D2 torque converter question

Hi all,
I have a 2004 D2 auto, I’m wanting to put a stage 2 remap on it for some more power and have read in several places that the torque converter needs to be uprated to deal with the extra power. It seems the popular way of doing this is to change out the converter for one from a 4.6 p38 Range Rover with an uprated plate. For this swap though there seems to be some modifications to the mounting of the p38 converter?
So my question is two fold; it appears only the Thor converters from the P38 are uprateable, and of course 3 times the price of other ones, why just this model? And Why can’t you just uprate the standard converter from the car?
Any advice would be marvellous, thank you!

You dont need to uprate them for the power necessarily, more to lose the speedboat effect of the saucer sized TC that came with the Td5. The best option is to buy a kit off Ashcroft but sadly they dont have the TC in stock these days due to lack of dead p38s ( many p38s died to bring us their torque converters).
The adaptation required is just cutting a hole to enable you to tighten the extra bolt. Not difficult.
Its an upgrade well worth doing though, as the factory td5 TC really is too small and revvy for most people. Getting in my brothers xc90 and seeing when a 5 cyl 2.5 diesel should change up makes you realise how speedboaty the auto td5 is.

ronsealdeath said:

You dont need to uprate them for the power necessarily, more to lose the speedboat effect of the saucer sized TC that came with the Td5. The best option is to buy a kit off Ashcroft but sadly they dont have the TC in stock these days due to lack of dead p38s ( many p38s died to bring us their torque converters).
The adaptation required is just cutting a hole to enable you to tighten the extra bolt. Not difficult.
Its an upgrade well worth doing though, as the factory td5 TC really is too small and revvy for most people. Getting in my brothers xc90 and seeing when a 5 cyl 2.5 diesel should change up makes you realise how speedboaty the auto td5 is.

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Cheers, thanks for your reply. So are you saying any of the P38 petrol TC’s will fit and they wouldn’t have to be uprated? There seems to be plenty on eBay ranging from £45 - £300 but there are quite a few different manufacturers of them. Eg Sachs, gems, etc is there any to avoid? Do Ashcroft sell the adapter kit on its own if I source a TC?
Thanks again,
Jeff

UKD2Donald said:

Cheers, thanks for your reply. So are you saying any of the P38 petrol TC’s will fit and they wouldn’t have to be uprated? There seems to be plenty on eBay ranging from £45 - £300 but there are quite a few different manufacturers of them. Eg Sachs, gems, etc is there any to avoid? Do Ashcroft sell the adapter kit on its own if I source a TC?
Thanks again,
Jeff

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I may well get shot down for this as I read up on it a while back, but I believe that the V8 torque converter needs.....
well if you read this, https://www.ashcroft-transmissions....nverters/td5-heavy-duty-torque-converter.html
it more or less tells you how to mod your bits to make one work. I suppose the other thing you could do would be to remove the 4 bolt plate and replace it with the three bolt one off the TD5, but have no idea how difficult that would be. I think if you have the time and no pressure, it would be worth getting one then taking yours off and sussing it out.

I went down the Ashcroft route about 2 years ago for exactly the reasons ronsealdeath discusses. I am not aware of any alternative kit to the Ashcroft one, so that is probably your only route. They were clear that only the P38 Thor and the original D2 V8 TCs were suitable for the kit. They had none, so I put a request on a breakers site and within 24 hours had found a good one at a decent price, and which I had delivered to Ashcroft for refurbishment. Whilst Ashcroft charged the same as they would if they had provided the TC, I had already provided the exchange unit, so avoided the deposit and got £100 for my old one on EBay to offset the cost.
I contemplated fitting it myself, but having never removed an autobox before, I had burst of sanity and got a local indie LR specialist fit it. Glad I did as they were aware of the Ashcroft kit but had never fitted one, and it took a lot longer than they thought and a fair number of calls to Ashcroft (who were apparently outstanding).
If your D2 is putting out anything close to 180hp then you need this modification. Mine was horrid to drive, unpleasantly revvy and if you tried to accelerate it just revved more and was slow to respond. Around town it was actually embarrassing how high the revs would be just to keep up with traffic. With the mod, in normal traffic I rarely go much above 2000-2500 revs, and it has become a very comfortable and pleasant car to drive. If I slip into Sport and gun it the revs will go to 4000 and for a D2 she is as quick as you would expect for a remapped D2 (ie not very, but much better than stock); but the real benefit is in the much more relaxed on road driving and in being able to access the power properly off road. If you do it, make sure you use a Nanocom or Hawkeye to reset the gearbox adaptations - it was a bit thunky for a month or so, but is now smooth as silk.

Would be so nice to have that fitted, but yet so out of reach...

ronsealdeath said:

Would be so nice to have that fitted, but yet so out of reach...

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Not cheap I agree. All in I reckon it cost me £1100. In my case I had already factored about £1000 into the cost of buying the truck. In the 3 years before I bought it there are bills for about £8000 from the previous owner, a good chunk for a complete professional engine rebuild, all the mods for stage 2 and an Alive remap. But having spent the money the gearbox could not deliver the power and he decided he had ruined his truck and wasted his money. So he sold it to me for a fraction of what he had spent and bought an L322 so he could waste some more. I wanted a manual, but could not find one with a decent chassis and a decent engine. I knew about the Ashcroft conversion and figured for £1000 I could realise what he set out to achieve. Fortunately I think I was right.

Sounds like you have now got it where it should be. If my gearbox ever goes then its the route i will take. OP should give Ashcroft a bell and go from there.

Si Click said:

Not cheap I agree. All in I reckon it cost me £1100. In my case I had already factored about £1000 into the cost of buying the truck. In the 3 years before I bought it there are bills for about £8000 from the previous owner, a good chunk for a complete professional engine rebuild, all the mods for stage 2 and an Alive remap. But having spent the money the gearbox could not deliver the power and he decided he had ruined his truck and wasted his money. So he sold it to me for a fraction of what he had spent and bought an L322 so he could waste some more. I wanted a manual, but could not find one with a decent chassis and a decent engine. I knew about the Ashcroft conversion and figured for £1000 I could realise what he set out to achieve. Fortunately I think I was right.

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Brilliant! Must admit I might have tried to convert it to manual, but I seem to remember peeps like SF saying that would be a nightmare, but sounds like you did really well!
So pleasing to find someone who managed to make a really good buy! Thort I'd done well to buy a decent D2 auto for £1850! . Still, it is still running.

Stanleysteamer said:

Brilliant! Must admit I might have tried to convert it to manual, but I seem to remember peeps like SF saying that would be a nightmare, but sounds like you did really well!
So pleasing to find someone who managed to make a really good buy! Thort I'd done well to buy a decent D2 auto for £1850! . Still, it is still running.

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You did do well! At the £2000 mark I found nothing but rusty basket cases.
I looked at 20 or so at prices up to £6500 and only found one manual with a decent chassis. The headlining was shot, the windows and sunroofs didn't work, the battery kept going flat and it had no CDL even though the owner claimed to have used it, but the chassis and engine were good. He wanted £6000. I probably paid slightly over the odds at £3800, but he had also just powder coated the Hurricanes black and fitted BFG KO2s all round. The only problem with that is that I would like to put a 2" lift on it and fit 235/85/16s. I have a set of 16" alloys, but waiting for the BFGs to wear out is going to take a long time.

Si Click said:

You did do well! At the £2000 mark I found nothing but rusty basket cases.
I looked at 20 or so at prices up to £6500 and only found one manual with a decent chassis. The headlining was shot, the windows and sunroofs didn't work, the battery kept going flat and it had no CDL even though the owner claimed to have used it, but the chassis and engine were good. He wanted £6000. I probably paid slightly over the odds at £3800, but he had also just powder coated the Hurricanes black and fitted BFG KO2s all round. The only problem with that is that I would like to put a 2" lift on it and fit 235/85/16s. I have a set of 16" alloys, but waiting for the BFGs to wear out is going to take a long time.

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I bought it in a hurry in 2014 (its a 2000 GS, as I suddenly developed a medical condition which meant no driving, so wifey who can only drive autos, had to be the driver. I hunted all over looking at D1s and D2s. I got it knocked down a bit as I could show the owner a trickle of bubbles in the overflow tank. I expected to have to change the HG and he told his mechanic who agreed, so he knocekd the cost off. In the end it didn't need it, so I reckon it was down to him not driving it much and not getting it good and hot, as I have not had much of a problem since, although the coolant level does drop slowly. Since then i have had the usual exhasut manifold warp, one wheel bearing needed changing, and the rear chassis has just been welded up. Other niggling jobs but nothing too challenging, just awkward sometimes. Came with a good history, although lots of owners. Maybe they were cheaper 4 years ago.

Touch wood I have been very lucky. After I put the V8 TC in it ran better but was still not performing as I expected and I was now getting some transmission thunks. I took it to Alive in Lincolnshire to check the map over and they charged me a few hundred quid and advised me that the turbo was worn (it wasn't) and that the rear diff was dead and causing the clunks (it wasn't). I swapped the turbo for a turbo rebuilds hybrid cartridge (which has been excellent) and when I cleaned the intercooler found that the reason for poor boost was because the silicon hose from the intercooler to the intake was slipping off. The old turbo was fine. I replaced the rear diff and found that the old one was tfine and that the clunk went away when I reset the gearbox adaptations. I reckon dodgy advice from Alive cost me about £800. Storm Tuning got my son's business. Other than that I replaced all the fluids bar the coolant as the rebuild used Evans Waterless which I really like, and I have changed the battery as the one it came with was working, but way too light. The only faults I have had are a replacement rear wiper motor and wet drivers carpets which occurred during the recent good weather. No sign of a leak so I am guessing the ac drains are blocked.

Interesting to hear that Alive, who so many praise to the skies, have feet of clay, if only sometimes.
I recently heard a story about Ashcroft which went totally against all the received wisdom one reads here and on other forums.
You must have been so annoyed, although pleased in a way, when you found that silicone hose slipping off.
Round here I have come across Landy garages that seem to be so good, give you good service and then suddenly they cock up and you get soooo p!ssed off with them! fortunately so far none of them have cost me too much, certainly no more than £200-£300. and they have pushed me into buying a Foxwell! Which I don't regret.
Good luck with the A/C.