1960 S2 Rusty Rhinos Rebuild

This old thing has been in the family for a few years we bought it (if I recall correctly) in 1996 - I remember being carted off on camping trips in the back as a kid, running out of brakes (!) and general Land Rover fun. Here's me (left) and my brother riding in the back in about 1996:



It came off the road in about 2003. Since then we have been distracted by a Series 2a build (it ended up being much more of a project than anticipated, as always), two Range Rover builds, a Sankey expedition trailer and several non-Land Rover based projects. 2007/8 a galvanised chassis was bought and sat in the same place until the beginning of 2013.

The purpose of the build was of course to bring it back to life. To keep it fairly standard but with a few things to help practicality. Land Rover purists will probably disapprove. It will be used as a daily and occasional off road toy.

We erected a make-shift workshop (a big gazebo type thing but we made a concrete base and bolted it down and modified a few bits to make it last a bit longer) and work began. It ha been a joint venture between me, my brother and stepdad.

So..here is the Land Rover in question:



Springs were being annoying and they are not going to be kept anyway, so lobbed them off to get axle out:




Removed the bulkhead:




Not actually as bad as we thought it would be to be honest. Next step was to get the bulkhead galvanised. Next time we see the bulkhead it will be a lot healthier:





And put the front axle onto the bench (aka the old kitchen door) at an easy-to-work on height ready to strip down and rebuild.



Pedal box re-furbished (including machining up the spindles) and painted:



On the side of the pedal box there as standard there is a bolt for greasing the spindle - the idea is take the bolt out and grease once a year or so. But never end up doing it. A more convenient solution is to make it with a greasable nipple instead. Simple modifications like this make Land Rovers much easier to live with:

Looks good Will you paint the bulkhead or leave it galved?

Getting into June 2013 now. Paying a little bit of attention to detail, with most things being stripped/rebuilt/painted but without going over-the-top. For example, the 'air-con' mechanism:



Other axle stripped down. This later gets reinforced and then rebuilt with new or refurbished parts and painted. Bench progressively getting grubbier.



Decided a while back to go for parabolic springs on this build as mentioned before because it is not going to lug around heavy stuff on roads to the limit of it's life like the other Landie:



Bulkhead painted. It is not quite the original shade of green, but it is Land Rover paint, and is Green, so it will do. Not after a show winning finish here!:



Then a big moment! Now sitting as a rolling chassis :



Front half closer:



Rear half closer:



For the keen on Series Landies you will it's not quite standard. Parabolic springs of course but also paired with Rough Country shocks. Poly bushes all round (shocks bushes are poly, but they happen to be black). Note the bottom shock pin...standard item has been lobbed off the spring hangars and much stronger bolts welded on instead. Stronger U-bolts. Ball joint covers. All-in-all made to last is the idea.



Wanted to keep things fairly standard looking but uprated where required. So ditching the standard wheels and going for a set of Disco 1 steelies - the same as we have tried and tested on 'Red'. They are also one of the few "modern" wheels that I think suit the Series Land Rovers. They will be painted in a suiting colour. Tyres are nothing special, but a bit bigger than standard and a good enough set of all-terrains:



To get in a bit more details about some of the bits and bobs involved with the things so far, odd order I know but I was reminded by them with the pictures my brother took.

The standard shock absorber bottom mount (which is also the leaf spring hangar) is a fairly thin pin with a split pin going though it. It was all looking a bit thin. To improve on this, thicker bolts were cut down and welded on so nuts can be used instead:



Bit more detail on the rear axle. Rear axle removed and put on the bench:



One of the main issues to be addressed was the rusty axle re-inforcer. It doesn't house anything or have any other function other to make it stronger. I have not seen these on all Land Rovers - perhaps someone could confirm which had them fitted - perhaps only military Land Rovers had them? But the right thing seemed to replace it rather than simply remove:



The dead axle re-inforcers:



After the reinforcer was removed the axle was tested (with a hammer, of course) to check to see if the rot had spread. Thankfully it hadn't and cleaning it up confirmed:





The initial attempt at replacing these was with a chopped-up bit of box section (lines for cutting marked). This didn't work out:



Attempt #2 was to make it out of three sections of steel plate. This worked somewhat better! This is the first of three tacked into place:





Problem solved



The original plan was to simply drain the diff rather than dismantle it, but the sludge that came out suggested a strip-and-rebuild was a good idea.



Rear axle mostly stripped:



Diff:



Which looks much better cleaned up and painted:



As do the back plates and drive flanges:



And re-assembed Those with a keen eye might spot later hubs which have bigger studs have been fitted. New shoes, cylinders and springs as a matter of course:

Very nice Good idea with those shock bottom mounts, the split pins are a right PITA to get out sometimes, I ended up cutting the back ones off with a hacksaw in the end

Into July now and one Saturday gave us the task of taking the engine out of the old chassis. Thankfully everything unbolted without too much persuasion needed. Removed the junk that had collected over time from the chassis to expose the engine. It was this point that we noticed how bent the old chassis was - there is a kink on the rear of the chassis which means on the rear one side sits considerably higher than the other. At some point it looks like it has had a new rear quarter. So perhaps whoever fitted that didn't do a good job? Or perhaps it has been in an accident - we will never know.



The can was to stop water getting into the carb - thankfully it did the job and the engine still turns over nicely:



Before moving the engine and box we split it - partly because it is easy to move that way, partly because it's handy to gently drop the engine and box to split it. I say gently...a slight miscalculation meant the gearbox fell off and onto the the floor. Whoops:



Rather than move the engine 20 feet across gravel on the hoist, we figured it'd be quicker and easier to load it into the trailer and drive it there. It was!



And the box. Wahey!



'Fred' had his first road outing! Looks rather odd like this I have to say:



From trailer and hoist straight to the engine stand ready for stripping. Handy that the last engine was the one we freshened up which went into Red, the Series 2A so was already correctly setup,



And then of course stripped down. The alternator will be replaced for a heavy duty Range Rover item and have an interesting idea for the carb. For most other things will be a case of clean, inspect and replace bits where required. Bits laid out ready for work:



The filter on the oil pump needed cleaning out but other than that all seems fine on the bottom end. No sign of metal in the sump either which is a positive sign:



So next step is to build the engine with new seals and so on. A new clutch will be fitted but the gearbox left untouched as there was nothing wrong with it.

Into the end of July 2013 now. Bores were OK. Head just needed going through the parts washer. Some grinding paste to smooth out valve seats (will find out how that goes later!) and seals replaced:

With the engine largely re-assembled, it's time for painting. This side of the engine was pretty filthy:



After attacking with a pressure washer:



Etched primed:



Paint!



And assembled. With Defender manifolds, twin choke carburettor and Range Rover alternator. Painted pulleys black to break it up a bit. And the red dipstick...well..had to be done



And that is how it stands at the moment. Next step is to mate gearbox back to the engine and mount that as well as the bulkhead onto the chassis.

samc88 said:

Very nice Good idea with those shock bottom mounts, the split pins are a right PITA to get out sometimes, I ended up cutting the back ones off with a hacksaw in the end

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We thought so too. It's the little things that makes a project like this a bit more personal I think

Looks like a nice rebuild!

I'm fairly sure i saw that rangey in kings lynn tesco quite a while back, infact i parked near it!

Thanks

The green-ish Rangie? Could well have been us

Good progress there.

I turned up some threaded pins to weld on the spring plates. It sure does make reassembly easier. Simply a 3/4" UNF nyloc nut and washer, tighten with a socket.

I also thought of putting some 90 degree grease nipples onto the pedal spindles. I don't know why Land Rover didn't do this originally.

looks good, dig the number plate, wonder if there is an FFR 109 reg anywhere

hope it keeps getting passed on from generation to generation too.

honolulujoe said:

looks good, dig the number plate, wonder if there is an FFR 109 reg anywhere

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Shame ours is not a 109" I suppose!

hope it keeps getting passed on from generation to generation too.

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No doubt about that. I am next in line and Rowan, my little one is already eyeing it up Hopefully the way that we are building it will keep it going for a good few years.

More progress..

Engine and gearbox in:



Gearbox took ages to clean... not looking too bad now:



Close-up of the home made exhaust:



The sharp rear bend is actually the over-axle section from a Range Rover exhaust. Note two straight-through silencers; I wonder if this will be loud. Hopefully not too bad:



Starting to look like a Land Rover with the bulkhead, engine and front panel in place:



Oil cooler for good measure. Also, electric fan. Oh and we know we are not going to win any awards for the paintwork - that is not the point of this build :



Next week will be to roll it out and start painting wings and other bits. Our rear tub has pretty much had it but picked up one locally for £10 - will make one good tub out of the two.

Some progress on this over the months

Reverse switch added:



Bonnet taken apart (rivets drilled out, frame taken off, cleaned/repaired/painted and re-fitted not with rivets but with stainless bolts):



First coat of paint put on with the roller. Not bad really. It will get one more coat:



Coat of paint on the wings and fitted. Most dents not taken out - keeping the scars



Engine bay:



Home made throttle mechanism (because the new setup is cable operated not rod)



A few touches to brighten it up a bit (each letter of the number plate removed individually, sprayed, and then re-attached)





And the original Land Rover badge, stripped and re-painted.



Meanwhile, the rear tub was quite a project in itself. The original was battered beyond belief. We got another tub with the aim of building one good one from two knackered ones:



There weren't good rear panels on either of them, so new ones were in order:



On the business end, a completely rebuilt overdrive:



With linkage built by Moss Engineering, Inc (close to the camera: switch for the twin fuel tanks):



Saving the best till last here. The rear now looks like this:



And *drumroll* the front....



From a literal pile of rusty parts to this. We're getting there.

Still lots to do, of course; this is a massive project. It's fractal like a Romanesco broccoli; each subtask uncovers an abundance of sub-sub-tasks which themselves have sub-sub-sub tasks. There's still the hardtop (which needs a lot of work and modification), the seats, the winch, the recovery points, getting the engine started, the electrics, and many many other things, all of which will mean many more months of hard work. But saying all that we are happy to have this family landie closer to being complete.

Nice job, thanks for posting. Can I ask where you got the bulkhead galvanised and how much it cost?



Thanks.

Sure.It was Ashtree landrover international . It cost £ 900+ vat thay took old one away and galvanised it :-D

900 quid! I hope they did some repair work as well as galvanizing.

Thanks, I'll look into ashtree.

Yep there was quite a bit of repair work done.

The making of the spare wheel carrier has started. Didn't like the look of the ones on the market and prefer to make things. So..top bearing:



Bumperette (is that the right expression?) and bottom bearing. Incorporates a fog light - the other side will have a reverse light



And an overall view. Quite a bit missing but if you can picture it will connect with an upright on that beam to the tailgate hitch so it's not just hanging there. Will make it in a way so that you can still get to the door lock. We have Defender rear door wheel mount (I think) which will be included in the frame.

Looks great. Bags of character.

thanks

So we are now in September 2016. A week before we drive to Spain and it has pretty much been finished. Still have the winch to wire up, tidy up the wiring and a few other bits and bobs but it has an MOT and can be driven down to Spain as it stands.

So here is Fred: