'Deluxe' black vinyl seats and door trims, but extra soundproofing and heavy rubber floor mats. Inertia reel seat belts.
Wheels and tyres - standard factory rims with 7.50R16 tyres. Spare wheel on a swingaway rear carrier.
To me, that sounds like a pretty sensible specification, with only two real grey areas. Firstly the steering (either it will work, or it won't), and secondly the chassis, where I have made enquiries about having a chassis custom made. This has the great advantage that it would be hot dip galvanised, but it might prove too expensive. We'll see what quote I get. The finished product won't be to everyone's taste - I want to produce a factory-look 88 V8, so it will not have the off-road parts (winch, chequerplate, big wheels) that many people fit to their rebuilt Landies.
Unfortunately the project is currently on hold for a couple of good reasons: firstly my new Landie-related business venture, Glencoyne Engineering, is taking up all my time, and secondly I have just rescued another Stage One! A genuine County station wagon in very straight condition, with its original engine and gearbox, but with an even worse chassis than the vehicle described on this page. Until I have put a new chassis under this one, I don't have the space to start the 88 inch project. Here it is.
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Anyway, back to collection day. I went down to Crowthorne by train on a Wednesday afternoon. Before I left, I checked the weather forecast on the Met Office website, and discovered a severe weather warning for Southern England and East Anglia, with gales and torrential rain forecast for around the time I would be driving back. This worried me, and when the train from Reading to Crowthorne was delayed by flooding and fallen trees, I got even more worried. Still, if you're going to tackle that kind of weather, a Landie is as good a place to be as any.
Mike (the vendor) picked me up at the station, and a few minutes later I was looking at a shabby but basically straight Stage One. It was pretty much exactly as he had described it to me (which is always a relief when you are buying unseen). The chassis was heavily patched and holed in several places, the panels forward of the rear wheelarches were badly corroded, and the doors were scrap. But the bulkhead looked very sound (just a few holes in the footwells), the front end panels were straight, and it had a good set of tyres. It fired immediately and settled down to a smooth idle. Mike had checked all the fluid levels and given it an oil change, so after we had done the paperwork, I gave the vehicle a quick safety check (lights, wipers etc) and then headed nervously into the rush-hour traffic.
First impressions? Damn, this thing drives well. I had forgotten how nicely a 109 station wagon rides. The steering was smooth and slop-free, the engine pulled strongly, the brakes pulled it up in a straight line, and the transmission and axles were about as close to silent as a Stage One ever gets. There was an occasional smell of burning oil - Mike had warned me that the valley gasket was not seating properly, and had thrown in a new gasket as part of the deal. The seats (plain vinyl, not even deluxe pattern) were uncomfortable, and water poured in through the top corner of the driver's side door. But all in all, the old Landie felt fit for anything.
After five minutes I hit solid standing traffic. Time for the first big test - does it overheat? The temperature needle climbed to the middle of the gauge and stayed there, exactly half way between C and H. Meanwhile the oil pressure gauge dropped down to an indicated 5psi at idle - deeply disturbing on most vehicles, nothing to worry about on a Rover V8. At speed, I was seeing a steady 20psi at 2,500 RPM (yes, the old beast came with a rev counter fitted) which should be good enough. Stop-start driving revealed some clutch judder and an occasional clonk in low speed corners which felt like worn spring eye bushes.
But for the rest of the journey home, that was about as bad as it got. I took it steadily at first, bearing in mind the Landie's recent lack of use, but after stopping for petrol at South Mimms, I was soon tanking along at an indicated 55-60 mph, with the old lady sounding totally happy and unstressed despite strong headwinds and heavy rain. Nothing fell off, nothing stopped working. By the end of the journey the blowing exhaust had got rather worse, as had the clonking suspension, but all in all it felt more like a £5,000 Landie than a £500 one. I ran around in it for a few days (until the MOT expired) which confirmed my first impression, and I was very sorry to have to park it up to await dismantling.
So I now have my donor vehicle. As far as I can tell, almost all the bits I need for the project are in good condition, and almost all the bits that need replacing are bits I don't need or was planning to replace anyway (springs, chassis). As a bonus, although needing some minor repairs the rear body tub and roof are about as straight and unmolested as any that I have seen, so I should be able to sell these (along with the high ratio Salisbury rear axle) and claw back at least some of the purchase price.
Incidentally, the vehicle is registered TAV 290X, I'm the seventh owner, and prior to moving to Crowthorne it spent some time in the Milton Keynes area. It left the factory painted light green, was resprayed yellow, then at some stage resprayed again in light green as per the photos. It has a factory recon transmission and a V8 of unknown origin, whose serial number tells me it came from a Range Rover automatic built for the Saudi market! The engine has a very neat Weber conversion, using a standard Stromberg manifold carefully machined flat to take a (rare) 40DFI twin-choke carb. If anyone can fill in the gaps in this Landie's past life, I'd love to hear from you.
Click here for a page of photos showing the Landie shortly after I picked it up.
Glencoyne Engineering - Land Rovers for sale