Flat Bed Disco 2 Project

I acquired this Disco about a year and a half ago with the intention of doing a few repairs to it, getting it MOT'd and just using it. However, when I started digging into it, it soon became apparent that it would require much more work than I originally realised. So I chucked it in the back garden and left it while I decided what to do with it.

So a bit later I decided that rather than do all the body repairs it would need it would just be easier to cut the back off and make it into a flat bed pick up.

Fast forward to now and I'm now in the process of doing just that. I've bought the Longranger trayback kit to make the cab and will be fabricating the load bed with 40mm box section steel, with aluminium chequer plate for the floor.

Enough waffle, have some pictures.

I like that, I seen one on bgay not too long ago with defender hicap rear tub fink it was on the isle o white
it looked superb. Pity it was so far away in lockdoon.

This is the sort of look I'm hoping to achieve.

Looking forward to this

Not as much as me I bet.

This morning I decided to do a code read with the Nanocom. Mainly to check out the three amigos, which it had when I bought it, and it seems all four wheel sensors need replacing. But there are loads of other codes I need to look into as well. I suspect a load of them are due to the fact that the engine has been running with no induction and exhaust system fitted. Weirdly, there is also an auto box code listed but it's a manual. Not sure if I need to worry about that one or not.

I think the sensor problems are due to the extreme lift (about 5") as the rear ones seem to be stretched a little. The front ones don't look too bad but it's sitting still with the normal amount of weight on the front. They may have been stretched by off roading axle movements though. I've ordered new ones all round and I'm going to lower it back to a more reasonable 2" lift by removing the lifting blocks. It has +2" springs and +3" lifting blocks. In order to keep the clearance for the big tyres I'm going to lift the body a little, not sure how much yet but not 3".

Old Land Rovers eh? I don't know why I keep buying them. Suffice to say that I had to resort to the grinder to get the rear calliper brackets off. They were both in a very poor state anyway so no great loss. I've added a complete rear brake rebuild to the list of jobs. The small bolts holding the sensors into the hub look like they're going to be a pain as well. Time for some dinner than back to more brutality.

Yep, the sensors were a pain to get out. I've left the outer cover of each sensor in the holes for now to stop anything getting in there. Building it all back up with new parts will be nice though.

No doubt the jobs list will grow arms and legs.

From the first few pics, I thought it was too tidy to cut up but when you started stripping it, it’s obvious why. Just shows how disco’s can rot!

Keep the pics coming!

Just plodding along with niff naff and trivia at the moment. I'm waiting for a welder friend to have the time to do the welding on the body so I can fit the cab kit properly. Currently in the process of removing all the body to chassis bolts. Four left to go and not a single one has come out in one piece so far. While I'm doing this I'm also finding even more rot in the body. It's discouraging to be honest.

Got a bit more progress to write about. I got stuck getting the rear hubs off after I decided to strip down the back brakes and replace everything. I broke two 1/2" tommy bars trying to loosen the hub nuts so I had my brother make me up a much more substantial tool. With a long lever attached this made short work of the hub nuts so now I have both sides of the axle completely stripped down. It won't take long to get them built back up again with all the nice new parts I've been collecting.

Got both sides of the back axle built back up now. Also took out the fuel tank to check the state of the inner chassis rails. Knocked off a load of surface rust but they're surprisingly solid. I was expecting to have to get them welded. Things are looking up.

Well, after things were looking up in the last post, they're looking down again now.

I'll start with the positive first though; all of the body bolts are now out. They were all tricky and needed cutting/grinding but the two at the base of the bulkhead were the worst because they were the hardest to get at. To get them out I first cut the excess thread off each bolt right up to the nut with a loose hacksaw blade then filed the end off the nut down with a flat file to get a clean, rust free surface. Then I drilled a hole right through the nut and bolt. This was all to reduce the friction as much as possible so than when I turned the nut the whole thing wouldn't just spin because I couldn't get anything on to the top of the bolt to hold it. This worked perfectly on one side and the nut came off easily. But on the other side it loosened about half a turn then just started spinning. So on that side I laboriously hand filed the nut and bolt down with a round file until I could just fold the nut in half. Pictures to explain:








So now the bad news. While I was working under the passenger wheel arch I poked around at a small rust hole on the inner wing. That soon escalated. It's pretty bad and I'm afraid to see just how much further it extends. Ttere are some rust holes on the drivers side inner wing too but I haven't touched those yet. Probably more horrors to be uncovered. Also, I've stripped down the front end and the rust is pretty rampant in the front panel too. More pictures:

Wow, love your project but man, I thought everything rusted bad here, (Inverinate), seems Shetland is even more salty

I'll be watching with interest, had a mad idea earlier of making a long bed beaver tail version some day, best finish the other 4 project vehicles first though

Keep up the good work

Cheers Dave. Yeah, Shetland is bad for cars. Very bad. Things have slowed down somewhat as we're having a run of fantastic weather right now so I'm taking advantage of that to get loads of work done in the garden.

Not a major update as things have not been progressing as planned but enough to report to make a post worthwhile I suppose.

Positives first:

As you can see in the first picture I have solved the problem of why the passenger window makes so much noise and won't move when you try to operate it. Fortunately for the wallet there was a good used one in the pile of spares that came with it. One small job ticked off the list.

I've cleaned and refitted the fuel tank and tidied up the associated wiring.

I have a pile of shiny new parts to go on. Namely a complete suspension kit (see negatives further down), a new fuel filter housing and a set of extended braided brake hoses. The new springs are +2" heavy duty items. The new shock absorbers are +4" adjustable items. I have removed the rear 3" suspension lifting blocks and plan on having them cut in half to reduce the overall lift by 1.5". This will mean I have a somewhat unusual lift of 3.5 inches instead of 5" as it was when I bought it. In order to maintain the clearance for the wheels and the overall tall look I plan on having 20mm body spacers made.

Negatives:

I spent a considerable amount of time cleaning up, treating, and painting the exposed rear part of the chassis. During this I'd found a few thin spots and the usual holes in the underside of the rails either side of the fuel tank which I had planned to have patches welded on. However, when I removed the shocks and springs to get the lifting blocks out I took the opportunity to clean up the bits of chassis I couldn't reach with them fitted and knocked a bloody great hole in the side wall between the spring top mount and top shock mount on the passenger side. At this point I decided to condemn the chassis and not waste another second on it. I also discovered that both the rear shocks were completely useless as well, hence the decision to completely renew the suspension.

I had been looking forward to fitting all this shiny new bling as it would have given me a real feeling of progress but now I'm even further behind than I was last time I did an update. However, it was always in the plan to get a new chassis at some point in the future but now I have an excuse to do it sooner. Can't afford it yet though so in the meantime I'll be doing other stuff to make the chassis swap easier when I do get it.

The new flat bed will be built soon though, so that's another positive. I have family arriving in a couple of days for a weeks stay and my brother is a good welder. He's also bringing all the steel needed with him. So there'll be more positive and interesting updates coming soon.

* Pic heavy post *

Some major progress made over the last week. The flat bed structure is about 95% complete and I think it's looking great. It's designed to be removable so it's fixed to the chassis at 6 points, 4 of which are the rear body mounting points. At the front it's clamped to the chassis as can be seen in the photos below. The box structure at the front will be panelled with ally chequer plate and sub-divided to house two batteries and a tool compartment. The lid will be in 3mm ally chequer plate, as will the rest of the bed, and will be flush with the floor.

There's loads for me to be getting on with now in relation to the bed so progress should be pretty steady for a while. Still waiting for the guy who's going to be doing the bodywork welding for me.

Wow some progress there buddy, are your plans to use a canvas top, or pannelled in bodywork for the Tub ?

Lovin' the ladder and also the Tea / Coffee Mugs made me chuckle

Cheers again Dave. I'm going to leave the back open and see how I go with it. If needs be I can partially or fully panel the back to make an enclosed space but I like it the way it is. There may be some partial panelling to mount equipment on. I do plan on having some sort of side structure below the bed something like the picture of the grey pick-up I posted earlier in the thread. At present I'm still not sure how to finish the back off above the bumper. I'd like to keep the bumper as it's a proper (and expensive) recovery bumper. I also need to figure out how to mod the fuel filler to fit in the new structure. It seems quite complicated and I'm hoping I can delete some of it to simplify it. As for the ladder, that was always in my head as part of the design since the start. It's turned out pretty much exactly how I imagined it. It's pretty high off the ground though so I need to incorporate a step much lower down to get started. I envisage a slightly flared part at the rear of the rock sliders I intend to fit later as the first step then the top of the tyre as the 2nd step.

Also, I plan on modifying and fitting the full length roof rack that was fitted when I bought the Disco and possibly put the spare wheel up there like it was on my Defender. Possibly. That might be a step too far. We'll see.

Copious amounts of tea and coffee were brewed during the construction of the bed as my brother is a tea drinking machine.

Great project, something different. Will look forward to seeing how it looks when it's finished.