Land Rover Gearbox/Transfer Box replacement on 110?

Afternoon,

When driving the other day i lost drive to all wheels, despite engaging every possible high/low/lock combo! I suspected a broken output shaft as all normal gearbox gears would engage fine, but when lifting the clutch i would hear a metallic noise, just as if the shaft had broken. I took it to a garage who inspected it - they've told me that the gearbox, transfer box and output shaft need replacing and will cost a couple of thousand! This seems rather excessive, I'm tempted just to buy a LT77/LT230 unit off eBay and fit it in the barn. A few hundred pounds (opposed to thousands!) and a day up in the workshop seems the best choice!

What do people think? What are the chances of the gearbox AND transfer box stripping all gears and needing replacement at the same time?! Would a LT77/230 combo from a discovery fit into the Defender fine? Pretty sure theyre the same across the board.

It's a 2.5 TD 110", late 80's.

Cheers!

Good to see you HAVE chosen the route i would have, just probably worth checking the clutch slave cylinder and doing the clutch while you are there, but 1 thing, most disco's use R380 g/box which is coupled to a 300tdi as standard, you have lt77 meaning you will need to replace the tunneling inside the vehicle and carpets if you have them, if you can get your hands on an early 200tdi disco chances are you will need to replace the gear selector mechanism with the defender one, because the levers are the other way round, as in t/box lever is in front of g/box lever. And anyway, if you do manage to get a 200tdi probably worth swapping the engine with it.

FORGOT ALSO: disco's were only ever fitted with 200tdi engines, and i'm fairly sure all transfer boxes were with an increased output speed of around 20%, which is down to different gear ratios, so if you were to do that your TD engine will have a hard time keeping up with this change.

There's always the compromise option - send your current gbox and tbox to ashcrofts for a refurb. it'll set you back around a grand, and it'll be good as new, and original spec. You've still saved a packet on that garage quote, and wont have to worry about it any more.

Cheers for the suggestions - will probably try and find one on eBay for an afternoon of fun in the barn. I'm also tempted to have a 2nd opinion from another garage as i think they're overcharging/replacing unnecessary parts to not have to do the work(!).
They look straightforward to drop out/drop back in without too many surprises...

Most likely the output splines of the lt77 have gone. Your existing input gear in the lt230 may be re-usable in a pinch, but better to renew it. As mentioned above, a disco unit will need a new input shaft to fit the engine, and the gear turret swapped over. You can check what has happened by removing the circular plate at the back of the LT230 - you can see the splines after removing the large nut.

Oh, and it's kinda obvious, but these are heavy buggers. Take care.

as above you need to find the fault first by removing pto cover if it is splines its a recon or a good used defender lt77 and a new input gear for t/box , about 430 for parts if recon box then labour to remove /refit

Have you actually made sure that a half shafts isn't the issue?