Right, well, you dont need, and in fact are better off doing virtually NOTHING to your Disco.
Lifts, comment elsewhere on the topic; they dont actually do much that is useful, especially the ones done on the cheap.... well they do I suppose..... they ruin the on road handling and give you lots of opportunity to discover the joys of fixing prop-shafts and suspension bushes! Other than that.... well they make your truck look 'the biz' and make you feel part of the 'crowd'....... but as for adding capability to your vehicle, they dont do a heck of a lot for you, especially if you are a newbie.
Snorkle..... if you get into anything THAT deep.... you'll have more to worry about than sucking some **** into your engine..... again, dont worry about it...... yet!
TyresOn this subject, err.... well let me start at the beginning......
On the left, a 'modern' AT, in specific, Wrangler AT2/s, they are not quite as 'open' as the 'old' Wrangler AT, or other more 'rugged' AT's, BUT in recent years, with more and more school-run and caravan club 4x4's, 'All-Terrains' have been becoming less and less 'All-Terrain' and a lot more 'Tarmac Tyres, that have a little bit of grip on grass'.....
Which has helped the 'myth' that you 'need' 'Muds' to go off road..... Tyres on the right, are Insa Dakars, and a full 'Mud'.... and in the slimy stuff they find grip like you wouldn't believe.....
BUT! I do NOT reccomend them for a newbie!
Muds wear faster than AT's, they ARE noisier on the road, they are less 'stable' on the road, they dont have as much tarmac grip in the wet, which are all faults I could live with......But the one I really dont like is that they cost about 20% MORE fuel!
Seriousely, in the same driving conditions, on road, they can drop fuel consumption on a Rangie from 20mpg to 15mpg, and on a Disco, from 28 to more like 21.
But the main reason for NOT reccomending full muds to a Newbie, is that less capable tyres are a great teaching tool.
Off-road driving schools, and even some on road driving schools actually use cars fitted with 'bald' or under sized tyres to make the slippy, so that you can more easily get them sliding and get a 'feel' for how a car behaves at the limit of traction....
And with tyres that DONT grip as well, you'll find that limit a lot sooner, and a lot more often, and hopefully a LONG time before you are in seriouse 'trouble'.
Full muds get a LOT of people a long way into trouble before that fact is made apparent to them!
But, as said, 'modern' AT's are not 'really' AT's, and you could probably do with a 'little' more bite from a tyre, but......
This is a standard Range Rover on 'modern' All Terrains, tackling some rather slippery slidy muddy trails.
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fu6-kp4hEkk"]YouTube - the Salisbury Safari - 19/07/09 "Tight & Scratchy"[/ame]
They are surprisingly 'competant', and there was nothing in on this 'run' that brought the old girl to an abrupt halt, she couldn't drive out of........
Even when I decided to get a bit 'silly'......
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsBOzuUfTHE"]YouTube - Salisbury Larkin[/ame]
OK, so a set of full muds would have laughed at that...... err.... ACTUALLY!
If I'd been on the Dakars, rather than the wranglers, yes, I'd have gone up in one, BUT, surprisingly, that little gully was tackled by a fair few on such tyres and many still struggled.......
Mainly becouse they relied on thier tyres to find them traction, having been advised you 'NEED' muds to do
"ANY" off-roading, and so NEVER learned to 'find' traction by feel, on a less competant tyre......
You dont say what your Disco's currently shod with, but unless it's a truly 100% road biased bit of rubber, for now, live with it, its probably got enough off-road grip to be getting on with.
When you have a bit of experience, and have got a 'feel' for how the car behaves when it breaks traction, and how to pick your lines to avoid loosing traction or getting stuck, and how to drive for traction, through 'feel'....
Or have worn out the rubber you got trying.....
THEN you have a choice to make; and you'll probably have a lot better idea of what choice to make from your own experience by then.
Just for note:- I run the AT/2's as a road come 'summer' tyre, becouse, as the vids, they have 'enough' competence off-road, work better, last longer and cost less fuel on the road, but I have a second set of wheels with the Muds on for when I want to go do some seriouse mud-plugging.
Its a good way to do it, and with a LOT of people putting part worn road tyres and wheels on the spares boards, when they have bought a new 'off-roader' and followed the advice that they 'NEED' full muds to do anything, there's plenty of 'cheap' second hand road-biased AT's on spare rims available, and often for less than having a set of remoulds put on your existing wheels!
In fact, a set of tyres like my Wranglers, and General Grabber ST's come up a lot, on rims, with legal tread, often come up on the boards for around £200.
Those Dakars are remoulds, and a very popular 'off-road' tyre, becouse they work very well, and are a lot cheaper than brand name alternatives. I think that they are around £60 a corner, fitted.
So, you COULD have a set of Dakars (or similar) put on your existing wheels, and buy a complete set of 'road' wheels with tyres, for around £500.... which is ACTUALLY not far off what you'd pay for a single set of 'premium' brand name tyres like BF Goodridge, AT's or Muds.
But, for a 'single' set of tyres, by far and away the best value I've seen for miles around is the Avon 'Ranger' AT.
It's an 'old fasioned' AT, in that it has a reletively open tread, very similar to the old Wrangler AT, which was a very competant tyre off-road, so should be good as a genuine all-round bit of rubber, and good for a newbie.
Avon also have a reputation for being hard wearing, and its a brand new carcas, not a remould, but best of all, they are actually a tad CHEAPER than most of the remoulds on offer at the moment! About £55 a corner; so IF you need new boots, good place to start looking, I reckon.
Will probably be what I fit to replave the Wranglers when they are shot, TBH, and even our Girtie there, was eying up a set in Craddocks the other day to replace the chewed up Trac-Edges on her 90, and them tyres, though technically an AT, before they were deleted from teh range were being marketed as a 'semi-mud'...
Which leads me onto Girties advice about removing the side steps...... on which point I have to dissagree...... they make very 'cheap' sill protectors come rock-sliders!
Thought I had a better picture of it TBH, but, this is the best I could do; navigating that rock, I 'hung' the drivers side side step on that big rock; took a bit of paint off the under side, BUT, propper side steps, bracketed off the chassis are often stronger than many 'sill-protectors', and you's struggle to rip one off......
Yes, they can snag.........
But that particular step had been used to demolish a garden wakk by the previouse owners wife...... hung 'skew' on a bent bracket, and despite three years abuse, defied all attempts to dislodge it with bits of the land-scape!
Yes, they do nick an inch of clerance, and add a bit of width, but starting out, those limitations are minor, and serve, like the tyres, to give you some kind of warning when things are getting 'tricky', while they do offer some kind of 'protection' which can save more seriouse damage.
Which leads to the more 'helpful' stuff for a newbie, IF you want to start spending some money or doing 'stuff' to your landy to make you 'feel' like you have 'kited it out' for some off-roading.....
Underbody protection!
The three main gizmos are; steering guard, front diff-guard, & rear diff guard, for 'protection', and for 'recovery', a pair of Jate Rings on the front (if not a feature of the steering guard) and 'something' at the back to attach a rope to. Jaw & pin tow hitches, with the ball on the top of the pin are popular, and reasonably cheap, but the hitch can be a tad high for many trailers if you actually want to tow, in which case, as shown at the end of the vids, standard ball with a shackle around it works well.
Tow-bars have a habbit of dragging, and are effectionately known as 'the plough'..... Dixon bate drop hitches are useful, expensive, but if you do want to tow, they do mean you can lift the hitch up out of harms way for off-roading, and drop it back down when hauling.
Other wise, you could simply remove it, but, again, its a cheap bit of protection, and when it ploughs a furrow, or you hang it on a rock, gives you a good indication of when you are pushing the envelope, before you do any seriouse damage.
HOWEVER, of all the 'accessories', Jate Rings and shackle, and a 'decent' tow rope, should ba at the top of your list..... starting out, good liklihood you'll get stuck, so that bit of prep is there to get you un-stuck.......
you DONT need a winch, a high-lift or a set of strops, snatch-blocks and different ground anchors for different soil types...... just a little common sense and a 'Recovery Buddy'..... some-one with another Landy to give you a tug when needed.
Which is why, joining a club, is probably the next most useful ting to do, after Jates, shackles and rope, and before steering guard and diff-guards.
To be honest, I dont have, and have not had steering or diff guards on any of my Landy's to date, so though 'useful' they aren't essential.
As a point of note, there's three things under there likely to get damaged in your steering; the drag link, the track rod and the steering damper. Drag link and track rod, from memory are about £20 a piece brand spanking new, and a steering damper, is about £15......
So you may ask why spend £90+ for a steering guard to protect just £50 worth of bits? (or at least I do!)
Reason is, its only £50 the FIRST time you ding something, and its not the dosh, but the inconvenience of not being able to drive home!
But, for a newbie, not 'Essential' but as you are more likely to ding something from lack of experience, something to prioratise reasonably highly, and certainly before any more radical additions or changes to the vehicle.
Driver Training
Always worth while, and possibly the biggest improvement you can make to your vehicle is fit a better driver.... doesn't effect the insurance (in negative way; some training can improve insurance premiums!) Doesn't take value off the vehicle and works on anything you drive there-after....
There are courses, but some arfe better than others, and what you get for your money is often very 'basic' training, and a few 'photo-oportunities'.
Back to advice about joining a club. Nany ARC affiliated clubs run TYRO (try Your rover Off-road) events, and they will stick one of thier experienced drivers into the passenger seat with you to give you some tips.......
Events are usually around £20, plus perhaps as much again to join the club, so very good value against a commercial training day that costs hundreds.....
But better still, its 'ongoing' training; avail yourself of the clubs 'events' and you can head off green-laning with any number of experienced off-roaders, who'll all be able to offer you the benefit of their wisdom and expertise, as well as perhaps tackling a few RTV events, which are compatative 'off-roading' but for street standard vehicles, and strictly 'non-damaging' (all you need is a club membership, the three previousely mentioned recovery points, and a cheap powder fire extinguisher in the car), as well as Pay & Play days..........
Maintenence & Preparation
This OUGHT to have been at the top of the list, but its really tedius boring stuff, and no where near likely to grab your attension like lift kits, or vids of range rovers churning mud!
BUT, some-one's mentioned axle breathers and the like, not mentioned is the elusive 'wading plug' or stuff like that.
I'll start at the beginning, though; old competition matra, to finish first, first you must finish.
Winning a race starts in the work-shop, making sure the vehicle is as 'good' as it can possibly be, and that doesn't mean it has as much power or handling as you can hammer into it, but that it is as structurally and mechanically 'sound' as it can be.....
Doesn't matter how brilliantly the engine runs or the suspension works, it only takes one loose nut or leaky hose to bring you to an ignominiouse halt........
So, worth while checking the car over as though for an MOT or competition scrutineering, and making sure all the hoses are good, that the jubilee clips are tight, that there are no loose wires, or connections, everything is neatly cable tied where it should be, etc etc.
THEN; check the hand-book, becouse there are a few oddities on Land-Rovers, and the 'breathers' are a case in point.
Most cars have vent-holes in things like the engine block, gear-box and axles, so that when they get hot, the air inside can expand and escape; but on a Land-rover, those holes are capped with a nipple, to which is attached a bit of windscreen washer pipe, routed up some-where high, so that the holes dont let in water or mud when you are splashing through stuff.
They are also often neglected, and on older cars, often perished, as out of sight, out of mind, and for more 'seriouse' off-roading, the vent-tubes often dont actually go as high as we might like.
So, taking a little time, finding the breather pipes, checking, renewing, and if inclined, extending them, is worth while.
Which leads me to mention the wading plug; manual transmission vehicles have another BIG hole in the bottom of the bell-housing, between the engine and the gear-box, where the clutch lives.
Reason for this is again, to let air in and out, becouse the clutch can get very hot, but also, becouse the clutch wears and as it does, becomes a find black sooty powder, that if it didn't have a hole to escape through, would gum up the clutch bearing and release mechanism, and build up on the inside of the bell housing.....
BIGGEST cause of Newbies being towed home from P&P's is a clutch that wont transmit drive.....
Caused by wading into deep water and mud, without realising you have to fit the wading plug to that hole to stop the mud and water getting into teh clutch mechanism!
Usually demands an expensive clutch replacement; not just becouse the mud wrecks the clutch plates, but also clogs the realease bearing and mechanism, and the mechanics doing the job have to do a lot of archeology to actually FIND the bits that have been wrecked before they can swap them!
Its in the owners book, where the wading plug should be kept; usually in a bracket between the engine and box, or somewhere around there; and instructions on how and when to fit it.
Familiarise yourself with the instructions, and have a go at fitting the plug; if for nothing else than to find out what sized spanner you need to keep in the car, and to make sure that the threads on the hole haven't rusted or been clogged with mud, by a previouse 'numptie'!
While delving into the books, also familiarise yourself with the operation of the Hi-Lo lever and diff-lock (if you have one)
Again, diff-lock is useful, but do NOT think that that is what gives you 'four wheel drive', or that you HAVE to engage it as soon as you go 'off-road'...... caused lots of broken half-shafts and centre diff failures, that one..... Diff-lock is ONLY needed when things are REALLY slippy.....
Back to 'training'.... experts whether paid, or club volunteers are best source of how to use diff-lock and even Hi-Lo correctly.....
Which is a good point; that tight and scratch lane in the first vid..... all done in 'high range'!
Yeah, Ok, its a four litre V8........ but I was talking about the little red Series III infront of it.....
Yup.. SIII in Hjigh Range, which means it was doing ALL that mud in two wheel drive........
So, in a Disco, you should be able to go a long way, before you find stuff to REALLY challenge your vehicles standard competance.
Summary
So the main advice is, leave it 'standard' bring it UP to standard and as tidy as you can make it; familiarise yourself with the hand-book, controls and procedures; join a club, add some recovery points, buy a fire extinguisher, and.....
GO HAVE SOME FUN!
