What have you done to your Freelander today

TSR2 said:

I’d like to see how you’ve done that

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Me to that's next on my list

I should have taken pictures as I did it! But it was not too difficult.

I bought an MGF rear view mirror from eBay cheap as some clown had cut off the loom connector. No biggie: I replaced with a three pin connector with the advantage that I had both sides - male and female. I then made a sub loom that was about 2m long. I used wire to match the MGF colours: black, purple and green/white tracer.

The Freelander wiring colours are similar but not the same: purple with white tracer rather than the green/white. Purple is the switched 12v supply, black is earth and green or purple/ white is the MFU switched earth.

The loom can be ran around the edge of the rigid roof liner on the 3-door - lift seals etc and thread through.

I used a semi-rigid wire to thread the loom to the main interior light.

You then need to decide how to tap into the main loom. I personally hate those loom splice connectors, so soldered another short sub loom to the lamp housing contact tracts and put another three pin connector to that - making the whole thing easily removable if need be.

Before:


After:

How the rear mirror should have been!


Giving good dash area illumination and handy map-reading light:

Wiring is well hidden

Nice job Rob I brought some thin three core wire for mine being as I didn't get the three pin connector either , I think later on I will replace the map reading bulbs with leds like I have with the main light

Thanks - I thought about LED too, but the ones I bought were too white/ cold. I rather like the warm glow of the standard bulbs

I fitted an MGF mirror a while ago and upgraded all the interior bulbs to LED. Made a hell of a difference.

A good few days of work for me have resulted in my car having five working electric windows and nine working speakers, for the first time in two years! I'm very pleased. Oil change and new brake pads in the morning.
Something must surely break now...

Brake pads and oil change today. Also fitted a new battery as mine was definitely not going to last the winter.
Now here's a question, just out of interest really (and probably one for you @Nodge68)

Does the Jatco box have it's own ECU and a memory that learns driving characteristics or anything? The reason that I ask is that today, after changing the battery, a number of gear changes were pretty firm. particularly 1st to 2nd, and 2nd to third, but only for two or three miles. Several other journeys today have all been normal since. Coincidence and funny five mins, or memory related I wonder.

kernowsvenski said:

Does the Jatco box have it's own ECU and a memory that learns driving characteristics or anything?

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Yes
The TCM is adaptive and learns the change characteristics for the gearbox that provide the smoothest gear changes. These are stored in memory within the TCM. I assumed they were stored in non-volatile (permanent) memory. But if the adaptation was lost after a battery disconnection, then the adaptations are must me stored in volatile (lost when power is lost) memory.

Yesterday i changed the 2 ancilliary drive belts - a/c belt was starting to crack nicely then treated the engine to new oil and filter.
why are the copper washers supplied with FL1 Td4 oil filters always too small ???

today took of the wheels, cleaned around the hub mating surfaces, lightly greased and reassembled.
I suspect that poor wheel seating may have been causing some tracking issue resulting in abnormal tyre wear up front.

Tested VCUs on both daily use Td4's - all good !
Results on https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/vcu-torque-test-results.109486/page-54

Washed both vehicles as even getting in and out was a filthy job !

Now that the uprated VIS motors and the replacement plenum chamber have been on the V6 for a month I ran the diagnostics on the ECU and was thrilled to see there were NO codes showing. This is the first time in the 2 1/2 years I have owned it that has happened. Made my day!

Needed to get my 6 monthly WOF (MOT) done today. One of the rear brake lights was out, and I think I also had to replace it for the last WOF so a bit concerned. Anyway, I removed the light fitting and took the bulb out and it was damp. Turned the light over and a load of water came out. Examined it and sure enough cracked. So over to the parts car, whipped its one off, plugged and screwed it in and all working.

Down to the WOF station and, 3 games of Suduko on my phone later, the 20 year old Freelander passes with flying colours

Awesome vehicle

Back to the interior light discussion. I bought an LED festoon bulb for the main roof light and it lights the interior up like a tanning bed!
I tried some 5w LEDs in the roof map lights but they were dimmer than the originals. I have a spare MGF mirror somewhere in my parts bins so I will have to dig
it out and give it a try. My MGF has Freelander column stalks so I may as well try swapping some parts the other way!

Rich in Vancouver said:

I have a spare MGF mirror somewhere in my parts bins so I will have to dig
it out and give it a try. My MGF has Freelander column stalks so I may as well try swapping some parts the other way!

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The mirror swap is beginning to get popular for FL1 owners.

On the MGF forums modifying the mirrors is a popular project.
Guys have opened them up and built in dash cams and even digital temperature readouts.

The new dash bulbs arrived from ebay so replaced the lights to binicle. (Clocks) and the smaller ones to the heater controls. Now can see what knobs i'm turning.

Have to put new terminal on the interior front light as existing has rotted completely. So call at local breakers this week

Checked RHD switch, and cables broke. Right at the terminal. Another item for breakers visit. Going to get a terminal and legth of cable attached and splice in.

Fitted new bearmach header tank only to find my existing cap doesnt fit. Ho hum .Off to ebay for a new cap.

Tow bar fitted, and ordered female spade terminals 2.8mm, so i can wire cable directly into loom plug in boot.
Passanger rear window mechanism replaced.

Stereo fitted. (Original was missing). Found a parrot hands free. All there and with a bit of futtering got it working. Only to find out front speakers were knackered. Got to figure out how to get a permant powered to keep channels.
Quick browse on landyzone figured out suitable replacement speakers
Onto ebay and ordered.(thanks ColinNI)

Full service and oil change. Rear diff mount banging. Had complete set ordered and arrived during week. Was going to replace all 3 diff mounts with new. But ill keep that for next week.
Found that passanger door lock actuater not working. So that to get. Do it with speakers.
Ho hum. Been a busy day..

Do the mgf rear view mirror fit to the freelander mount easily. (Understand the wiring will be further work)

They are the same basic mirror just with the lights added. I suppose you could say they were deleted for the Hippo as it had the headliner mounted lights. That would have been difficult on an MGF .