Makes a mockery of the image that is portrayed for such vehicles. Great for your business though
Some of you will remember my post a few weeks back about the Defender with the rear cross member corrosion.
Well here we are again but this time a D2!
This car is a 2004 which is virtually a run out model but sadly the rot has well and truly gotten hold.
Most of the time with these vehicles the rear chassis legs blow out from the inside.....design fault which lets water in and sits at the lowest point. This one was very different with the normal areas perfectly ok but rotten behind the suspension air sacks.
Slightly more complicated job than the Defender due to the suspension configuration but vastly easier to gain access and take apart. There's a huge amount of these being scrapped for this reason however theres also loads out there with this time bomb waiting to happen. The pics........
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Makes a mockery of the image that is portrayed for such vehicles. Great for your business though
Is it really the D2 or (also) neglect by the owner. That rust didn't appear overnight.
Menno
I had a 2010 Defender 90 XS CSW which I used throughout the year. First thing I did was to clean the chassis and coat it with Dinitrol (like waxoyl but much better). It stayed pretty much rust free until I sold it last year.
Left alone they will slowly rust away.
Dinitrol is good stuff. Having said that... some Dinitrol adepts just have everything covered by the stuff with the rust under the wax. Some shops state: "Yeah, when covered with Dinitrol there's no way the rust will go on; there's no 'air' under the Dinitrol..."
Furthermore, I'm a great fan of Mike Sander's anti-rust products http://www.mike-sander.de (with an English page as well). Even the local Dinitrol workshop admits that Sander's products are at least as good as Dinitrol's.
Menno
Great post, thanks FFF, much appreciated.
B
The cost of this chassis repair must surely write an 04 D2 off? I wouldn’t take this on in my workshop even if the customer was happy to pay,it’s surely not a viable proposition? Fair play to you though - that is not a pleasant job by any means and you seem to like getting stuck in to em mate!ps- I assume Land Cruiser is a dirty word in your area??
Last edited by meridian; 27th June 2019 at 08:23. Reason: Addition
Before carrying out any such work we always check the car over to make sure it mechanically and financially viable. This customer was given the vehicle and it’s stands him at nothing so he reasoned it was worth it to get a few years use.
We find it very difficult sometimes carrying out repairs where the repair costs more than the vehicle is worth and so would always advise against it..... some customers however don’t take advise and blindly continue with their vehicles, devil you know scenario
Have you heard of bilt-hamber? Their rust removal, conversion and waxes seem to have a good following in th UK.
https://www.bilthamber.com/corrosion...st-treatments/
Last edited by Captain Morgan; 27th June 2019 at 12:32. Reason: There, their, they’re
What sort of order of cost are we talking about for that level of repair? (I appreciate that you may not want to be specific of course!)
My old D3 always cost me an eye-watering amount of money to have repaired, serviced, whatever really, however basic the item was so I dread to think what this chaps bill will amount to.
Weren't the insides of the chassis members Waxoyled (or equivalent) in the factory? I got my Fiesta done when I bought it new thirty years ago so I would have expected this sort of vehicle to have it done as standard.
I was unfortunate enough to unwittingly buy not one but two defenders that had been dumped in the sea to launch boats. Guess what happened to the rear cross-members.
All vehicles need to be properly prepared for storage and need a certain amount of keep-alive maintenance. Driving a vehicle into storage and just leaving it there is asking for it and I can't imagine that's happened to one of the last defenders off the line.
Hi again FFF, I if it stands him in 2k in reasonable order and he has work for it I guess it’s not too bad. Trouble is it’s all the “while it’s stripped stuff” that runs away isn’t it? Full brake pipe rerun,axle bushes,should we change the airbags or do a spring conversion? And on it goes. Good luck to you tho it’s not your decision it’s the owners isn’t it. Out of interest do you buy partial chassis or fabricate your own?
We check over the vehicle to make sure theres nothing obvious that needs doing before the decision to continue is made. There's no way we would only look at the chassis whilst doing this and quote £1300 and then turn round and say oh by the way it also needs XXXXXXX and it'll cost an extra XXXXX
This actually does need brake pipes which are an absolute doddle whilst out, all the suspension bushes are ok and can be reused. The price for pipes is factored in, it's the stuff you can't see that's not obvious before stripping that can increase the price. For instance we could spend an hour getting 1 seized bolt out which we simply wouldn't know beforehand.
Thankfully we know the cars, know the issues and we'd always give the customer our opinion before starting anything like this. If they choose to ignore your best advise then that isn't our fault.
Last edited by Franky Four Fingers; 27th June 2019 at 19:19.
Fair enough F,I wasn’t judging anyone just an interested fellow mechanic. Good luck with the mig in this heat,
As a long time owner of older land rovers of various models that seems very fair to me. These things aren’t always driven by economics though. I have spent much more than my RRC is worth in repairs in the last two years and it’s just dropped a cylinder liner (3.9v8) so the block is out and off to Turner Engineering for some work. Probably another £3k by the it’s back in but I’m missing the old dog.
After much sweating and swearing finally got the chassis in this afternoon.
Dinitroled my Defender from new (2013) an recoated last year, no issues
- - - Updated - - -
Dinitroled my Defender from new (2013) an recoated last year, no issues
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Dinitroled my Defender from new (2013) an recoated last year, no issues
That new chassis looks great. Must have been a tough job, working 'over your head', offering up all the pieces and get them aligned as well.
Menno