Buying a Series, you got bigga things to worry about than what engine is in it!
For £2k you are nudging 90 territory, but if you want a propper landy, and one you can more easily live with, dont go there, you'll get more for your money with a leafer.
And as you are at the top of the market, go for a Tax Exempt SII.
They hold thier value better, and you dont have to pay road tax on them, provided they are GENUINELY 'standard'....ish!
By now, most will have been rebuilt maybe a couple of times, probably using mainly more available SIII parts.
Should have gear-box with syncromesh only on 2nd 3rd & 4th, rover axles both ends (if 109) metal dash and radiator grill, and then numerouse 'deatial' differences, like non servo, and if an 88" probably single circuit brakes.
For your money, you want one that has been rebuilt on a NEW galvanised chassis.... check for reciepts, or look for makers plate. You can get an old chassis zinc dipped, to hide a multitude of sins.
Next up, look for one that has reciepts for LOTS of mechanical parts, including chrome swivils for the front axle, as well as the steering ball-joints. A new or reconditioned steering box would be good as well, but more importantly a steering relay.
Inspect the paperwork as hard as the car.
Shiney paint means bog all on a Landy, and the headline stuff like 'parabolic springs', nice tyres, seats, cubby-boxes, over drive units, electric radiator fans and stuff are all pretty easy stuff.
The real MEAT in a Landy is the transmission, with the transfer box on the back of the gear-box, that gives it four wheel drive.
If some-one has gone to the effort of doing a full rebuild on a new chassis, then they REALLY ought to have thought about that.
Its right in the middle of the car, and a pig to get out if it goes wrong, and they frequently do when old or abused. So if you have stripped a car to the bones, you WOULD think it a good idea to get a 'good' reconditioned gear-box, OR recondition it yourself..... Many dont, they chuck the tired original back on without even changing the oil!
Reason is that a Series box is about £500 to recon properly with new syncro cones, bearings and seals and stuff, book suggests a lot of specialist tools, and fiddly assemblies that put a lot of ameteur spanner jokeys off. While the alternative, a good reconditioned unit, is about £500, more for an ashcroft 'Remanufactured' unit; that would be about a grand, as much as the chassis cost (though that is a simple steel fabricated structure without any moving parts, so you tell me which is better to chuck your money at?)
So, if you are looking at a restored vehicle, with Galv'd chassis (and you should be for your budget) ask lots of awkward questions about that transmission...... it SHOULD be 'done' and something you wont have to take the whole car to bits to ever have a look at.... or YOU might as well do the full resto yourself, so why pay some-one top dollar for it, you might as well start with a scrapper and do it all the way YOU want it done to begin with!
As said, engines are simple slot in replacement jobs compared to anything else on the car, like steering and transmission, you can 'live' with almost anything tha might be there, and replace to suit your preference later.
BUT for your money, I'd be dissinclined to look at non-standard engined cars, though a 'well done' 3.5 Carbed V8 might be worth a look.
As said, ALL the standard engines are thirsty, V8 is hardly any more so.
Diesels, are gutless, VERY gutless.... they have about 60bhp and are hauling best part of two ton about.
Petrols aren't much better, they have about 70bhp, and can just about be tortured into doing 70mph!
Diesels AREN'T as imperviouse to water or wading as people suggest, they dont have ignitions to get shorted by water, but they still have an alternator up top, and a starter down below, they DO get drowned, as I learned the hard way!
(Picture wading through a deep ford, engine chugging along nicely, driving eighty miles home, but stopping for a pint of milk at a petrol station, only to discover that the starter solenoid has shorted.... OK..... so squib that with WD40..... but then theres no power to turn the starter 'cos the alternator got drowned and hasn't been charging the battery for the last three hours..... yes 3hr to do 80 miles..... a Deiesel WILL do about 60mph if your ears can take the tappet clatter, but the acceleration is glacial, and you wont hold a very high average road speed!)
Diesels are pretty robust though.... they dont really make enough power to do themselves any seriouse harm, but they do wear, and as they wear they get smokey, and start drinking thier sump oil, thats dragged down the valve guides or past the piston rings, and it burns better than the poorly atomised diesel sprayed by crackered injectors!
Reconditioning a Diesel is a VERY expensive job. A set of injectors, the starting point is about £100, then having the diesel distributor, (injection unit / metering pump, by whatever name you preffer) reconditioned properly is about £250 ish.
Diesel head, will need the normal reconditioning ops of having the valve guides replaced, the valves and seats ground, but also the hot-spots replaced, and if they need to be skimmed, then the combustion chamber volumes need to be re-balenced.
They are a LOT more expensive to recondition than a petrol engine.
On a Petrol, you can buy a brand new Zenith Carb for about £100ish, and an upgraded electronic lucas distributor for about £70........
You can add to that a Turner stage 1 or 2 'unleaded' cylinder head, for a small power boost for about the cost of a Diesel head 'done'.
All up, completely rebuilding a petrol engine, expect to spend around a grand on parts and specialist services, plus your time & effort. Add about 30-40% to do a diesel.
For comparison, you can recon a V8 for pretty similar money, mainly becouse the parts for teh V8 are more available, and sold in higher volume, so often a tad cheaper, even though you need a few more of them in some areas (like piston rings!)
So, for Money, I'd not be bothered about engine. For week-end play-thing, who cares? As long as it has one, and the previouse owners haven't buggered it about trying to make it fit.
If it had a V8 conversion, that would be good, becouse otehrwise I'd leave the engine it had in there until I decided I couldn't live with it, or it went pop on me, and do a V8 job myself. But if pre-converted, it would have to be neatly done, AND have the engine backed by a reconditioned gear-box, AND have the servo-assisted duel curcuit brakes from a later SIII 109 fitted.
If not V8'd, then I'd still apreciate the 109 brakes if there, but no great shakes if not, just something I'd do as I went along, waiting for the engine to give up on me!
whether there or not though, I'd be scouring the small adds on the boards for a 'take out' 3.5 carb v8, thats a bit tired and going cheap, if not 'dead'. That motor I'd fully recon for fit, when the one fitted died, but it IS a thousand pound job, but one that is OH-SO satisfying to do, and a fully recconed v8 is just so 'crisp' it makes most feel like they are providing thier power through a jelly fly-wheel!
Might be tempted to gas it, too, but then as a low mile 'occassional' car, probably not worth the hassle. and a well fettled V8 CAN do as well on MPG as an average four pot.
But if that's not to your taste, then 2.25 petrol.
You can do some silly stuff to them, and chucking lots of money at Roland at ACR in Wrexham, you can get a 2.8l 4-pot that makes more power than many v8's..... and (drinks as much fuel!), but still looks like it grew in the engine bay!
Left alone, reconditioned, or played with, the four pot is an 'OK' engine, and it does give a different kind of grin factor, having something that is 40+ years old and just like the pictures in the antiqated books!
But, you have to remember that it IS a 'vintage' car! The leaf sprung landies design owes more to the age of steam than it does the space age, and its basic design is that of a 1930's vehicle, and one adapted to be part tractor, part lorry, part car.
FACT that we can even envissage using an old Landy as an every-day car, or expect to drive it in modern traffic at ALL, is testimony to how good it was when it was first built, but it AINT no Nissan Micra!
They come from an age when the driver was expected to do such stuff as adjusting the brakes, tappets, timing, and carburettor in the weekly maintenence, rather than just filling it with fuel, and checking the tyres now and again! They are maintenence demanding.
But as a 'play-time' car, that can be part of thier charm.
Anyway, bottom line, worry about getting as good a motor as you can for your money; chassis, transmission, steering & brakes up top of the list; as said, scrutinise the paperwork, and worry about what engine it has or what colour it is, or whether the scratch in the rear tub will polish out last.
