1992 200tdi Discovery- gradually improving my daily driver

Did you empty and refill your swivel housings with oil yet?

dieseldog69 said:

Did you empty and refill your swivel housings with oil yet?

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Looks to have grease in the swivels, going by previous pics.

Henry_b said:

Looks to have grease in the swivels, going by previous pics.

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Yuk, the one shot grease is ok but you don't know if it's actually lubricating the CVs, this is the earlier housings with the filler, level and drain plugs so should have had oil originally, often grease is used when the swivel balls are pitted and they leak.

dieseldog69 said:

Yuk, the one shot grease is ok but you don't know if it's actually lubricating the CVs, this is the earlier housings with the filler, level and drain plugs so should have had oil originally, often grease is used when the swivel balls are pitted and they leak.

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the sweep seal on OP's swivels look to be dead, going by the amount of grease on the swivel ball

They swapped to one stop in 1996 IIRC

K2tnt said:

View attachment 174442

View attachment 174443
Just picked up this earlier in the week, full MOT, 126k, nice condition, £800!
Looking forward to ironing out the niggles with it as I drive. Delighted!

Planning on keeping it as original as possible- 200tdis are getting rarer.
After a set of beige boot seats, possibly load roller cover and maybe an original Discovery rear wheel cover too!

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Very nice! Keep hearing that more after market parts are appearing for these so sending good vibes and looking forward to updates.

Kerry-Ann

It’s got one-shot grease in the swivel housing. The CV is full of grease too, as I packed it when i changed the CV back in March (I think it was).

Have tried removing a shim from the top swivel to remove play, but have the whole kit to fit. Will probably end up fitting it sooner or later anyway.

K2tnt said:

After driving to Wales over the weekend, the death wobble presented itself quite dramatically, and again it was very wandery over 60mph!

So am going to sort the Panhard rod bushes, possibly get power steering box refurbished (it’s dribbling a bit), and look at swivels.

I saw that you can try putting shims in the top of the swivel housing without stripping the whole thing down- does this work?

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What I have found with swivels is either do it properly or not at all.
I have tried a few times to shim them in situ, and even with the swivel supported on a seperate jack the seal always ends up leaking a few days later.

Whilst it is messy, it is not a big job at all to strip down, I would say hardest bit is swivel to axle bolts, mainly as access is poor and it takes an age.

Have bitten the bullet and began to change swivel, as death wobble was still there yesterday at 55mph- bloody annoying! Hopefully changing swivel on passenger side (that’s the one with the dodgy seal) will sort it...

Right, well got started onto stripping hub and swivel off today.

All came off nicely, even these clag-covered bolts.

Dropped the bearings out the swivels- the bottom one was mangled. Cage bust, rollers everywhere! So that’s where the play was.


Thought it was odd that it was so destroyed, then inspected the swivel ball...

So that explains that! What must have happened was when I changed the bust CV back in March, some of the mangled metal must have remained in the housing, scraped the ball and bust the seal and bearing.

Now all I need is a new swivel ball- anyone got one handy near Derby?

Have to say this has been a nice interesting read. There is something to be said for the d1 in original unabused condition. Keep up the good work.

Haha thanks! It’s trying my patience a bit- I’ve had to borrow the father-in-law’s Zafira for the family holiday up to Yorkshire this week because of this. I was quite cross with the Disco but I’ve forgiven it a bit now I know why the swivels went.

Back from holiday in Zafira! New swivel housing came, so fitted it and did swivels. Think it seems ok- needs proper test drive to check.

If it’s not Ok, where would be next port of call? It’s had all new balljoints, steering damper, Panhard rod bushes, tyres (balanced), and refurbished steering box!

Would I be best off doing other side swivels, or front shock absorbers next?

I know pretty much zero about discos yet but isn't it likely the other swivel will go the same way sooner or later? Assuming it is the same ages as the 1 you just replaced. Unless you just checked it over looking for play.

Yeah that’s a possibility, but I think the passenger side swivel went because bits from the shattered CV joint worked their way into the bearing and killed it.

I know that the passenger side tends to take more stress but whats the condition of the other cv joint? I think I'd still have to check it all over if it was me. Probably as I have ****e luck when it comes to cars.

K2tnt said:

Would I be best off doing other side swivels, or front shock absorbers next?

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I'd check the other swivel over carefully - if there is no play, oil or grease level correct, and the pre-load is still in the right ball park, I'd go no further for now.... So, shock absorbers ...

Not done very much with this at all in the last few months, mainly because I don’t think I’ve driven it further than a few miles from house! However the headlights hadn’t been working properly when switching between main and dipped beam for a while- there’s be a split second of darkness when going from one to another!

I pulled the switch out and found the connector was very dodgy, burnt and replaced with a bullet connector!

I replaced this with a new one from a seller on EBay (landrover-connectors) but this didn’t fix it! Luckily I had 2 spare headlight switches- guess what? These didn’t fix it either!
So I stripped the switches down only to find all 3 had the same problem- the sliding contacts for dipped/main beam were melted and mangled on all 3 of them! Don’t think they’re really up to the job of handling the current for the headlights.
New one bought (off EBay again), and whilst there I thought I’d upgrade the wiring with a Boomslang kit from Paddocks, to stop the contacts melting again.
Was pretty easy to fit, although some wires were weird lengths (both earths very short, positive wire very long!). Routed the wiring over the top of the slam panel, looks pretty neat now.
Headlights appear to be brighter- will see how much better they are when I get the opportunity to drive it at night!

They definitely switch between main/dipped beam without going dark, which is a positive. The Boomslang kit should mean the switch won’t burn out too.
Still haven’t really sorted the death wobble properly, but it’s hardly urgent at the minute...

Wiring diagram is on here in FAQ section. Also it is recommended to use ceramic headlight connectors as the plastic ones are prone to melting.

Yeah I saw- read lots of your posts on headlight wiring too haha! The Boomslang kit is pre-wired which I why I got it, thought it would be easier than building loom myself.

MOT passed today, which was a very pleasant surprise!

Advisory on front ball joint which is weird as I did them last year. Going to go all out on suspension and do all springs, shocks and bushes as it’s still got a bit of death wobble though. Should be fun...