Land Rover Monthly – October 2019

LANDROVER MONTHLY 45

mentscreenwash switch for the obsolete
Lucas one. Again the Internet made this
task far easier than itwould once have
been.Within afew minutes I hadfound a
switch which looked almost identicalto
the original. I emailed thecompany who
sent me asample – it needed the thread
recutting so that itwould screw in, but in
all other respects itwas perfect. I ordered
a die nut online,recut the thread on the
switch (plastic body,so not exactly dif-
ficult),screwed it into the back of a Series
III wiperswitch and itworked exactly as
the original. Iteven had thesame type of
screw terminals in thesame positions.So
I ordered 100switche s, listed them inmy
eBay shop, and another smallgap in the
availabilityof parts for classic LandRov-
ers has now been filled.That first sa mple
switch was ins talled in Dave’s Lightweight.
Would anyof this even have been pos-
sible without the internet? It would
certainly have been much harder.
There is howeve r a dark sideto the
internet. To be blunt, it makes it far too
easy for idiots to communicate with the
outsideworld. Once upon a time, ifyou
wanted to pass on incorrect and unhelpful
technical adviceyou either hadto wait to
be asked, or activelyseek outsomeone
stupid enoughto listen to you. Nowyou
can just post your wrong information on
the internet where it might potentially be
seen by millionsof people. Joking aside,
there is avery real problem here. I don’t
hang around on LandRover forums and
online discussion groups much, mainly
because I already have more than enough
randomstrangers ringing me upat work
lookingfor free advice (“Justwondering
if I could pickyour brainsfor a minute”).
But I follow acouple of Facebook groups,
and one Sunday morning Iwas idly
browsing through oneof them when

somethingcaughtmy eye.

A noviceSeries IIAowner was trying

to replace therear brake shoes on an 88

inch and had posted a request for advice

on how thereturn springs should be

fitted. By the time Isaw the post, one per-

son had given him thecorrect answer and

four hadreplied with information thatwas

not only incorrect but potentially lethal.

I couldn’treally let that onepass by, so

I puttoge ther a post explaining not only

where the springs shouldgo but also why

they neededto be fitted in thatparticular

way. I find that if I understand howsome-

thingworks I’m less likelyto assemble

it incorrectly, and I doubt if I’m alone

in thinking thatway. I alsovery politely

requested that peoplerefrain from giving

technical advice on a brakingsystem that

they were unfamiliar with as theirwell-

meaning helpcould get someone killed.

The response? Quite afew ‘lik es’, and

anotherfour group memberstelling the

Series IIAowner howto assemble his

brak es in such away that theywouldn’t

work properly and mightresult in a nasty

accident. See what I mean about idiots?

To be fair, theten-inch drum brake fitted

to every short wheelbase LandRover

from 1948to 1993 is a slightly unusual

beas t. The trailing shoe is designedto be

free-floating so that itself-adjusts, being

held invery lightcontact with the drum

by a spring inside the brakecylinder.The

leading shoe has a snail-cam adjuster and

return spring. Oncar-type drum brakes,

almost invariably thetop return spring

goes between thetwo shoes, with

provisionfor adjustment(whether manual

or self-adjusting)at the bottom. This is

the advice peoplewere giving theSeries

IIA owner.

If you put areturn spring across the top

of the two shoes on a LandRover ten-inch

drum brake, it will pull the piston for the

trailing shoe rightback in to the cylinder,

and the shoe will no longer be ableto

self-adjust. You’ll probablyget awaywith

it on new shoes and drums, but assoon

as the shoesget a bitof wear in to them,

you will find that the brake pedalgoes

almost to the floor before the brakes

start to do anything.There is a spring

attachment post on thebackplate below

the cylinder: thetop spring should hook

round the adjuster po st on theback of

the leading shoe, long endforward,pass

between the adjuster and thebackplate,

then hookround theattachment post on

the backplate. I ha ve seen a few Series

vehiclesover theyears with thetop spring

attached across the two shoes: it isa

common enough error already without

having it spread far and wide onsocial

media. Happily, ifyou type “LandRover

Series brake springs” into Google Images,

you get half a dozen pictures showing

you thecorrectway to put these brak es

toge ther. The in ternet contains bothgood

and bad in formation,so don’t justgo with

the first thingyou read.

Ten-inch drum brake showing thecorrectwayto

fit the springs

2.5 diesel – old but good

I HAVE done quite afew 200Tdi and

300Tdiconversionsover theyears.

There aretwo types of ve hicle which

have provided the bulkof this work.

The fir st is Ninetys and OneTens built

between 1986 and 1990 with the 19J

turbodiesel engine.This motor has

acquired aterriblereputation over

the years. It was the last in a lineof

all-iron diesel pushrod ‘fours’ which

went back to the 2052cc motor fir st

seen in theSeries I in 1957. By late-

1950sstandards itwas an astonishing

technical achievement, revvingto 4200

rpm at a time when most small diesels

struggledto ge t past 2500. But die sel

design moved on a lot in thefollowing

30 years, and strapping a Garrett tur-

bocharger on to this ancient motor was

a de velopmenttoo far. Worked hard,

the enginesfell to bits: cracked pistons

were commoneven though theywere

supposedly strengthened, and internal

block cracking also manifested it self.

The 19Jwas a warran ty nightmare.

Treated sensibly and maintained

properly, it’s actually not abad engine.A

healthy 19J will pullstrongly enoughto

keep up with the traffic, and the power

delivery is moregentle than on modern

turbodiesels. But mo st of the ones that

come to me are life-expired, difficult

to start fromcold, blowing oil from the

breather into the air filter(diverting the

breather pipe into a Coke bottle is acom-

mon modification) and making all kindsof

strange noises. I usuallystrip themof re-

usable ancillaries(turbo, injection pump,

starter motor, etc) and scrap therest. In

a few years time I’ll probablyregret that,

just as I nowregret all the three-bearing

2.25 petrol engines Iweighed in when

they were two a penny and no onewanted

them.

The other mainsource of conversion

work is ex-militaryvehicles fitted with the

naturally-aspirated 2.5 diesel engine,for

which the description‘strong but slow’

comes to mind.These come intwo

versions: thestandard 12J engine, and

the muchrarer 11J, a military-only

variant which used a 19J bottom end

complete with uprated pistons. Almost

invariably the engines thatcome out

of military Ninetys and OneTens are in

good order, many having donevery few

miles since beingreconditioned.The

demandfor the se engines is not huge

and Ican’t bringmyself to scrap them,

so my workshop is gradually filling up

with the things.

About the only market I ha ve found

for them is fitting themto Series vehi-

cles in placeof the earlier andweaker

two and a quarter. The 2.5 gives a sig-

nificant improvement in performance

comparedto the 2.25. Drivability is

better: theearlier engine has a fully-

governed injection pump whose all-or-

nothing throttle responsetakes some

getting usedto. The 2.5 has a proper

vacuum pumpto power the brake