A Poor Mans Defender.... SIIA 109

[nzstato]

Making some more progress...

Welded up these sill/b-pillar/dogleg sections as one

Started hanging all of the doors with new hinge pins

Need to throw some diesel in it so I can move it to strip the rest of the firewall and get the rest of the colour going.

 

[nzstato]

Getting some more of the pieces back together... Using lots of seam sealer with all of these panels.  Ran some rivnuts into the B-pillar, made it heaps easier to bolt the sections up to there.

Pulled the heater radiator so I can repair/paint the firewall and get the spare shroud I have to make it a complete unit

Hiding behind the ID plate was this lovely hole.... I suppose thats one way to get to a leaking core plug

 

 

 

[nzstato]

Doing my last run of door skins for a while as really need to get back onto this project before I loose my shed.  Here's how I do it.

 

 

[nzstato]

Tiny bit of rust on the firewall I fixed up

Filled in all of the extra 'speed holes'

And shot some epoxy, not super concerned on the finish for the interior, its all going to be covered by sound deadening and marine carpet.

Got epoxy onto my dog leg repairs so I could fit these panels, rather happy with the result

Bit of a tidy up and then we can get some colour going...

[nzstato]

[nzstato]

And the rest....

 

 

[nzstato]

Not terribly interesting but making some progress..

A tube worth of sikaflex to seal up the roof join. Also replacing the rubber donuts for where the safari roof bolts on, hope to get this all in colour soon so I can mount it.

Windscreen back in with new seals

Going old school glazing with the butyl tape (which I actually like working with)

 

Bought a roll of sound deadening off TM (cheapest option I found) and working through layering all the internal panels.  The roll is better than the flat pack as have less wastage.

 

[nzstato]

Not my best painting in the world, nor the best photos in the light but I got the roof done and back onto where it is suppose to be.  Looking alot more like a truck now...

 

 

 

[nzstato]

A bit more progress (but not too much pics).  I must have melted the main fuel line shut when I welded the firewall and after attempting to turn it around in my street it ran out of diesel 100m from my house after sucking what was there in the filter.  Got a new line made up but the cartridge filter that is in it is unobtainium at the local BNT and the existing sediment bowl is leaking air through one of the passages so will run one of the generic setups. 

An ongoing problem for this has been it popping out of the gearbox selector from the janky DIY shifter.  The alignment pin on the shifter ball (a ground down bolt) had worn which was causing the shifter to move sideways and cause the problem.  I ground down a new bolt and gave it some heat treatment so hopefully that solves the problem for another 20 years.

 

I still have my timeline of months before I loose this shed so trying to work on the big stuff while interior/tyres etc can be sorted if its moved to my warehouse.

I knew the front diff was going to need some work (as they all do at this age/wear), and the front shaft definately needs new UJs.  Not my first rodeo in one of these so I know what I'm up against...

Brakes look ok (which I dont want to touch now, as have intentions for a disc break conversion in the future), shafts in ok nick, but these intermediate bearings need replaced (and are a little $$$), looks like there has been a bit of moisture in there and the oil that came out was sludgey brown....

Yep, need a few front diff (anyone got one?), there are some chips (old ones) out of the crown wheel and there is corrosion pitting.  

Annoyed at myself as I had spares of these from my 88 from 8yrs ago and gave them away.  Lesson learned, always horde, never sell....

 

[nzstato]

Being that I dont have too much time to keep my shed I went ahead and sprayed the front.  I bashed out the main dents where there the best I could but realistically the whole front end needs alot of panel work at some point in the future - probably worthwhile to get a whole new clip.

Ive got new bits on the way to rebuild the front axle so that's the next job on the list....

[nzstato]

Making a bit more progress

Due to GC @NickJ who brought me a replacement diff down I could start getting this back together.  Replaced the pinion seal for good measure while it was on the bench.

Bit of paint makes it all look nice.

The intermediate bearings on the half shafts were stuffed so I sourced some replacements including the inner races which needed to be swapped on the shaft.  Easiest way to do these is cut through most of them with an angle grinder then some solid blows with a chisel should split them off.

 

The UJs on the halfshafts are stuffed also, these have been replaced but some bright spark forgot to remove the dust seals on the needle bearings so they were running dry.

 

[nzstato]

Continuing the process of reassembling this front axle

Also giving these free wheeling hubs a bit of an overhaul.

Think I mentioned I wanted to go to a fixed rear glass.  I got some glass cut to the required size and bent up some simple brackets to drill into the frame, very much how the rear door glass is fixed.  Pretty happy with the result TBH.

[nzstato]

Got all the running gear buttoned up so first time outside with all the panels on (during the daytime) I can take some decent shots of it.  With some new rubber and painted rims it'll look sweet, need to strip all the haggard paint off the bumper too.

 

 

[nzstato]

Its moving day....

Here it will be sit for some undetermined amount of time... I may be able to get the wheels/tyres refurbed while it stays in storage but there wont be much of an update on this until I build my new shed.  Been a good fun project so far and am itching to get the rest of it completed and on the road... 

 

[nzstato]

Decided to stop feeling sorry that this is tucked away and get to work on it some more...

Its always been a smokey beast... have pulled the injectors to get them re-tipped.  The nozzles did look pretty bad

 

Getting these off to treat for some new shoes.  285/70-16 is what the landy barrys say I should be going for. 

 

How long ago did Goodyear make these here...?

 

[nzstato]

I feel like I've made the most progress in a long while...

Got all the old tyres pulled and sent the rims to the blasters, added a good thick layer of 2k while they were at it.  Decided on a generic grey rather than white (to match the roof) as will likely get scratched up and look terrible.

Came up well

There was also another 109 chassis waiting to be blasted when I was there, so thats always a good sign...

Got a good deal on tyres (correctly 235/85/16) and after wrangling up some muscle (aka @azzurro) to haul them back to the warehouse, got em fitted up, reckon they look quite the part. 

As per the discussion thread, I've been (rightly or wrongly) having a go at my own upolstery, got one set of seats completed so far.  Pros and cons with going with the canvas but will see how we go long term

[nzstato]

Now to have a go at the dieselly bits....

After looking around at the injector pump, and doing ALOT of googling have come to the realisation this is your standard Bosch A model pump with a pneumatic style governor on the back end of it.  From my basic understanding, rather than a set of flyweights you have intake with a throttle butterfly with a vac take off pre and post the butterfly.  Depending on the throttle position (and vac differential) it then moves a diaphragm which is connected to the fuel rack - kinda a pretty simple design - your idle and max fuel delivery is then defined by a set of adjustable stops on the butterfly.  I found (this setup seems to be found in old mercs) that if the diaphragm is in poor condition  then it can lead to overfuelling (my problem).  When I pulled the housing there was quite a bit of oil in and around the leather diaphragm.  It looked in ok condition so cleaned it up and refit.  I suspect a seal has gone somewhere else in the pump (suspect shut off pivot) but I'm hesitant to pull down further until I see how it now runs.

I had also sent my injectors away for a service, I was prepared for the worse but the Barrys said they cleaned up fine and were tweaked to spec.

I had just enough juice in the batt to turn it over enough to bleed half of the lines and then fired up.... Certainly sounds alot smoother, and with a quick run up it looks to be much cleaner out of the exhaust.  The diesel in this thing is several vintages old so I'm sure with some fresher stuff it'll do well.

 

[nzstato]

Still working on the interior, I have 2x rolls of tar mat into this thing...

 

To go over it I bought a generic roof lining kit, initially failed by trying to do it all in one go.  Was much easier to cut panels in between the roof bracing.  Also a cleaner look methings, can run the wiring for the internal light a bit easier too.  

I should have just enough material to re-pad this panel which goes above the windscreen.  Some auto-archeology in pulling it apart, its just sheet steel in behind the dried up foam.

 

 

 

 

 

[nzstato]

This is making some progress, but with alot of other things going on with life it has been slow.  When I shifted it back into my shed I noted one of the wheel cylinders was leaking.  

Need to finish up the interior, check some of the wiring then its off for WOF time.

 

 

 

[nzstato]

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