Holden powered series 1

[Steve B]

Hi there,
Please excuse me as I’m new into landover ownership.
I have just purchased an unregistered 1955 86” with a Holden 186 motor fitted. I’m in WA, and was wondering if it is possible to get it registered with the Holden six in it and what other modifications will need to be completed. Am I right in thinking the export model came with the 2.0 petrol originally in 1955?
Am I right in thinking this will also need to be checked by an engineer and certified?
Any advice would be very much appreciated

[JDNSW]

Your 1955 Landrover would have been built with the 2.0l engine. It may have been fully imported, but at that date would most likely have been builtin Australia, mostly from an imported CKD kit supplied by Rover, but with some locally made parts. At this date these would have been not much (perhaps some electrics, paint etc), and certainly did not include a different engine, although the specification may have differed somewhat from the home model, with changes occurring at a different date.

However, in the 1960s, when the Rover engine needed overhauling, replacing it instead with a Holden engine was very common. This was done for two reasons. The most important was that the Holden engine was readily available second hand, and either low mileage, with the vehicle written off due to accident or rust, and even if it needed overhauling, parts were readily available and cheap, and engine overhaulers very familiar with it, none of which could be said about the Rover engine. The cost difference would usually cover the conversion cost.

As a bonus, the Holden engine provided a significant increase in power.

Conversions ranged from professional to backyard butchers.

The conversions do come with some issues. The engine most commonly found in the Series 1 is the so called "Grey" engine.

This is a development of a Chevrolet engine first appearing in the 1930s, itself a direct descendant of the engine introduced about 1914. It is unsophisticated compared to the Rover engine, notably not having a gull flow oil filter, and driving the camshaft via a fibre gear, which is prone to failure at inopportune moments. Perhaps more importantly, unlike the Rover engine, it is not designed for working at steep angles, and if used 0n steep grades, the carburettor can flood causing misfiring, and in some circumstances the oil pump can suck air resulting in loss of pressure.

Since it is a six cylinder engine compared to the Rover four, it does not really fit in the space. The usual option was to cut the front crossmember or move it forward, and move the radiator forward, often using the quite inadequate Holden Radiator, and invariably ditching the fan cowl.

A more fundamental issue is that the Holden engine has a lower maximum safe rpm than the Rover engine. This led to a number of solutions. The easiest was to swap the diffs for higher geared ones out of a Rover car - I am aware of at least one that only had the rear diff swapped, making four wheel drive virtually useless.

Also, you will find quite a few of them fitted with the Fairey overdrive (and occasionally other types). While quite a satisfactory solution to the problem, these can present an issue finding parts. Later, but rare for Series 1, these conversions became common enough to spark the introduction of transfer case conversions to provide a higher ration high range.

A separate issue is the conversion plate to match the Holden flywheel housing to the Rover bell housing. These need to be quite accurately made to avoid misalignment of the gearbox input shaft, which will resultin multiple failures within the gearbox. Insufficiently accurate conversion adapters are common enough to result in the trope that the Rover box was not up to the extra power (it is).

When your conversion was made, there were probably no checks on engine changes, and at most the owner would have been required to advise the registration authority of the changed number (which would not always be done).

The situation at present is state dependent, and the first thing you need to do is to gather all the information you have on the vehicle and conversion, specifically, if possible the former registration details, including engine number and chassis number, as well as the registration number, preferably documented. You then need to to contact your authority, and probably to an engineer who can advise your next steps.

But I emphasise it will depend on the state (and I am not familiar with WA), and the particular vehicle and what information you can gather.

I hope this helps!