'75 Land Rover S3 88" ongoing project... V8 and rollcage!

Once the main rollbar was done, I moved back a little and made a crossmember to sit above the rear axle so I could relocate the rear dampers inboard. I had two reasons for this, firstly I was losing articulation on the dampers maxing out on me, and secondly, the rollcage bolted over the top of the standard chassis mount so they couldn't go back on in the original position















The rear stays were then welded back in, and with some of the spare steel tube I made some extra brace bars to go between the feet of the cage







Once all welded, the cage was painted black all over











Roll cage now bolted down in the back, a successful job well done!





All bolted in and twists up with plenty of remaining travel, now it was the stiff springs I'd fitted to get a little extra height restricting movement



With all the extra stuff going on up top, I also started on a 5 speed conversion with permanent 4wd, using a Defender LT77 gearbox and Discovery transfer box to get the ratios and length as close to where I wanted them. This involved making custom front and rear propshafts from odd bits I had knocking around













They don't vibrate upto the legal limit, though the front propshaft centre carrier bearing bushes are clearly too soft, and still need stiffening up.

A chance discovery at a local scrappy bagged me a late series 2a wire mesh grille, much better than the tacky plastic series 3 grille I've always had

All this work making it more off-road than on-road led me back to the engine issues I had. I was more or less persuaded into going tdi power, assured that with a few tweaks of the pump v8 performance was just do-able, with better economy and reliability off-road. So out with the old abused 3.5 v8, to make way for a refreshed 300tdi









Funky pattern on the pistons!









The standard front radiator panel was modified to make room for an intercooler across the front







Intercooler squeezed in place



I made a new stainless steel raised air intake going through the old 90 heater intake I had on the passenger side wing







Obligatory twisting up a mound of gravel shots!









I drove a few miles with the tdi, fiddled with it, and quite simply lost heart with my old Land Rover. The tdi just didn't suit it, was too loud and quite simply unrefined. I've driven a few others since and they're all the same to me, and with limited funds I let the MOT and tax slip, parked it up in the corner and left it for a year....

Loving your work, top quality. This is a great read.

V8 is so much nicer

Bit of LPG, bob's your uncle!

After about a year of inactivity sat in the naughty corner, a sudden burst of enthusiasm and mindless stupidity I had an idea, and it needed to happen to see if the idea was a good idea!

The springs I'd fitted to get a bit more lift were plain and simply too stiff being more arched, so with some research the plan was to have straight springs fitted, but I'd lose the height unless...



















I just happened to have a trailer load of old axles to rummage through, and once I picked a pair, they were stripped down, and the old coil spring mounts cut off...









A set of good brake calipers were scavenged from the pile of axles and rebuilt with stainless pistons







The bent steering drag link is a scrapper I chopped about to mock up, it's almost the right shape, just needs a little more tweakage to get in the right shape then I'll knock something up a lot stronger and more permanent











More obligatory twisting up a bag of sand shots!

















It would have gone right the way up and over the sandbag, I bottled out as I really didn't want to have to lift the Land Rover off it's side in the driveway

The spring over conversion is nowhere near finished, and still requires an immense amount of work and testing to make it roadworthy, and I still reserve the right to change my mind! I want the springs a little flatter, and make some anti-tramp bars as the rear axle did show a tendency to bounce around a little bit

With this big departure from the norm almost certainly into the realms of controversy, and the hate I've developed for the tdi that brought this whole situation round, the next focus of my attention was to pull the tractor engine out, and replace it with something a lot more appropriate

I've got to about 2 months ago now, so onto the last part taking upto these past few weeks

I'd been heavily researching replacement engines, and had a choice of two almost ready to go lined up on the garage floor, so in readiness I started to re-make the exhaust system, re-routed with the tailpipe exiting high up the drivers side rear wing









Then bought a 3rd engine!







It's a Mercedes OM606 turbodiesel, 3ltr 6 cylinder with an enormous reputation for stonking power output and reliability, a natural choice to make!

The 300tdi was ripped out and the OM606 swung in on the crane to see if it would actually fit being a long 6 cylinder engine







Success!!! It dropped in behind the front crossmember with the gearbox nose raised as high as I could get it before dropping back down with about 2 inches between the front crossmember and the crankshaft pulley

Knowing it just fits in place, next job was to get it running, so I acquired two more injection pumps, left to right OM606 EDC pump, OM603 n/a mechanical pump, and OM662 turbo mechanical pump.



They were all stripped down and I made one OM606 turbo mechanical pump with the larger EDC 6mm elements for more power/smoke

I also needed to make the gearbox adapter, so sat the engine upright on the crank pulley and washed the sump out to have a look inside to check it's health





Engine appears to be in top condition inside, with no sludge in the bottom, so I used an old Mercedes gearbox I had, cut about the first 30mm off the bellhousing flange and bolted that to the OM606 engine. I then lifted a spare LT77 down onto it, trimmed the bellhousing flange to fit and made a start welding them together with some aluminium wire in my MIG welder. It's only roughly welded together for now, enough to test it out before getting it fully TIG'd up and finished







Plenty of room around the back of the engine post v8 footwell mods!





With the engine bolted to the gearbox, and sat on a block of wood (no mounts yet) I started it up



Wow, what a sound!

The Land Rover throttle cable easily hooked up to the injection pump with a few old bits of series throttle levers and arms on a rough steel bracket bolted to the inlet manifold



I've found a Discovery 300tdi radiator sits on top of the front crossmember, and near-enough lines up with the radiator hoses on the engine





Of course, I couldn't leave the engine without fiddling with the governor



And this is what it looks like now

I expect at least another half year of fiddling about with the suspension and steering before it's anywhere near ready being roadworthy, I do have a little experience of spring-over on series Land Rover's, this being my second one!

LT77 will be fine, it's got proper oil in it not ATF, and I'm not building a 450bhp drift monster! Around 180-200bhp would be more than enough, no idea what that equates to in torques, and all depends if I keep the stock turbo, find another similar sized turbo or plonk a supercharger on the side

Wow, that sounds amazing!

I'm also playing with an OM605, but that's a whole other story