Hi guys,
Still relatively new here but I've been lurking and bought this a while ago; http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f7/should-i-buy-110-hardtop-2-5-t-d-pics-link-150023-4.html
As I said at the time the 2.5 TD lump had seen better days and within a fortnight of ownership I'd experienced three flat batteries due to excessive starting efforts, a broken exhaust downpipe, a failed water pump and a wrecked rear crank seal. On top of this 50mph became a struggle and I calculated that it was returning an average of 15mpg - enough was enough.
I scoured ebay and the likes and came across an MOT failure Discovery with a 90k 200tdi lump with full service history. After a few seconds thought I snapped up everything under the bonnet for £500 and a week later everything was on my driveway on a pallet - nice service I thought.
And so the operation started.
First off it was time to get the old 2.5TD out of the way - 2.5 hours after starting we'd managed to get bodywork out of the way, fluids drained, battery off, transmission tunnel out, bell housing bolts undone, exhaust off, fuel lines undone, wiring loom disconnected, mounts undone and had started to lift the oily, messy lump out of the way. It put up a good fight but not good enough to withstand the efforts of an engine crane and a fired up Dicky A :mil26:
Once it was out we started to get an idea of how wrecked the 2.5TD was. The engine bay literally held more oil than the sump (no more than a pint of metal-filled oil came out of the sump) and on removing the head we found that cylinder 3 had a cracked/holed piston, which explains why it sounded so awful and had less power than an electric whisk - even for a TD it was terrible. I stripped the old engine bare, sold what I didn't need, kept anything remotely useful (hoses, mounts, wiring loom, alternator etc) and binned the rest.
So, onto the 200Tdi lump. Whilst everything was out on the floor I decided it was a great opportunity to change all regular service parts and replace the clutch, clutch release bearing, clutch fork and rear crank seal. If you do this conversion I would absolutely recommend you do this, even if cash is tight - as you'll read later on the agonising feeling of having to undo all of your hard work again is soul destroying. With the clutch off, to make refitting easier I swapped the Discovery flywheel housing with the 2.5TD flywheel housing so that the studs lined up with the LT77 gearbox. The TD housing is a straight fit onto the back of the 200Tdi lump and I put a healthy bead of quality instant gasket sealant between the block and housing mating faces, just to be sure.
I also swapped the 2.5TD mounting brackets and fitted a Steve Parker downpipe to the turbo and torqued everything up, as access is seriously restricted/impossible with the engine in the bay. As my deffy doesn't have power steering, I also removed the power steering pump and clocked/relocated the Discovery alternator using a very decent kit from Glencoyne Engineering - for ~£20 the quality is top notch and fitting took less than ten minutes. This also seemed a good time to fit up the wiring loom.
As I knew the history of the engine, I didn't change the timing belt but again, if buying an engine of unknown history I'd highly recommend changing this whilst it's all accessible.
Next step was to prepare the engine bay/chassis for the new lump. There are a couple of bits that are in the way when putting the Disco engine in the Defender, namely the bracket to the right of the bell housing (that holds the clutch slave cylinder hosing) and the radiator mounts that sit too high for the taller Discovery radiator/intercooler. Ten minutes with an angle grinder, a file, a welder and some Hammerite and all was done.
Then came the first test fitting of the 200Tdi. Whilst it was loosely slotted in the bay I measured up the exhaust mid-pipe and cut it to length and made sure the wiring loom could be fitted comfortably without any snags/traps. I also planned the fuel pipe fittings and swapped the TD fuel filter/housing for the Discovery item, fitting a brand new filter whilst it was out.
Then the fun started, firstly with the clutch. After using a genuine LR clutch allignment tool I found that the new clutch-flywheel assembly wouldn't engage with the gearbox input shaft. The problem appeared to be a mis-allinged clutch and after 6 times in and out of the engine bay, I finally got it right using my good old line of sight and the big fella thumped home against the bell housing.
Then the turbo. I knew the clearance would be very very tight between the turbo-intercooler outlet and the inner wing but didn't fancy either clocking the turbo or cutting/hammering the inner wing to pieces. With a bit of trial and error, I took a punt and got onto the guys at AP Motorstore (www.apmotorstore.co.uk) and ordered up a few 90 degree silicone elbows, a 300mm polished joiner pipe and a 45 degree silicone bend. Not cheap but now, instead of the piping coming out of the turbo and directly down to the intercooler at the front of the engine bay, it heads backwards towards the bulkhead then up and over the top of the turbo before meeting the intercooler at the front of the bay. Job done and it looks pretty neat and tidy too.
Whilst speaking with the guys at AP Motorstore, I also ordered up several alloy joiner hoses in the right sizes to allow me to extend the water/intercooler pipes to the correct places. I used a frankenstein collection of 2.5TD hoses and 200Tdi hoses with the joiners to make it all work. The main problem points were the bottom 'Y' hose and the intercooler to inlet hose. The bottom Y hose is a case of simple common sense when you look at the TD and Tdi items together. For the intercooler pipe you can either buy a new Defender 200 Tdi hose or you can cut the Discovery item in half and whack a bit of old Discovery exhaust pipe in as a joiner - I chose the latter and job done.
With all bolted up, fuel lines connected and fluids topped up, it was time to fire her up. I was relieved that she fired first time on the button with no smoke, leaks or struggles.
Getting a helping hand from my Step-Dad!
Unfortunately it wasn't a long lived love afair - twenty miles down the road the rear crank seal let go, there was a severe lack of turbo pressure and lots of blue smoke out of the exhaust under power. It felt sluggish and gutless, not what I had expected. To make matters worse, when pulling back onto the drive it made a huge bang and blew black fluff out of the exhaust before kicking out a thick grey smoke screen. My instant thought was "that's dead".
I can honestly say that motivation was very hard to find over the next three days and I had to dig deep to find the energy to work on the bastard - all I could think about was how much the insurance pay out might be if it 'accidentally' caught fire
It turns out that a well regarded Land Rover specialist had sold me a cheap pattern part on the rear crank seal (wrongly boxed as a genuine part) and there was no way round it but to pull it all out and start again. Gutted, but these things happen.
Whilst it was all out again it did give me an opportunity to inspect the turbo and upon close inspection I found the reminants of a very old looking rag that had found its way through the turbo vanes and out of the exhaust, taking the oil seals and vanes with it. The state it was in I would say the turbo had been damaged for some time and whilst annoying, I was just relieved it was that and no further damage had been caused. I sourced a second hand turbo unit from Avenger 4x4 in Peterborough (absolute gentlemen, I would highly recommend them) and the next day I was bolting on a replacement.
And that is that. Touch wood, she has started everytime on the button since, has not let me down once and pulls like a steam train. 80mph is now easily achievable, she goes up hills and seems to be regularly returning 35mpg. Towing is also a complete doddle and, for a diesel, the Tdi sounds great!
All in, the big fella owes me circa £3,000. I don't think that's at all bad considering it's a reliable 200 Tdi 110 Hard Top with modular wheels, BFG's and jacked up suspension. I love it more than ever!
Next project - home made spray job
On a serious note, I found some of the below companies/links to be really useful throughout the conversion;
The 'How to' thread on this forum - really well written, thank you!;
http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f7/how-land-rover-90-td-discovery-200tdi-engine-conversion-90679.html
Gelncoyne Engineering (Parts and excellent 'How to' for wiring and fuelling)
http://www.glencoyne.co.uk/200di2.htm
AP Motorstore - Decent price silicone hoses and hose joins, good guys.
www.apmotorstore.co.uk
Avenger 4x4 Peterborough - Legendary service and great advice when I needed it
www.avenger4x4.com
And that's that. All in, would I do it again? Absolutely. The improvement is almost unbelievable and if you're willing to do your homework and are not afraid to give something a go, it's not that bad a job.
Perhaps I'll have a go with a TVR V8 next time though - I fancy a 500bhp mud machine
Dicky A
Still relatively new here but I've been lurking and bought this a while ago; http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f7/should-i-buy-110-hardtop-2-5-t-d-pics-link-150023-4.html
As I said at the time the 2.5 TD lump had seen better days and within a fortnight of ownership I'd experienced three flat batteries due to excessive starting efforts, a broken exhaust downpipe, a failed water pump and a wrecked rear crank seal. On top of this 50mph became a struggle and I calculated that it was returning an average of 15mpg - enough was enough.
I scoured ebay and the likes and came across an MOT failure Discovery with a 90k 200tdi lump with full service history. After a few seconds thought I snapped up everything under the bonnet for £500 and a week later everything was on my driveway on a pallet - nice service I thought.
And so the operation started.
First off it was time to get the old 2.5TD out of the way - 2.5 hours after starting we'd managed to get bodywork out of the way, fluids drained, battery off, transmission tunnel out, bell housing bolts undone, exhaust off, fuel lines undone, wiring loom disconnected, mounts undone and had started to lift the oily, messy lump out of the way. It put up a good fight but not good enough to withstand the efforts of an engine crane and a fired up Dicky A :mil26:
Once it was out we started to get an idea of how wrecked the 2.5TD was. The engine bay literally held more oil than the sump (no more than a pint of metal-filled oil came out of the sump) and on removing the head we found that cylinder 3 had a cracked/holed piston, which explains why it sounded so awful and had less power than an electric whisk - even for a TD it was terrible. I stripped the old engine bare, sold what I didn't need, kept anything remotely useful (hoses, mounts, wiring loom, alternator etc) and binned the rest.
So, onto the 200Tdi lump. Whilst everything was out on the floor I decided it was a great opportunity to change all regular service parts and replace the clutch, clutch release bearing, clutch fork and rear crank seal. If you do this conversion I would absolutely recommend you do this, even if cash is tight - as you'll read later on the agonising feeling of having to undo all of your hard work again is soul destroying. With the clutch off, to make refitting easier I swapped the Discovery flywheel housing with the 2.5TD flywheel housing so that the studs lined up with the LT77 gearbox. The TD housing is a straight fit onto the back of the 200Tdi lump and I put a healthy bead of quality instant gasket sealant between the block and housing mating faces, just to be sure.
I also swapped the 2.5TD mounting brackets and fitted a Steve Parker downpipe to the turbo and torqued everything up, as access is seriously restricted/impossible with the engine in the bay. As my deffy doesn't have power steering, I also removed the power steering pump and clocked/relocated the Discovery alternator using a very decent kit from Glencoyne Engineering - for ~£20 the quality is top notch and fitting took less than ten minutes. This also seemed a good time to fit up the wiring loom.
As I knew the history of the engine, I didn't change the timing belt but again, if buying an engine of unknown history I'd highly recommend changing this whilst it's all accessible.
Next step was to prepare the engine bay/chassis for the new lump. There are a couple of bits that are in the way when putting the Disco engine in the Defender, namely the bracket to the right of the bell housing (that holds the clutch slave cylinder hosing) and the radiator mounts that sit too high for the taller Discovery radiator/intercooler. Ten minutes with an angle grinder, a file, a welder and some Hammerite and all was done.
Then came the first test fitting of the 200Tdi. Whilst it was loosely slotted in the bay I measured up the exhaust mid-pipe and cut it to length and made sure the wiring loom could be fitted comfortably without any snags/traps. I also planned the fuel pipe fittings and swapped the TD fuel filter/housing for the Discovery item, fitting a brand new filter whilst it was out.
Then the fun started, firstly with the clutch. After using a genuine LR clutch allignment tool I found that the new clutch-flywheel assembly wouldn't engage with the gearbox input shaft. The problem appeared to be a mis-allinged clutch and after 6 times in and out of the engine bay, I finally got it right using my good old line of sight and the big fella thumped home against the bell housing.
Then the turbo. I knew the clearance would be very very tight between the turbo-intercooler outlet and the inner wing but didn't fancy either clocking the turbo or cutting/hammering the inner wing to pieces. With a bit of trial and error, I took a punt and got onto the guys at AP Motorstore (www.apmotorstore.co.uk) and ordered up a few 90 degree silicone elbows, a 300mm polished joiner pipe and a 45 degree silicone bend. Not cheap but now, instead of the piping coming out of the turbo and directly down to the intercooler at the front of the engine bay, it heads backwards towards the bulkhead then up and over the top of the turbo before meeting the intercooler at the front of the bay. Job done and it looks pretty neat and tidy too.
Whilst speaking with the guys at AP Motorstore, I also ordered up several alloy joiner hoses in the right sizes to allow me to extend the water/intercooler pipes to the correct places. I used a frankenstein collection of 2.5TD hoses and 200Tdi hoses with the joiners to make it all work. The main problem points were the bottom 'Y' hose and the intercooler to inlet hose. The bottom Y hose is a case of simple common sense when you look at the TD and Tdi items together. For the intercooler pipe you can either buy a new Defender 200 Tdi hose or you can cut the Discovery item in half and whack a bit of old Discovery exhaust pipe in as a joiner - I chose the latter and job done.
With all bolted up, fuel lines connected and fluids topped up, it was time to fire her up. I was relieved that she fired first time on the button with no smoke, leaks or struggles.
Getting a helping hand from my Step-Dad!
Unfortunately it wasn't a long lived love afair - twenty miles down the road the rear crank seal let go, there was a severe lack of turbo pressure and lots of blue smoke out of the exhaust under power. It felt sluggish and gutless, not what I had expected. To make matters worse, when pulling back onto the drive it made a huge bang and blew black fluff out of the exhaust before kicking out a thick grey smoke screen. My instant thought was "that's dead".
I can honestly say that motivation was very hard to find over the next three days and I had to dig deep to find the energy to work on the bastard - all I could think about was how much the insurance pay out might be if it 'accidentally' caught fire
It turns out that a well regarded Land Rover specialist had sold me a cheap pattern part on the rear crank seal (wrongly boxed as a genuine part) and there was no way round it but to pull it all out and start again. Gutted, but these things happen.
Whilst it was all out again it did give me an opportunity to inspect the turbo and upon close inspection I found the reminants of a very old looking rag that had found its way through the turbo vanes and out of the exhaust, taking the oil seals and vanes with it. The state it was in I would say the turbo had been damaged for some time and whilst annoying, I was just relieved it was that and no further damage had been caused. I sourced a second hand turbo unit from Avenger 4x4 in Peterborough (absolute gentlemen, I would highly recommend them) and the next day I was bolting on a replacement.
And that is that. Touch wood, she has started everytime on the button since, has not let me down once and pulls like a steam train. 80mph is now easily achievable, she goes up hills and seems to be regularly returning 35mpg. Towing is also a complete doddle and, for a diesel, the Tdi sounds great!
All in, the big fella owes me circa £3,000. I don't think that's at all bad considering it's a reliable 200 Tdi 110 Hard Top with modular wheels, BFG's and jacked up suspension. I love it more than ever!
Next project - home made spray job
On a serious note, I found some of the below companies/links to be really useful throughout the conversion;
The 'How to' thread on this forum - really well written, thank you!;
http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f7/how-land-rover-90-td-discovery-200tdi-engine-conversion-90679.html
Gelncoyne Engineering (Parts and excellent 'How to' for wiring and fuelling)
http://www.glencoyne.co.uk/200di2.htm
AP Motorstore - Decent price silicone hoses and hose joins, good guys.
www.apmotorstore.co.uk
Avenger 4x4 Peterborough - Legendary service and great advice when I needed it
www.avenger4x4.com
And that's that. All in, would I do it again? Absolutely. The improvement is almost unbelievable and if you're willing to do your homework and are not afraid to give something a go, it's not that bad a job.
Perhaps I'll have a go with a TVR V8 next time though - I fancy a 500bhp mud machine
Dicky A
