Hi All, have I bought a yellow citris fruit?

[PaulMac]

During the week I purchased my first Defender, It came with a long list of goodies such as winch, ARB bull bar, light force spotties, built in compressor and outlet coupling (also came with air hose) built in Engel fridge and inbuilt slide out draws.
Motor wise the car starts and runs extremely well, transfer case is less than 100km old recently replaced water pump timing belt and temperature sender.
Drive train has a fair amount of slop/backlash from what I've read on the forum over the past few days is, that it may be worth my while replacing drive flanges, axles and A frame joint. This seems to be the root cause of most clunks etc. Also has old man emu shocks that have done around 15000km
Now for the lemon part!!!!
As usual for a new car purchase i started nosing around and lifted the floor mats and found that I have a Freddy Flintstone mobile!!
The join from the floor to the fire wall foot well (fire wall side) Is up **** creek.
I'm living remotely atm so I'm thinking of a patch repair and a permanent fix when I get back to civilization. I'll post some pics tomorrow to get some expert advice.
Cheers

[Benny_IIA]

During the week I purchased my first Defender, It came with a long list of goodies such as winch, ARB bull bar, light force spotties, built in compressor and outlet coupling (also came with air hose) built in Engel fridge and inbuilt slide out draws.

Motor wise the car starts and runs extremely well, transfer case is less than 100km old recently replaced water pump timing belt and temperature sender.
Drive train has a fair amount of slop/backlash from what I've read on the forum over the past few days is, that it may be worth my while replacing drive flanges, axles and A frame joint. This seems to be the root cause of most clunks etc. Also has old man emu shocks that have done around 15000km
Now for the lemon part!!!!
As usual for a new car purchase i started nosing around and lifted the floor mats and found that I have a Freddy Flintstone mobile!!
The join from the floor to the fire wall foot well (fire wall side) Is up **** creek.
I'm living remotely atm so I'm thinking of a patch repair and a permanent fix when I get back to civilization. I'll post some pics tomorrow to get some expert advice.

Cheers




Rusty firewalls are a quite common thing in defender/series vehicles that have. I personally think you cannot properly repair a bulkhead in a defender and they are Twin skinned in some places and also have a number of layers folded on top of each other in certain places.

The only way to properly fix the problem is to replace the firewall although it is fairly long and tedious job it really does not require to much mechanical knowledge, if you played with meccano as kid you be sweet.:angel:

If there is rust is the firewall there probably will be rust in the door frames and maybe even the chassis, they generally they start to rust in the rear X-member I think.

There are a few threads on here showing how to replace a firewall; I have recently done one myself if you have any question I’m happy to answer.


Ben....

[dmdigital]

Hi Paul.

I see you signed up:)

As for the rust:(

[spudboy]

Hi Paul. Are you able to post up some photos so we can see what you are talking about & see how bad it is?

The easiest way is to make the photos an attachment (see the "manage attachments" button when you are making a new post)

[dmdigital]

If Paul can't I can. But I think Paul is pretty computer savvy;)

[PaulMac]

Have some pics to share, I'm thinking the best path forward is to cut the rusted section out. Buy a replacement section from a wrecking yard and weld her up! Also get a good rust inhibitor on it.
Also attached a pic of the new girl.. It is a 1996 300TDI with 160,000 on the clock

[dmdigital]

:eek:

How's the door frame Paul?

Did you get behind the kick panel?

[spudboy]

Here's a coupe of threads to peruse:

Rotten Footwell - LR4x4 - The Land Rover Forum (http://forums.lr4x4.com/index.php'showtopic=12130)

Footwell replacement - LR4x4 - The Land Rover Forum (http://forums.lr4x4.com/index.php'showtopic=26161)

Footwell RH - RHD | Land Rover spare parts and accessories (http://www.landroverspares.co.uk/product.html?cpdID=267)

Hope they are of some use
David

[PaulMac]

Door frames seem to be OK, a little bit of a brown tinge around the drain holes. Will have to remove some more covers to get a better look at the A pillar, hopefully no rust has got in there.

I'll have a read though those threads, thanks Spud.

[lardy]

you can buy a new bulkhead from Simmonites, which i plan to do in a week or so it has been a tiresome path to get to this bit lol.
I also need to buy some doors as mine are starting to get excited.
don't let it get you down Paul its all doable its a land rover.

[Blknight.aus]

the acidity of the yellow fruit in this case is determined by purchase price how much rust it has in the common rust places and how much hard yards your willing to put down.

but its all repairable.

[Disco44]

With all that rust would that not that be a roadworthy violation?
John

[Blknight.aus]

correct.

unless the inspector didnt find it..

[PaulMac]

I dont regret buying the Landy, past my first defender today gave him the wave... special moment that!

I'm prepared to put the hard yards into it, it will just be a question of how I go about it. Fold up my own sheet and weld it in, or buy a replacement panel from the wreckers. Dont really want to tackle replacing the entire fire wall. I think I can put a stop to it, by fixing whats there and monitoring it.

Paid less than 9K for the car and with the extras I think it was a good deal. I've bought some fish oil so i'll get that into any areas prone to rust.

[Didge]

Hi Paul, this is the 3rd time I've typed this. Get near the end and then hit the wrong button; damn!. I reckon your buy sounds quite good! By the time you finish reading this you'll feel better. I didn't want a project car but in August I paid $13k for my first Def; a 95 110 300TDi with 200k on the clock. Extras were, big steel roof rack (that upon closer inspection either needs ditching or some serious cutting and rewelding), alum full length side steps, big alum bull bar, old spot lights, recovery hook and obviously tow bar. Wheels are 31 x 10.5 R15 Sunraysia's. Circumference is too small giving lower economy and wrong speedo reading. Replacing those. It also came with RUST! Some in the front passenger footwell and some bad rust along the bottom of the front passenger door and other doors showing stains. At first I panicked but have consoled myself with the thought I can cut it out faster than it can form. As the guys say it is repairable. I was planning on cutting it out and as I don't yet have a mig welder riveting (with good quality rivets ) a piece of bent gal steel in place (with some sealant to fill the gaps) for both the floor and doors. Also little bits of alum corrosion here and there. Cheap Defs in Sydney are like hen's teeth.
Oh, I've also spent $1100 (much to the disgust of the Minister of War) on a new timing belt kit ($450 fitted), new ball joint to rear diff ($130 ish fitted), new booster pump for brakes ($400 ish fitted), new overflow bottle for radiator ($75 ish fitted) and other assorted bits and pieces. Still need new front brake disks, pads and hub seals ($250 supply only on ebay), shocks ($$$$), probably steering damper and probably other suspension bushes and sound proofing. And I also still have the clunk so that'll probably be the rear axles and hubs considering I've done the ball joint, hopefully not the diff, t/case or g/box; skill level with the clutch to reduce the clunk has risen though! Feeling better????
A workmate has a 2000 Disco and he said they become like family pets. We grow to love them despite the fact they bite us occasionally. So I know exactly how you're feeling but you can do it. And yeah, hey the WAVE - cool eh? I'm obviously older than you; we used to do it in Kombis in the 1970's. It's an elitist cult club we're in. Enjoy :)
cheers Gerald

[dmdigital]

Paul good news:D

Give me a call at work tomorrow but leave it until after lunch.

[PaulMac]

I got in contact with Karcraft, however they do not have foot wells for defender's only series vintage.. I'm thinking it may be worth my while just buying some 2mm plate, cut out the rust and fab up kick plate myself rather than trying to buy a replacement Defender one.
Alternatively cut out the rust and do all the prep work before taking it the panel shop to get done.
What are your thoughts on fabing up a kick plate as opposed to trying to buy a replacement one?

Did take a bit more of the matting off and found a gremlin in the bottom of the door frame :o
In the process of removing the rusted bolts and screws holding the floor pan down, had to use the hacksaw to cut a groove in the heads to get them out.
Attached are some pics of the rust up against the trans tunnel and also the lower portion of the door support.
Also a pic of the passenger side, no way near as bad. will still clean it up and put a stop to it though.

[Didge]

From the photos I'd invest in a mig welder and get stuck into doing it myself. A panel beater will cost a fortune and it's all going to be covered up anyway so doesn't have to look too pretty. Have you seen the photos (County firewall and pillar rust) in the tutorial section showing pretty much the same problem? It's the pillar that's of real concern. The floor panel should really be a doddle cos as far as I'm aware it's not taking any real loads ( I stand to be corrected )
cheers gerald

[Panya]

Had this with a '96 defender and symptoms started on an '00 model. On the '96 just cut out the bad bits and weld in a good bit. I think we used 3 mm and an arc welder. Car is a lego set what are you worried about?! Seriously though it is a fairly straightforward repair and you don't notice it. Two things though - first the rubber soundproofing mat that lies against the firewall? Ditch it. The thing has a water absorbent foam backing lying against the firewall and just lies there providing moisture long after the rain has gone. Second thing is that it may be likely from the damage that your windscreen does not fit tightly on the rubber between the screen and the firewall hence the wet. Whilst you are at it see if that needs the screen brackets loosened, the roof pushed down (possibly with a new rubber strip) against the bulkhead and the windcreen brackets tightened up by your nearest gorilla...

[Didge]

Thanks Panya, I found exactly the same with the rubber matting- may as well have had a towel in there. Any suggestions on a good alternative to that soundproofing?

[MacFamily]

Gday Paul

Ive been down this track before myself this was my effort with little help from Dave with his welder.

http://www.aulro.com/afvb/projects-tutorials/83628-defender-rust-repair.html

Also Deejay has done some rust repair this is his thread http://www.aulro.com/afvb/projects-tutorials/82491-county-firewall-pillar-rust-repair.html

Hope this helps :)

[PaulMac]

Decided I'm going to get it fixed properly, for me that means driving 4,119km back to melb, where I have a mates dad who is a great panel beater. He will get it done at a reasonable rate too!

Reasons for not doing it myself is that I life in Nhulunbuy which is east of no where, dont have a shed or any of my tools up here. To get it fixed by the panel shop up here I'm looking at 2K plus.
I will aslo get to spend Christmas with the family.
Plan to leave the landy down south until the wet season is over and then do an east Coast adventure on the way back (over a 2-3week period). Just hoping we dont get to much rain between now and the 23rd :(