"New" 90 200tdi with a hard ride - any expert opinions please!

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jasflow

New Member
Posts
9
Location
Bucks
Hi all,

I suspect this will be the start of many, many posts on this excellent forum from me! Just purchased my first Landy 90 200tdi. Didn't spend a lot (£2.5K) but chassis seemes to be good (as far as I can tell!), engine & gear box seem to also be good (it drives, doesn't come out of any gear and no "knocking" sounds etc!)... just front outriggers as good as non existent, passenger side floor plan needs a small plate welding in where some rust has gone through the bulkhead footwell (but not a very large area) and top corners either side on bulkhead need patching (around the vents, which seems to be a very common issue). Paint work not great, but not terrible .... seems like the guy who had it before me had done a fair bit of work ... maybe he had had enough of spending money on it! :)

Its been quite a while since I did much proper work on my cars and I'm no welder so outriggers and patching of top bulkhead and floor pan will be first jobs done by a local garage.

What I am finding though is the ride is very hard over our pot hole riddled lanes. My Landie has Procomp ES9000 front & rear shocks but I have no idea what the springs are - however it sits taller than standard. From what I had read the ES9000 ProComp shock is often used (although not a great shock) as it is a "popular make of longer shock" for rising the suspension ... but also people use "lower chassis mounts" for the shocks or "shock turrets" instead of buying longer shocks when increasing suspension height. When looking at my front shock setup I think that what I am looking at is a shock turret to raise the height (maybe not - see pictures below!) but then from the guide I was reading it was saying that wouldn't in theory be necessary since the Procomp shock was fitted...? This is the aricle ... Defender suspension lift/Upgrades - Land Rover Technical Archive - LR4x4 - The Land Rover Forum.

If anyone could take a look at the attached picturs of the front and rear setup of my car and tell me what I am looking at as far as what's currently on the car and possibly then what I need to change to improve ride quality that would be great. I wont be carrying any extra weight in the car and doing next to no towing... hopefully a bit of green laning in the near future would be good. Tyres on the car at moment are 205 80 R16. Thanks for any help and I apologise now for any stupid / obvious things that I am asking or saying!

P.s. as far as mods go my budget is reasonably limited as I have lots of areas that money needs to be spent on so a full Old Man Emu setup of shocks and springs @ around £750 is highly unlikely :( - although from what I have read would probably be the ideal solution.

Thanks again for any help.

frontshock.jpg

bulk.jpg

rearshock.jpg

wheels.jpg
 
Hi and thanks Dr evil.
i take it changing to something such as Terra Firma TF201 light load suspension set up compared to the HD springs and Procomp shocks (i.e. here: TERRAFIRMA SPRINGS & SHOCKS +2" LIFT SUSPENSION KIT DEFENDER 90 TF201 | eBay) should in theory make a pretty good ride quality change - I realise my Landie is no Range Rover as far as ride quality but it tends to crash down pot holes and jump around a fair bit a the moment on the lanes! From the reading I have done although Terra Firma isn't anything amazing it is pretty reasonable...?

Cheers.
 
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