Thread: Newbie with stage 1 ute

I had a State 1 ute once. It was a beast of a thing!

Changing to Defender doors is a nice upgradethat will give you full opening windows. Check to make sure the hinges match before buying the new doors though!

I wouldn't change the wheels to the fatter 16' Sunraysias though. Chances are you'll run 31x10.5 tyres, which means you've now lost 1" ground clearance from your diffs. You'll also put your speedo out.

When your LR was new, Land Rover fitted restrictors near the carby to de-tune the 3.5L V8. It was judged too powerful for the 4 wheel drum brakes. Make sure those restrictors are removed for a significant kW addition. You might get a few more horses by upgrading the exhaust system too.

If it were mine, I'd be chasing up fuel caps and seat base plates very quickly. Water in the fuel system is no fun and the road noise without the seat bases must be considerable!

regards,
-Alastair

As I mentioned in your other thread, I would be very cautious about the Defender doors. The hinges will match, and it will fit the hole, but they are much thicker, so you will have to move the seats inboard (means new seat cushion for the centre seat) and you may have to fit a smaller diameter wheel - not good without power steering, particularly if you are fitting wider tyres. The door check arrangements are different between the Defender and Series 3, so you will have to think up something to work there. You will need the striker plate and fixings as well, and may have to drill new holes for it.

The rear window being stuck is probably just a matter of replacing the bailey channel an cleaning the gunk out, but may simply be the latch has twisted on the glass. When removing the latch, be very careful not to lose the little plunger.

John

Welcome! You'll love what the car can do, and the advice from here is useful.

From having a Stage 1 with wide tyres, I can strongly advise against it! I don't think the clearance and gearing isues are enough to worry about, but the on-road steering weight goes up dramatically and there is NIL improvement off road (in fact, I've found the standard 7.50/16 tyres much better). Looks good, but the pain isn't worth it.

Doors - replacing the tops will be cheaper (though not cheap) than replacing the doors. You want every mm of elbow room you can get - this from having a County at one point, and their doors are still thinner than the Defenders'.

I'm not sure what you mean about the three additional guages. Presumably your car has three holes in the centre of the dash? These could have been anything as the Stage 1 comes with only the Speedo and fuel/temp guage plus the warning lights in the centre of the air vent space.

I think you'd be able to use any gear shift knob for the hi-lo lever.

There was an oil cooler option avilable for these - might come in handy if you're doing winch work so check if you have it. The cooler sits in front and below the radiator and the right 1/2 of the blanked space below the normal Stage 1 grill opening is cut away.

I can't help on the fuel switching - that must be an owner-install as the rear tank is the standard one.

Fuel caps are the same until ULP so should be reasonably easy to locate.

Again, welcome and enjoy! There are a few Stage 1 owners here and I'm sure we'd be more than happy to help if required.

G'day Pete

Welcome to AULRO and to the ownership of a Stage 1

The standard dash on all the series vehicles and 110's is the 2 main guages, the centre of the parcel tray has provision for 3 extra guages which could be ordered when new, these were Smiths 2inch gauges, now can be substituted with VDO 2" or 50mm The usual extra guages fitted were, Temp,Ampermeter or Voltmeter, and Oil Pressure they supplimented/replaced the guages that were standard on the earlier Series vehicles, it gave you at a glance that was going on in the engine bay, i would recommend you fit them, also a low water alarm as they save engines from cooking,

I would also recommend you get a workshop manual for it, would be worthwhile to look in the IT shop on this site as Dave has a few digital manuals for sale , (it helps to keep the site running)


cheers

As UncleHo just reminded me, you may want to get hold of the excellent catalogue from Four Wheel Drives in Melbourne - they have just about everything Landy so far as I can tell, the genuine gear knobs for example. The website is here:
http://www.fwd.com.au

Hey Pete, Welcome on board....

I've got a 4 door stage 1.... goes like the proverbial.... was gunna fit a tacho, but figured the fuel gauge does much the same thing in these beasts....

Here's a link to some stage 1 manuals (plus others)

Pic's when ya ready please mate....

Cheers,

Pete