Oh dear, what a long gap between posts, sorry to my followers. I’ve not had a brilliant year so far what with health issues and work getting in the way of everything, and any precious spare time seems to be spent wrestling with hedges or up in the loft sorting out crumbling-house issues. Never mind, a backdated post to start getting up-to-date with the limited progress I’ve made on the Land Rover, this one documents an evening spent removing the front radiator panel and associated items.

Shortly after buying the vehicle I acquired a repaired front panel from an Ebay seller. However I didn’t want to fit it before now as it would have to be modified to accommodate the intercooler and Disco radiator so it was safely stored in shed No. 3. (My ‘best’ shed!).

The pictures kind of speak for themselves so here we go:

In case you’re wondering, the rusty strip in the centre aperture was ‘supporting’ the electric cooling fan. I had assumed this was a ‘Kenlowe’ unit but it appears to come from a Renault or similar.

The steering and tracking rods aren’t as bad as they look. Notice the large holes through the front cross-member where I guess a winch was once fitted by someone with a wandering drill. Inside each wing there should be two plates with captive bolts for attaching to the front panel. These had been replaced at some time with bolts and washers and now the aluminium has corroded so they weren’t actually doing much, most just pulled through.

In this image you can see the very long alternator belt. I’m not keen on this arrangement, I assume that bracket also held the air-con compressor unit when the engine was in its original vehicle. I would like to fit a series alternator bracket and alloy spacer to give a shorter belt but these brackets are hard to find and making £50 or more.

Note the two sections of angle that had been welded on to support the Disco radiator.

The nearside inner wing had been significantly butchered (out of shot) during the engine conversion process to accommodate the turbo so some work will be needed to regain rigidity.

These images show the typical rust damage that happens on these vehicles, so no surprises there.

The Disco radiator is in very good condition so hopefully I can sell this (if the non-turbo arrangement works). Also pictured is the fan which I’m surprised still runs due to thick rust on every metal part, a sturdy bracket that was fitted to the top of the radiator panel to support the intercooler and the plastic grille, even that has had various holes drilled at some stage.

Thanks for reading…