Saving the defender

So, optimism bias gets people into all sorts of difficulties - like deciding to jump into a croc infested river - or to rebuild a clapped out and rusted defender [biggrin].

Once you've made the decision to jump, sooner or later, reality slaps you in the face, and then you realise you just have to get stuff done, or drown, get eaten, or have a pile of carparts in your driveway, garage, backyard and living room...for the rest of your life- or at least until your wife leaves you, takes half the house, and unceremoniously has your "piles of junk" taken to the tip - and puts the charge for that, onto your credit card.

The struggle is real.


I remember reading a book in high school (a long time ago) - it was called "Things fall apart." basically, its about the chaos that occurs when a system is dismantled. I read the book, but missed the message. 20 years later I pulled a defender apart - message received [biggrin].

well continuing to tick things off the list...

Rebuilt the clutch slave cylinder.

I bought a rebuild kit in a little blue box - but the rubber looked so cheap and nasty that I just pulled the piston out of the original, cleaned it up, put in some rubber grease and put it all back together. It wasn't leaking, but the cylinder was fairly cruddy. I'll keep the cheap rubber as a backup if this one fails.

Rebuilt the two rear brake calipers

Once again, those little tin retainers are a pain in the ass. You need 4 to replace 2, as you will bend two trying to get them in place. Three of the pistons were in bad condition and one was clearly newish - so that has also gone into the spares box. These calipers are not the AP originals and look to have bene replaced only in the past few years - but they must have been dunked in sea water a few times as they were in pretty bad condition. All cleaned up ok though.

Replaced the rear brake line that I cut through with an angle grinder

Yes, I was a bit hasty cutting through some rusty bolts for the rear sway bar and sliced through the brake line. $35 later I've got a shiny new replacement in place.

Replaced the 4 bolts ontop of the rear axle to A frame

These little suckers were rusted badly - the 12 point heads were almost rounded as a result. One had been 'repaired' by glueing a large hex bolt over the 12 point head - clever solution really. the challenge here is you cant buy these 12 point bolts soI had to go to a bolt shop and get the best solution using a standard hex and a washer under it - as the bolt hole is recessed into the axle housing only 1/2 the bolt head remains for the spanner/ socket - which is not enough to get the torque onto it.

Pulled the seat frames out of the molasses bath

They have been in for over a month now as I was busy on other tasks - certainly cleaned all the rust out of them, they will be KBS coated now, then the new seat foams will go in.

Soaked the turbo intercooler in diesel and flushed it out.

This was full of crud, so im hoping this clean out will help somewhere with 'performance'

Cut a few gaskets

The last order I was sent the wrong gaskets for the rear stub axles- they sent front gaskets instead - I had the old one and some gasket paper, courtesy of Toxic Avenger, so I cut out a few gaskets and put those in.

Put in another order for parts - little things hold up bit events - for example the plastic retainer for the clutch to slave arm was broken - its a 12 cent part, but without it you cant mate the gearbox to the engine ( which was scheduled to be done last weekend) . In another example - we did the timing belt last weekend, but couldn't complete that task as I need to replace the O-ring behind the crankshaft pulley and the seal behind the camshaft - so I end up with lots of tasks 1/2 done as I try to make the best of the available time to work on moving some part of the project forward.



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Well, another milestone met today. Finally got the clutch in and bolted the gearbox onto the engine.

I had all sorts of trouble trying to mate the gearbox to the engine, as I had the gearbox in neutral when it should have been in gear so I could align the input shaft with the clutch splines. Anyway, thanks to the guys here who gave me some tips on how to get it in.

I also used a G-Clamp on each side to help mate up the box once I was sure the splines were right - that box is a heavy bugger and i couldn't push it closed on my own.

Next step will be the drive shafts and I'll work my way around the axles and suspension and tighten everything, as currently everything is just nipped up.

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Well today was another milestone.

I finally got the brakes onto the axles, the fluids into the axles and the wheels on.

In other good news, I also realised i've got Maxi Drive axles and HTE drive flanges in the rear - and I have to say, after 20 years of abuse they are still as good today as the day they went in. Axles are stamped MDE 1725X (which I understnad means "maxi drive engineering"...the X is the longer one...not sure what the 1725 means)

Next project is welding and painting the firewall so I can get it back onto the chassis.

Once it's on I can run the wires back through the chassis, get the tank on and then the body rebuild can commence.

I've still got to tell the story about the transfer case, which is now in pieces on the garage floor - but that can wait for another day.

Nice find on the Maxi Drive axles. I had them in my old 110. Awesome bits of kit.

I got around to stripping the seat frames last week when the kids were asleep, and it became clear that it would be much easier to send them off to get powder coated, rather than me doing a KBS coating ( the seat frames, not the kids [tonguewink]).

It only cost $60 per frame ( in pieces )and I'm happy with that. End result was excellent. Unfortunately forgot to take the bases didnt I - so tey go off next week.

I got the frames back together last night and put seat back foams and trims on both seats this morning. Looks excellent and it was an easy job after watching the britpart video on youtubes.

- just remembered also - customs removed the spray glue from the re trim kits...the buggers.

1. dismantled to go off to powder coaters
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2. frame reassembled:
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3. seat foam in place:

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4. Rear trim in place.
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This is a great thread. It's almost paleontological watching this 130 go together bone by bone.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/webkit-fa...93ac/imagejpeg I am liking the way 130 is coming along

Lets see...

1. Front seats are finally re-trimmed and in storage waiting for the build to catch up:

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2. Cut out the rust, welded and then painted both the footwells.

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3. replaced the faulty ball joint of the steering arm:

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4. sanded, repainted and installed the sump cover:

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Next jobs will be seam sealer on the firewall welds, penetrol into the cavities, sound and heat shields onto the firewall and then firewall onto the chassis ! hopefully this will all happen over the next 1- 2 weeks.

Well, finally got to put some paint on the firewall today.

I've gone a very unconventional direction here and I'm using a tintable UPOL Raptor liner as the body paint. It's intended to be a spray on tub liner, shot through a shutz gun - but if you thin it down 10% you can shoot it through a 3mm nozzle HVLP gun and ( in my opinion) you get an awesome finish as a result.

This is not a high gloss finish for the untrammelled eye to admire a dent free restoration. Oh no. This is the stuff of thick orange peel complexion that you use to hide all sins :-)

Personally, I love it. Others will think i'm nuts.

Here is the original, with the vent hinge completely rusted off...

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And here is the new paint, with a residential door hinge I bought form bunnings and cut to suit :-)

I should have nipped the welding dag off the right edge of the new hinge, but I got carried away with paint. Al well, perfection is a myth, as they say.


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