Defender 110 double cab with Isuzu turbo diesel build up...

[The Rover Shop]

I think it was an exmoor brand and is designed to go In the bed of an older 110, I don't think it will be able to stay there all the time as I don't think it's totally waterproof, so I may have the wifey make up a canvas cover for it...or it just gets installed when needed... The back folds forward and then it hinges up sideways, definitely not as complex a design as the newer lock and folds, and will be a bit of a job to install good quality mounting points for a seat belt but definitely doable...actually as I type this it's no problem at all to do, especially while I have the fuel tank out of it, but this is all dependant on whether the next owner even wants this capability or not, so I may not install the seat belt mountings. Spent the day today fabricating the front of the bed (rear bulkhead/firewall) and I think it will come out very nice with some cool features incorporated into it.

 

[The Rover Shop]

I didn't like the positioning of the rear high stop light I was going to use so I went another route...this unit is a running light and stop light combination and is very bright, it sits above the protruding rear lip of the rear window so it shouldn't cast light into the cab when applied...



Fuel filler neck mounting point was a bit corroded so I made a matching 5-bar filler plate..looks good...also in the pic is the rear side lights I wanted to install where the old style lights were mounted...these are smoked red LED lights and I have matching smoked ambers for the front defenders..I think they look great..



Dabbed up my spare wheel tailgate spacer block and it works great.. And installed protective rear checker plate inside the tailgate door..

 

[The Rover Shop]

Fabbed up the rear bulkhead in 1/4 aluminum plate, made it in 3 pieces for ease of installation..cross bar in pic will be installed inside to give complete rigidity..all marked up so this weekend is going to be all about pulling the whole roof etc off again and installing the bulkhead and sealing it all up on reassembly..



Not sure if I am going to stick with this set of LED taillights or go with a smoked clear set...kinda like the colored ones as it throws a splash of colour into the black and white..

 

[The Rover Shop]

Okay...in regards to the braking system on this truck...since I went with 4 wheel disc brakes I decided to upgrade the rest of the brakes...brand new stainless lines have been run from front to back, I wanted to upgrade the vacuum booster to the later style discovery double diaphragm style....some one in the know told me that the discovery one will fit right onto the old existing brake pedal box assy, all you have to do is drill 2 new holes for the booster to mount...so after all that sealing up and installing of the pedal box, I went about doing this...yeah...it doesn't work...so I ordered a defender 4 wheel disc pancake booster assy, while it bolts right in to the existing pedal box holes the throw is different...the brake pedal doesn't allow the brake booster rod to sit all the way back...this would cause severe problems with the brakes....thankfully I remembered I had a late model defender brake pedal box laying around so I went about changing it to auto pedal.....I made a template from a discovery auto pedal and made the brake pedal and welded it to the existing pedal after straightening it a bit...this allows the brake pedal to be larger in size and further away from the accelerator pedal...and now it takes a factory brake pedal rubber should you want to use one..





You can see the old pedal setup on the left...this pedal wouldn't have worried me leaving it as it was...the newer ones are much smaller ..

 

[cj7ox]

Great build!

 

[The Rover Shop]

Finally got my arzz back onto this....lottts of progress and neat ideas I thought of during the build so I will be updating this a good deal now..

 

[The Rover Shop]

Had to go back through my older posts to see what I had updated..... okay, so I finished up the rear bulkhead and it's really really solid, there's no damaging it now... I drilled drain holes in the bed of the truck in the corners to allow water to drain out and prevent pooling..decided that I wanted to use the inside surface of the rear bulkhead for the storage of some item so it is now a double sided wall installed sound deadening insulation in between to limit the noise, plus I'm mounting a subwoofer amp on there and I don't want that horrible rattling noise..

 

[The Rover Shop]

Got the lower dash mocked up in place so I can make sure everything sits where I need it to as I'm doing some neat stuff with the interior electronics... had to cut the dash up to accommodate the double din touch screen stereo/nav/camera/internet system..as well as some additional gauges and switches?.

 

[The Rover Shop]

One of the main features of this truck is that it's a 2.8 Isuzu turbocharged engine..,had to have a special bracket made for the a/c compressor mounting...really happy with the way it turned out...
View attachment 405557

In this pic I have already replaced the complete timing belt system and a new water pump..

 

[The Rover Shop]

I wanted to have this truck as user friendly as possible so that meant an automatic...since I don't like the positioning of the shifter in the 97 NSA trucks I decided to do my own configuration...I moved the transfer lever forward about 6 inches and that gives me enough room to use the correct rover shifter housing assembly...I will have to make a few mods to the actuating rods for high/low and diff lock but I have that mod sorted..will post pics soon... I needed to make my own transmission tunnel setup to mount the shifter on...this is a rough mock up, I need to change it a bit and then I will make it tidy with epoxy etc...once this is all done there is a upper console cover that goes over top of all this..





Once the shifter console is on its a bit tight with the transfer lever but I have a plan for that as well...the automshifter is in a really ergonomically comfortable place like this...

 

[The Rover Shop]

So I wanted to upgrade this vehicle a little for hotter temps as my initial idea was to take it home to Australia... I wanted to intercooler the turbocharged engine and I had an allisport performance 200tdi intercooler laying around that I just couldn't bring myself to putting on my camel trophy restoration...so I modified the framework for the oversized intercooler to fit...this should work a treat...


I also wanted to install a larger heavy duty radiator, so I did that and then made my own fan shroud to house the high flow 16" thermomfan...this thing moves some serious air.. made the shroud out of stainless and it uses the original shroud mounting system

 

[The Rover Shop]

Using a larger radiator assembly meant that the radiator and intercooler setup sat too high in the front valance, I also wanted to install a/c and with defenders not really having much room in front of the radiator for a condenser and fan I moved the radiator mounting points back about 2 inches and down an inch, since I am using an electric fan this isn't a problem.. this now give me plenty of room to run a high efficiency condenser in front of the radiator and a decent pusher fan for the condenser that's switched on when the a/c is on.

 

[The Rover Shop]

I'm a big fan of snorkels, but I always find I need a custom intake, I did one for the 130 build and it worked out excellent so I did the same for this one...took a piece of 1/4" aluminum sheet and cut out the right shape, hole sawed a 2& 1/2" hole and cut the ends off 2 90degree elbows, installed them at the right angles and had my aluminum welder weld it together...

 

[The Rover Shop]

Took an old stainless snorkel I had laying around, cut it to length and added some rivnuts in the correct spots and mounted it to the external cage..looks great..

 

[The Rover Shop]

One of the things that's always concerned me with defenders is their lack of low coolant level warning light...I had an allisport aluminum coolant reservoir laying around (again couldn't bring myself to installing it on the camel) so I wanted to try a low coolant level sensor into that...I will use this to trigger a red flashing led in the dash next to the temp gauge...trial tests it works excellent..so good as a matter of fact that I'm going to install one on my td5 130...





Trick is to not have it too close to one of the outlet as the flow could be enough to give you false readings..and don't have the sensor too high that it does the same or too low that the float can't swing or it binds...I think where I mounted it is the best compromise..