88" Series 2A, 300 Tdi and Garrett VNT turbo

[TVS]

I'm a long time reader but I've just subscribed to post a 'build' thread for one of my projects. Hope this is interesting/amusing/perhaps even informative but above all, in the right place on the forum - I don't want to get shouted at!

Nearly 20 years ago I repaired and got back on the road 1969 Series 2A SWB that I'd bought a few years before. I fitted a late 2.25l N/A diesel (replacing a worn out 2.25 petrol) with some new shells, piston rings, timing chain and valves and for a couple of years drove it about with free wheeling hubs and an over drive. From memory it would do about 58mph flat out or about 40mph with any kind of trailer. One day I came across a reconditioned CAV injector pump on eBay which was, retrospectively, suspiciously cheap. With it fitted the engine made significant amounts of smoke at WOT and my cobbled together tacho showed the engine now maxing out at less than 3,000 RPM. Not deterred and fully of youthful enthusiasm I decided to address this adverse A/F ratio by adding a turbo from a Landrover 2.5 TD engine. It worked ‘well’ in my estimation of the time and pulled strongly (for a 2.25 diesel) but had a super narrow power band from just about 1800RPM to around 2800RPM! It was defiantly wasn't for a Landrover - perhaps a big Perkins or something. Eventually the engine started pushing out oil from the sump and I set about replacing it with a Perkins 4203. The donor engine I had turned out to have damaged pistons and set of pistons and liners was silly money but by this point the LR was already striped down and out of action. Several years later and cheap 'low millage' 300 Tdi turned up from a local scrap yard.

At this point I could afford to spend some money on it so over a period of time (nothing happens fast!) I fully repaired the bulkhead and had it, along with the front panel galvanised. I also had all the panels resprayed and fitted a new-to-me galvanised chassis. I was building it this time to last! Skipping over the detail of a massive of wasted time trying to get a really early Ashcroft LT77 (2WD!) conversion to work with the series t'box and it ended up with a much sort after stubby R380. At this point I also realised that water had been sitting in the bores and one was badly pitted. A local 'reconditioners' fitted a liner for me but also reported that quite a few other things weren't 'right' and they'd replaced various bits with other second hard parts. They seemed to know what they where doing and I was glad to get it back so didn't push them for more details. Major panic (!) - when I first started the engine I was getting little spatters of oil coming down the down pipe! Fortunately there wasn't anything coming out of the exhaust ports in the head so put it down to be the original 300 Tdi turbo was introducing oil directly. Wasn't this supposed to be a good, low millage 300 Tdi? It had been clean enough on the outside! So this started me looking at other turbo options...

I've run out of time tonight so will post more tomorrow :)

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Cant wait to hear the rest.. also need photos!

[TVS]

Continued...
Initially I was looking at other turbo options with my goal to improve the low turbo spool up - we had a 300Tdi in a 1994 Discovery and that really had absolutely terrible torque until about 1800RPM which made it very hard to start of pulling trailers, especially on any kind of incline. It was then that I learnt of the new (to me) VNT technology and started to try and understand how to control them i.e. can't simply have a wastegate style system. I read a lot about the GT2256V being used from all sorts of VWs, Sprinter vans and also on the then current HS2.8 engine. But I wanted to keep the parts all Landrover as this makes repair/replacement easier and I found out the 2.4l Puma engined Defenders (same as the Ford Transit van in the UK) had a GT2052V. These make, from memory, 122hp (same as the TD5?), which felt a safe target for a 300TDi and also the capacity also exactly matched - what could be better? I tracked down a nearly new one on eBay and also a 200Tdi Discovery exhaust manifold. Fortunately I still hadn't built up the front end of the Landrover so access was easy. It turned out that although a simple adaptor plate could be made, albeit with a very slight dog-leg, the exhaust would be uncomfortably close to the back of the alternator and the bulkhead bracket would need relieving to clear the turbo compressor.

I don't have any photos from the time but here is a recent one of the setup:

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At the time I didn't have the Defender heater so I could have a nice straight inlet pipe just clear of the upper face of the foot well. Unfortunately the heater, a UK available universal fit one (no names mentioned), just wasn't up to defrosting toes and the windscreen at the same time... or ether for that matter! Also the water pipes had to poke though the bulkhead and conveniently had to come out almost directly behind the engine block! I hate things like that.

Anyway, back to the setup of the time. I fitted a ceramic heat shield plate like you might use in a Chemistry lab under a Bunsen burner onto a piece of stainless sheet and attached this to the turbo downpipe flange with little tabs. This gave me about 5mm clearance to the back of the alternator but it worked great and never had any issues it the alternator or wires getting too hot. You can just see this in the photo above.

I made a down pipe up in stainless bends with a laser cut flange, the outlet is a whopping great big 3" from memory! I used a non-concentric stainless reducer down to 2.25" (as per the rest of the exhaust system) which also dog-legged the pipe past the chassis. I used the front pair of tapped holes on the block (where the earlier engines have the engine mount) for a bracket to support the down pipe and ran the exhaust under the passenger floor (RHD), just behind the front leaf spring, into a big custom silencer before turning 90degres to come out just in front of the rear tyre.

Later I'll put a few words down about charge cooling but from a mechanical turbo installation point of view, this was how it ran for a while. I'll also see if I can dig out some more photos...