The ultimate touring defender?

[dages]

Ok, the plan is to start a thread on what people think is the ultimate set-up and assesories for a Defender for those long trips in Australia. Any photo's of your rig will be welcome!

What i trying to get out of people is stardard stuff or assesories they have tried and tested and love or hate for touring purposes. Now I know we'd all love a defender stacked with air lockers, rock sliders and 50 inch rubber, but that's a different purpose and not really what I intend to have a defender for.

I'm heading off in a month for a big trip in the north west, but as I brought this fender for touring i've been reluctant to go too heavy on the mods just yet until I've spent some travel time in her.

As a basics I've got; long range tank (127L), dual battery set-up, driving lights, aftermarket seats and a good stereo. I have a 2001 extreme.

The following will come;

Roof rack - i loath then, but for touring are a must. Where else do you shove that fire wood, surfboards etc. I trying to get a flat aluminium type. Others are too heavy I recon.

Wheel carrier - otherwise i'm going to lose my door! I'm sold on Bearmach.

Snorkel - I feel are over rated, then again your bound to do some swimming in the long term.

Awning - Trying to work out how. If i have the roof rack not problem, otherwise I'm putting an aluminium channel strip on the gutter. Got custon made a canvas sheet, two poles and a rope sewn into one side.

Water tank - can't stand dragging out a 20L water container for the girl to wash her hands. Getting a tank made for the reccessed floor behind drivers seat. Two options a) gravity feed tap, requires hole in floor tap on back door with a electric or manual pump.

Dust/ water proofing - huge problem. I went on about 100km of red dirt recently, good oportunity to view how poor the defender is sealed. Started using marine silicon on all the gaps, including under seat boxes and the back cargo area. I have also gone nuts with Inox, a water proof lubricant and anti corosion spray that is perfect for electrics and inside the door panels.

Back deckout - currently undertaking the fitting of a bed and cargo system using the aluminium tube and joiners from Capral. Will place pictures and a post in the near future. This will be a set-up I will change a hundred times until it's right. This system allows this and I am using all original fastening points to avoid drilling too many holes.

Hopefully you got something on your fender that you just coudn't travel without, or that you blew a heap of cash on and have never used?

Brett.

[Omaroo]

Dages - here's my setup. It's not ideal yet - but it's getting there:


Land Rover bull bar
IPF driving lights
Safari snorkel
Graeme Cooper front wing checkerplate
Graeme Cooper spare wheel carrier
custom steel drawer on runners
steel frame shelf system on top of drawer with 10 plastic boxes
39 litre Engel fridge on slide
80 litre stainless steel water tank behind drawer and under floor between the wheel wells
Brass water tap exiting through rear bumper
130 litre long range fuel tank
Bush Ranger MaxAir compressor under rear seat
EezyAwn Elite rooftop tent
EezyAwn 2.5 metre pull-out shade/rain awning
GME TX3400 remote head UHF
Garmin GPS-III
ARB dual battery installation with intelligent isolator
ARB high-lift jack in addition to bottle jack
ARB half rack behind rooftop tent
500W Pure Sine Wave inverter mounted to top of cargo barrier
two spare Michelin tyres
Motorola 9500 Satellite phone

Tartan blanket across rear seats (mandatory accessory )

Rear ARB locker to geo in yet.
5 x 33/12.5-15 Goodyear Wrangler MTR's to go on (already have them)

[camel_landy]

Firstly... Keep it simple.

Don't bother changing any of the mechanicals as it makes servicing & sourcing parts much easier. Just make sure it's well maintained & replace the consumable items before going on a big trip (filters, fluids, wheel bearings, brake pads, etc...).

Split charge & aux batteries are the way to go. you can actually get 3x batteries in the Defender battery box if you try. :wink:

Water, large tank in the rear foot well (if not carrying passengers) and an electric pump with filter for dispensing. On mine, I stuck a tap before the filter so I could also run a shower.

For fuel, stick an aux tank under the drivers seat. you can also stick some extra tanks in the rear wings. That will give you sufficient range without breaking the suspension or raising the centre of gravity.

Awning - Have a look at the Hannibal unit. I've tried a couple of awnings but the Hannibal one is the Rolls Royce of them all. Well worth the extra $$$.

Roof rack... Avoid! It adds extra drag and sticking anything on the roof will affect the centre of gravity.

Snorkel - A must. Not only will it stop the water getting in but a centrifuge type will also help keep some of the dust out of your air filter.

Talking of dust... Don't bother trying to keep it out. It WILL always find a way of getting in. Instead, just make sure that all equipment, clothing, food, etc.. is stored in something suitable to protect from the dust.

Decking in the rear works well. As does storing lunchtime things in an easy accessable box/drawer or something. The last thing you want to do is unpack half the truck just to have lunch!!!

Wheel carrier...Yep. If you can, try & get the automatic type that swing out with the door. You'll find that the regular type get on your nerves having to unlatch & re-latch all the time.

Finally.... MAKE SURE YOU GO AS LIGHT AS POSSIBLE Weight and overloading is the biggest killer. Even if there's only 2 of you in a 110, don't be tempted to take all those little luxuries - do without!

My 2c worth.

Mark.

PS. If you can, get a copy of "The Vehicle Dependent Expedition Guide" by Tom Shepard. Published by Desert Winds & Land Rover. Well worth the $$$ and explains everything you need to know about everything!

[camel_landy]

Almost forgot....

Get yourself an early type bonnet & get it sprayed up for the colour of your truck. That way you can then mount a second spare on the front. The bonnets only take a couple of seconds to swap, so you can ose the original one day-to-day and then swap over to the other one when you do a trip.

Mark.

[p38arover]

Originally posted by camel_landy
PS. If you can, get a copy of "The Vehicle Dependent Expedition Guide" by Tom Shepard. Published by Desert Winds & Land Rover. Well worth the $$$ and explains everything you need to know about everything!

A small section may be seen here: http://www.rgs.org/pdf/HBETve.pdf

[dages]

Bejessus..thanx for the prompt reply guys

Great set-up Omaroo. Mark agree with all your comments, but how do you have the Hannibal awning without the roof rack?

Just a question, given that the seats take three bolts to remove from the vehicle why do you keep them in during big trips. Mabye it's because I carry surfboards but they are the first thing I take out. Then again they are good for securing luggage in the back.

Jimmy you just drove from Perth to Cairns, how was you rig?

[noddy]

Howdy Dages

Firstly, how many people will be travelling in the vehicle??

We have just finished 11 months travelling around the country. Most important mods (other than roofrack, lights, winch etc):

- water tank & tap
- long range tank (especially with fuel prices)
- remove back seats (if only two people and make up a shelf)
- cruise control (during the long stints it was a blessing, makes the drives so much more comfortable)

[noddy]

Sorry Dages

Can now concentrate....

Water tank (60 ltrs) -- so much better than carrying jerries. Fitted under drivers side, along the chassis rail and fitted a sureflow pump with tap on the back door. Perfect for filling water bottles and cleaning up. No crawling under the car for a tap!






Remove rear seats -- we made up a rear shelf from Queblok (Capral) and used it for mounting the fridge (40ltrs) and enough room for our 'Day Box' which contained lunches, driving snacks, and things we need to get at quickly. You could also use it for a seat for short distances.



Inverter (500W) -- the fitting location came courtesay of Greylandy and turned out to be brillant. Made up box from Queblok and located under the cubby box (removed existing bits of wood). Great for keeping out of dust, did get warm with the transmission tunnel, but overall was excellent and essential for recharging camera batteries, satphone, etc



Rear Wheel Carrier -- fitted a Bearmach to replace the OEM. Was good, given that the rear door probably would not have made it home. Ended up busting one of the mounting studs, otherwise OK and essential given what corrugations will do to the standard door.


As for dust -- cannot be avoided and will get everywhere. Just make sure everything that is vulnerable is in containers.

These are some of our pick mods, other than the mandatory bullbars, lights, snorkel etc. As has been mentioned though, I would be keeping an eye on weight as the Defender will just about swallow a small town if you let it.

Hope this is of some help.

PS: Omaroo -- love that rear setup!! 8)

[dages]

Noddy what a greatset-up, well done.

I am currently creating too sections in the back. the rear one will be semi permanant, with a flat bed about 10cm below the side window height. This will also give me two small compartments above the wheel boxes for oils, jacks, belts ect.

I then will have a section that replaces the rear seats (pretty much identical as you have shown). This will be interchangeable between city mode (seats in) and touring mode (seats out and Queblok shelf/bed in).

Love the inverter, cubby box raiser set-up. Sounds simple and effective.

With the tap is that a 12v set-up? What was the rough cost?

[camel_landy]

Originally posted by dages+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dages)</div><div class='quotemain'>Mark agree with all your comments, but how do you have the Hannibal awning without the roof rack?[/b]

Unfortunately, you don't. As my truck is an ex-Camel Trophy vehicle, I stuck it to the side of the roof rack that was already there. :-D

<!--QuoteBegin-dages

Just a question, given that the seats take three bolts to remove from the vehicle why do you keep them in during big trips. Mabye it's because I carry surfboards but they are the first thing I take out. Then again they are good for securing luggage in the back.[/quote]

Take the seats out. You don't need them for the trip & they're easy to remove. As for tie downs, just fit some. You'll find that a chandlers comes in handy as does a rivnut (clinchnut) tool.

Finally... Sorry to p1ss on Noddy's party. Winch - Forget it. You'll probably only use it the once and that will be to pull somone else back onto the road. For that, you would have had to pay big $$$ and have to carry the extra Kgs. Get yourself a hand winch instead.

Mark.