31st October 2010 - Destructive: out... Constructive: in!

Well it finally happened - I stopped taking things apart and finally did something constructive! My first bit of "restoration" took place!

I settled on stripping down and rebuilding the propeller shafts for no good reason other than they were the first thing I saw when I looked at the big pile of Pod in the garage.

Here is what they looked like when they were removed from Pod. Front:

And rear:

Getting the old universal joints out was a fun job - they were actually in pretty good condition, but my approach for this renovation is typically to replace things like seals and bearings as I have no idea how old they are or how they have been maintained. Pretty much everything else will be "restored" one way or another. The old UJs were Hardy-Spicer - same as the new ones. So obviously not original, but quality parts nonetheless.

When it comes to renovating metal parts like this, generally I will do the following - degrease, wire brush, primer, top coat. Here's a picture showing what the application of a wire brush can do - the part on the left has been degreased, the part on the right has also been wire brushed.

So each prop-shaft component was masked up:

Given a coat of red oxide primer:

And then a coat of black gloss:

A quick word on the paints I'm using - I did a little reading around the subject of primers, and discovered that all red-oxide primers are not the same. "Red-oxide" is essentially iron oxide or, as it is better known, rust. Its purpose in primers is actually to provide a "filler" to help the paint smooth out imperfections in the surface being painted. As a barrier to prevent moisture getting through it's pretty useless. More expensive primers will contain rust converters, and also glass "plates" to create an impermeable barrier. The primer I eventually bought is called Corroless S and contains a rust converter, zinc phosphate and glass plates, plus a bit of red-oxide. It's normally used for painting oil rigs and so on!

Over the top of this mega-primer, I'm using good old Frosts chassis black. This is decent paint at a sensible price - and it's easy to touch up the chassis and associated parts once a year, provided the base paint continues to do its job.

The prop-shafts bits are all painted up now, ready for re-assembly. How exciting!

17th October 2010 - Axles off!

The last "big" items still attached to the chassis were the front and rear axles, complete with springs and shock absorbers. I'd like to say they came off without a problem - but they didn't. To be fair, nearly all of the bolts holding the springs to the chassis did come undone reasonably easily, but the front bolt on the rear nearside spring absolutely would not come out of it's hole - the bolt was rusted solid inside the spring. I tried various approaches to removing it - heating it up with a blowtorch, beating it with a very large hammer, etc. In the end, I used Mr AngleGrinder to remove the hanger itself from the chassis - that should put my welding skills to the test some time in the future.

So the chassis now looks like this:

I bought some cheap and cheerful axle stands to keep it off the ground (they were less than £10 a pair!). Originally the plan was to start the chassis renovation right away, but time is moving on and I'm concerned that if I jetwash it inside and out at this time of year, it'll sit there full of water all winter without drying out. So I'm going to finish removing the last couple of bits from the chassis (bulkhead brackets, handbrake, etc.) and then wrap it up until the spring. It's not as if I haven't got anything else to be getting on with!

For completeness, here are the axles sat alongside the garage - these will be stripped and rebuilt, along with the springs and shock absorbers. I see no reason to replace perfectly good components just because they're a bit grubby.

So I'm now at the point where all the main deconstruction is complete - Pod is in lots of bits now! I've got to start the actual restoration process - but where to start...?

10th October 2010 - Bulkhead removal

As I mentioned earlier, my original intention was to do all the repair work to the bulkhead while its still attached to the chassis. Back in September I started doing a welding course at Basingstoke College - this has been great fun, but has also highlighted the fact that my cheapo MIG welder really isn't up to much. So I've decided I'm going to upgrade it as and when funds allow. So as not to halt progress on Pod, I decided to just tack weld the passenger door pillar into position so that I know it'll all line up, and then complete the repair work with the bulkhead off the chassis once I've got my new welder - it'll be easier working in the garage rather than on the driveway too!

So here's the passenger side - before...

and after...

With this done, I was now finally able to remove the bulkhead.

Not much left now!

1st October 2010 - Engine out!

Today I hired an engine hoist from County Hire in Tadley to get Pod's engine out. It absolutely chucked it down - I was soaked to the skin.
I had already undone all the bolts holding the engine to gearbox and the engine mounting bolts. With no bodywork in the way the engine plopped out incredibly easily.

Here's the engine, bolted to my shiny new engine stand.

Pod is looking sadder by the day - hopefully this will all be worth it!

September 2010 - Bulkhead repair

As you can see, the bottom of the driver's side of the bulkhead has seen better days. It needs a new footwell and the bottom of the door pillar is rotten.

The previous owner had already cut out some of the footwell, but to do a (hopefully) invisible repair, I'm going to have to take out more - right to the edges of the panel so that the joins are less noticeable.

Through the Series 2 forum I found a guy called Les who makes really original looking repair sections for S2 bulkheads. I purchased a pair of replacement footwells, bulkhead feet, and door pillars from him - to say I was impressed with the quality is an understatement. He does sell on eBay, but if you have trouble finding him drop me a line.

I should have taken some pictures of the work "in progress" but I got a bit carried away with the repair and didn't think about that until I'd nearly finished. Sorry.

21st August 2010 - More dismantlement

More nuts and bolts were undone and big lumps of stuff removed from Pod.

I'm now at the point where to remove the engine I need a hoist (which I don't own) and to remove the bulkhead I first need to repair it. I've been advised to repair the footwells and door pillars with the bulkhead still attached to the chassis - if the bulkhead is repaired off the vehicle it'll almost certainly be a complete pain in the backside to get it to fit the chassis again afterwards.

15th August 2010 - Deconstruction Commences

I actually managed to last about a week before I couldn't resist getting busy with the spanners. Mucho thanks must go to Mrs Jonesy for not beating me around the head with a frying pan......yet. In fact she took the rugrats to visit my parents for the day so that I could crack on with this unmolested. What a very nice wife.

For a 41 year old vehicle, Pod came apart very easily. My first day working on him and everything just unbolted. Having said that, I don't think it's the first time since he was built, since the chassis has had a new rear cross-member and a couple of new outriggers.

Someone has been creative with the floor of the tub - I drilled off about a thousand rivets...

To find this...

It has been suggested that Pod had a crane fitted once upon a time. Anything's possible...

9th August 2010 - The Big Day!

The big day arrived - I was so excited. Pod finally arrived!

Pod had failed his MOT earlier in the year - the main problem being the "tin worm" that had infested the footwells and door pillars on both sides.

Apart from that, he looks nice and original - all there just in need a lot of TLC.

Initially I considered patching up the footwells and doing the bare minimum to get Pod through his MOT, just so that I could drive him around for a bit and suss out what works, and what needs attention. But in the end I decided that I couldn't do a decent job without stripping everything off the bulkhead - and by that time I'd be halfway to stripping him anyway.

I promised Mrs Jonesy that I wouldn't start on Pod until I'd finished one or two other jobs, so Pod sat on the drive looking magnificent.

History

It's already been a few months since Pod arrived, so I've got some catching up to do. But before that, I'll tell you about the events prior to his purchase.

I already own a 1988 Land Rover Ninety - basically a Defender from before they were called Defenders. This is more of a rolling restoration - there's plenty of things that need doing, but nothing that stops me from using it as a daily driver. I'm slowly upgrading things, replacing things, servicing things, but above all it needs to stay driveable.

I was 40 last year and suddenly started to feel very old. I toyed with the idea of buying a car from 1969 as a project, but the things I liked (at the time) were all out of my price range or complete and utter wrecks. It wasn't until early this year that the idea of a second Land Rover entered my head.

I started looking at the various Land Rover forums on the interweb, and kept searching eBay for a suitable project. I wanted something that was complete, but scruffy and in need of plenty of TLC. I didn't want something that was just a box of bits, and I didn't want something that had already had loads of money spent on it.

The first candidate was spotted on the Series 2 forum - a chap called Phil from Stroud was selling his "project" Landy due to lack of time and money. It wasn't exactly what I was looking for since he had already done quite a lot of work to it, but it wasn't a million miles away and the price was fair. I faffed about trying to decide whether to go for it or not, and eventually told him I'd have it..... only for Phil to say he'd decided to keep it and finish it himself! I'm really pleased he did - he's doing a great job, but it meant I had to keep looking.

Several possible vehicles came and went on eBay - anything with an MOT always blew my budget, as the eBay madness took over and people paid silly money for fairly ordinary vehicles. Eventually another "unfinished project" appeared on eBay. It was another short wheelbase 1969 Landy - a hard top this time, that the owner didn't have the time or money to complete (sounds familiar!) The auction ended with the vehicle unsold as the owner had a strange idea of what it was worth. I made him a fair offer without seeing the vehicle, based on the pictures he'd taken - which he accepted.

I used a site called Shiply to find a courier that would bring my Landy to me for not too much cash. The deal was done, a date arranged, and it all seemed to be going to plan. I was like a kid at Christmas on the day it arrived - and here it is:

It was at about this time that I looked at the registration document - "Date of registration: August 1970". I was apoplectic with rage. I contacted the seller - do you know what he said? "Oh yeah, I forgot to check the document before I advertised it". I'm glad he was in Coventry at the time - I was so hacked off.

Mrs Jonesy pointed out that he had misrepresented the item in the original advert, and as such I was entitled to my money back. I explained this to the seller who was understandably reluctant to go back on the deal. I mentioned "Small Claims Court" and he said he'd give me half my money back and I could keep the Landy.

As soon as the registration document arrived in my name I put the Landy back on eBay (correctly advertised this time). A week or so later, the vehicle was sold and gone from the driveway. Time to start looking again!

I soon found another possible project - a 1969 short wheelbase truck cab in Norfolk. I asked question after question of the poor chap selling it, and got plenty of pictures of the Landy. I also checked the chassis number at Gaydon (home of the Land Rover archives) to ensure it was genuinely a 1969 Land Rover. It all seemed good. Here's one of the pictures I was sent.

The auction ended - I won it. The Landy was mine. Again I used Shiply to find a courier who would bring the vehicle to me.

Greetings

Hello.

"The Beardy One" (you know who you are) suggested I start a blog to record the deconstruction and (hopefully) the restoration of my Land Rover, "Pod".

Pod is a 1969 Series 2A, truck-cab, 88" (or short wheel-base) Land Rover with a 2.25 litre petrol engine. The reason I chose this particular Landy to restore is that Pod is the same age as me - he was built just 6 days before I was born. In addition to restoring Pod to his former glory, I hope to research his history and find out what he's been up to and where he's been in the 41 years since we were born.