Good evening,
May I first say how glad I am that I found you all.
I recently had the misfortune of having to return a leased car, it will be picked up on Tuesday; booh hooh! As such I was left without a family car and with slight financial problems. (but who hasn't these days?) I decided to kill two birds with one stone.
I was already on the lookout for a cheap 4 x 4 to use as a towing and winching vehicle.
I found what seemed to be the best option in the form of a 300 series 2.5 Tdi Land Rover Discovery. Yes it was old, '94 but it had a FSH, 125,000 miles and appeared to be the most solid Disco I had seen so far and I had seen too many over the previous weeks. I hoped that it would return about 30 or maybe more to the gallon, thus making it an almost affordable replacement for the Audi.
However having got it home and stripped out the interior etc. I have found a number of problems. I pray that they are not too serious, but I am sure that the experts on this forum will shoot me down in flames.
1. The steering is the wooliest I have ever known and I have had a number of series 2's and even a series 1. A quick inspection revealed nothing obviously loose underneath, but who knows.
2. The rear load space has some rust in a few areas, but it has some serious rust, maybe a 1 cm strip about 35cms long, along the front edge. (the front edge of the rectangular piece which fills most of the rear load area and which joins the main floor just behind the line of the rear seats.)
3. The drivers door retainer has obviously gone kapoot as the drivers door has a horrible crease where it has pushed against the trailing edge of the front wing.
4. ECONOMY, OK so I knew it wouldn't give me the 50MPG of the leased Audi, but it seems to be drinking Diesel as if it was free. Yet when I start it up, even on a very cold morning (-5) there is practically no smoke from the exhaust and none during normal running.
5. The fixed glass rubbers(rear screen, rear side screens and upper screens) are full of gaps, where I assume that rainwater will pour in. (And I live in Scotland, even worse the West, famed for the rain.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now the good bits, the body shell, at least outwardly seems in good condition. It has many scrapes to the paintwork (Who cares.) but other than a few very small surface rust parts appears to be good and solid.
So have I bought a dud or is it a potential goody?
Any remarks will be greatly appreciated, be they positive or negative.
And another thing, will 235/80/16 tyres work on my Disco?
And is it possible to run it on a mixture of Garage bought Diesel and supermarket cooking oil???????? If so what percentage of mix and which type of oil and will it require any modifications to any parts of the fuel system/engine. And are there any supermarket oils better than the rest?
Many thanks for reading this far through my ramblings.
I sincerely hope that I have not gone over my allocated number of queries/questions on this first post.
Rolexroz
May I first say how glad I am that I found you all.
I recently had the misfortune of having to return a leased car, it will be picked up on Tuesday; booh hooh! As such I was left without a family car and with slight financial problems. (but who hasn't these days?) I decided to kill two birds with one stone.
I was already on the lookout for a cheap 4 x 4 to use as a towing and winching vehicle.
I found what seemed to be the best option in the form of a 300 series 2.5 Tdi Land Rover Discovery. Yes it was old, '94 but it had a FSH, 125,000 miles and appeared to be the most solid Disco I had seen so far and I had seen too many over the previous weeks. I hoped that it would return about 30 or maybe more to the gallon, thus making it an almost affordable replacement for the Audi.
However having got it home and stripped out the interior etc. I have found a number of problems. I pray that they are not too serious, but I am sure that the experts on this forum will shoot me down in flames.
1. The steering is the wooliest I have ever known and I have had a number of series 2's and even a series 1. A quick inspection revealed nothing obviously loose underneath, but who knows.
2. The rear load space has some rust in a few areas, but it has some serious rust, maybe a 1 cm strip about 35cms long, along the front edge. (the front edge of the rectangular piece which fills most of the rear load area and which joins the main floor just behind the line of the rear seats.)
3. The drivers door retainer has obviously gone kapoot as the drivers door has a horrible crease where it has pushed against the trailing edge of the front wing.
4. ECONOMY, OK so I knew it wouldn't give me the 50MPG of the leased Audi, but it seems to be drinking Diesel as if it was free. Yet when I start it up, even on a very cold morning (-5) there is practically no smoke from the exhaust and none during normal running.
5. The fixed glass rubbers(rear screen, rear side screens and upper screens) are full of gaps, where I assume that rainwater will pour in. (And I live in Scotland, even worse the West, famed for the rain.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now the good bits, the body shell, at least outwardly seems in good condition. It has many scrapes to the paintwork (Who cares.) but other than a few very small surface rust parts appears to be good and solid.
So have I bought a dud or is it a potential goody?
Any remarks will be greatly appreciated, be they positive or negative.
And another thing, will 235/80/16 tyres work on my Disco?
And is it possible to run it on a mixture of Garage bought Diesel and supermarket cooking oil???????? If so what percentage of mix and which type of oil and will it require any modifications to any parts of the fuel system/engine. And are there any supermarket oils better than the rest?
Many thanks for reading this far through my ramblings.
I sincerely hope that I have not gone over my allocated number of queries/questions on this first post.
Rolexroz
