Land Rover heater valve

So with my 19J motor there was not a heater control valve for the water flow. It is unbearably warm on hot days. I never needed to turn on the heater this last winter except to demist the windscreen. I drove 70 miles on the freeway and had 140F air blowing thru the heater.
   Searching the web was/is confusing for the correct valve for this engine. Mainly due to it being metric. I wanted to put a brass hose adapter in the rear of the head and put the valve in there. I did find that it is a weird 16x1 thread. But try to find one...............I think I have a lead on one but it will get here too late for my trip.
   My fix was to go for a generic valve from NAPA #660-1140, unfortunatelly made in China, for around $30USD(are they making a killing or what!). It fits 5/8" hose and installation was easy. Cut hose, remove section, install valve, put on clamps, refill coolant.

I've not been as sucessful with my wire control though, I rifled thru my stuff and don't have a hard wire to install so I put on a wire from an old bicycle shifter. The wire is too "soft" to push/pull the full distance but I really like the look and placement. At least it can be shut off by raising the bonnet.

Drove it the other day on the same freeway run and it was noticeably cooler. My shoe still showed 125F but the airflow thru the heater box was cooler.

Land Rover 109 roof rack

   I have decided that it would be easier to sleep on the roof if I can. So to do this I need a roof rack. The ones online are waaay too expensive for what you get! Heck, I'm a retiree not a dotcom-er.
  So questions on forums and searching the web found this website; http://www.gamiviti.com/ selling the old Con-Ferr gutter mount roof clamps. This is a strong and clean design, though not cheap! Biting the bullet 2 sets were purchased.

 I assembeled 1 to see how they went together and to get the height measurement.

Then taken out to the 109 and compared with the roof.

Next a set of measurements were needed to design and fabricate some riser extensions.

Measurements were made on both a tropical roof and a standard roof. I made my extensions long enough for the tropical roof variety. Using 3.5x6x3/16" flat steel, holes were drilled 1" from each end giving a 4" extension. At Home Depot I bought 2-10' lengths of Super Strut. This gives me 4 pieces of 60" for the crossbars. I chose the smaller cross section for aerodynamic reasons(I know, I know... it's a flying brick!).

After the first set was made up and tested I did the reamaining sets and all was put together and fitted then taken apart and cleaned and coated with spray on truckbed liner  from Duplicolor. Once dry reassembled and installed on the 109.

Now I have to figure out the rest of the platform.............

Land Rover interior light

   Well, I'm glad I found out that I needed a third light on the interior before I went off to who knows where. The problem occurs with entering the back door at night. I would have to crawl in to the middle to get to the light. So when at West Marine I picked up another of those swiveling LED lights that I had put in previously. It was just a matter of connecting into the power wire with a posi-tap connector and running a wire to the rear above the gutter. Then I marked and centerpunched for holes and drilled them out. I used the stainless screws provided with the light. The black ground wire I just tucked under one of the mounting screws. So now I can just open the door and reach up and switch on the light!

Light off

Light on

All 3 interior lights ^^^

UPDATE 4/24/2018;  I have decided to replace these lights with some LEDs like the fog and rear red lights from KC Highlites. There will be a forthcoming post on them as I have done the rear light yesterday.

Military Water Carrier, MWC, faucet

     I have been dragging 5gallon cans of water thru the deserts and forests and camping for YEARS!  Always having to put on some sort of spout and tip the thing over and pour out the contents. Well a couple of years ago I bought some MWC's. You know the plastic(?) brown kind.
    They have a nicer wide lid with a pour spout and a  sealable vent. But you STILL have to tilt em over and pour out the contents. Hmmm, if it was cold beer would I be so annoyed?

     Since I got these I've been looking for the rumored lid with builtin pump that fits. I have scoured the internet and prowled the hardware and garden stores. So last week I went in search of..... I went to Kayak store, West Marine, Home Depot, OSH, 2 auto parts stores. Nothing in stock but West Marine was willing to bring something in on Monday to see if I could make it work. http://westmarine.com I went down this morning a picked it up. Thanks Amy and Becka!

It is a Whale brand manual pump for fresh or salt water. Nomenclature is V-pump Mk6 with standard outlet, GP0650, or hand pump galley. A bit pricey at $63USD. 12mo warranty.

Here it is showing the basic components; pump, hold down, screws.

     Next up was to figure out how to put it in the lid. The pump body has a 1" OD, the pour spout on the lid has a 3/4" ID. My solution was to remove the pour spout entirely enabling me to mount the pump. This was done with an electric knife

Next it was out to the garage to make the opening for the pump the right size. My thinking was to drill it slightly smaller than the pump to get more of a press fit and maybe I would not need the supplied holddown. First a 7'8" hole saw was used and I tried to press, by hand, the pump into it. It would not fit.

    Then a 15/16" wood drill was tried and still the pump would not go in. I wound up with using a 1" wood drill, it made for a snug fit. In the last pic you can see that I flattened the area around the hole with a file to make a good base for the pump to sit on.

This is the basic pump in the lid and the next pics show the holddown in place.

To put the holddown on I used and awl to mark one hole and then drilled it and place a screw. Then with the holddown steady I marked the other side, then removed the pump and holddown and drilled out the last hole. With the holddown on the pump can be slid in and out of the lid.

    I had to go to the hardware store and get a piece of tubing. The inlet on the bottom of the pump is 5/8" and the same size tubing was loose so I bought 24" of 9/16" tubing and crammed it on! I just stuck the whole thing in the MWC and the tubing sits on the bottom. I used a piece of 5/8" stainless steel tubing to weight the tube and keep it at the bottom.

     Once the MWC was filled with water I pumped up a mug of water, to my surprise the pump is a dual pump working on both in and out strokes. It took 7 strokes to fill a standard mug. Then over the sink I turned it upside down to see how badly it leaks................to my surprise other than some residual in the pump nothing came out!

    You can see that the pump can rotate to any direction for use. I plan on having it up toward the handle for travel and down the side for use. I may try a piece of tubing on the nozzzle for a longer reach. I like that the pump head stays in one place while the pump handle moves.

OK last pic, you can see that the holddown has 3 screws, why? you might be asking yourself. Well the third screw, the one closest to the pump, is a set screw and when screwed in pushes a wedge against the side of the pump preventing rotation.

Land Rover109 oil catch tank

It's working!!!!

I've just been driving around not paying much attention to it thinking it wasn't working but LOOK^^^ it is! That is after about 200 miles of driving, not much at freeway speeds. I have not drained it yet. I plan on filtering the first couple of drainings(checking for drill shavings) and putting it back in the motor. Once I am convinced it is clean it will all go back in the motor.
It feels better to know I'm not just spewing it out everywhere (and all over the back of my 109!) wasting oil and money.

If you haven't figured it out the black stuff in the sight guage is oil from the rocker cover.

   Update;

Wow is it working. I drove about 100 miles at freeway speeds and the tank filled up and overflowed into the discharge hose. Then spewed drips all over the back of my 109.
To fix it I needed to plumb the drain into the sump. The 1/4" tank flange was purchased at The Hose Shop along with a 1/4x1/4' barb and a plug. The oil sump was pulled and cleaned and I drilled-ground out a 1" hole. My friend and fellow Roverite Brett, http://www.gottdenerdesigns.com/index.html  welded on the flange. My poor placement of the hole(Hey, I just followed the online drawing!) made it difficult to get the tig welder in there and the brazing under the weld is leaking oil.
    After that was all done the sump reinstalled and the barb put on showed that the barb was too long and the hose would not clear the front driveshaft.

     A barb with a 90 was procured and exchanged for the straight one. The hoses hooked up and the drain valve opened.

   I can't rotate the pics, sorry. Anywho on the last freeway run it appears to work perfectly. The rear of the 109 showed no oil vapor after 120 miles of freeway driving and at least when the motor is off the oil drains back into the sump. After stopping I never saw any oil in the tank. One issue hopefully solved!

109 Land Rover driving the Roamerdrive

  After installing the Roamerdrive I had to go for a drive.

From my house I headed up into the mountains and the shifting was a little notchy at first. I went about 10 miles and figured I needed to look under the rig and see if anything was leaking. So I pulled over in a turnout overlooking the Monterey Bay and looked under. Only to see a drip, drip, drip coming from the drain plug on the Xfer case.
   Since I had reused the crushwasher I figured that was the culprit. A quick turn with a wrench showed no improvement so I decided to head home. It would have to be drained to replace the crush washer.
   I got home and put a bucket under then went insearch of a washer. I didn't have one!!!!

   Using my motorcycle, a 2008 Vstrom, I headed the 13 miles into town, stopping at the FLAPS with no luck, to The Hose Shop which I figured surely must have the right washer. But no joy. Next I headed over to the local Brit car repair shop and after and extensive search by 2 employees, no joy. :-(
   Lastly I headed over to my friend Mike who owns Andy's Auto Supply. Mike found a washer which fit from the master brake cylinder for some car. I bought 2 and went home to see how much oil was left in the case.
   To my surprise not much had leaked out. Maybe enough to cover a dollar bill was in the bottom of the bucket. But not for long! I opened the drain plug and let the oil out, while that was happening I installed a different drain plug with the new washer. Then put the oil back in the Xfer case. By now it was close to dark.

    The next day I went out and there were no drips on the drain plug! YAAAY!!!!! I hopped in and started my break-in drive over. Once again stopping at the same turnout to check for leaks, there were none, I was so chuffed!!! I commenced up Hwy 9 to Hwy 35 and turned left towards San Francisco just crusing thru the redwoods and open spaces on the ridgeline all the way to Hwy 92.
   At 92 again a left turn and I was on my way to Half Moon Bay. The Roamerdrive was shifting well and quieter than the Fairey it replaced. In HMB I went to lunch with friend Brian then hit Hwy 1 South back towards Santa Cruz.
    This was a little faster road being mostly rolling terrain with a posted 55 speed limit. Fine for me I am not a speed demon anyway. The 2.5DT pulled the hills well even in od, there was no problem keeping up with traffic and noise level tolerable with out earplugs, but I do have bad hearing to begin with........
    After a brief slowdown at Pigeon Point(I forgot my camera) I was cruzing past Ano Nuevo and Big Slide in Santa Cruz.
    I passed a truck at one point in a passing zone, my gps showed my max speed there to be 67mph. Then I came into Santa Cruz. As the 109 rolled up to the second stop light I pushed in the clutch to shift out of od and this terrible screeching noise erupted! It was like fingernails on the blackboard only 30 times louder!
   Quickly thinking the worst I moved towards the shoulder, as the rover slowed the noise stopped. While sitting awaiting the light I checked the od--yes, out--mainbox--yes, in gear---let out clutch---car moves forward. So the tranny still works and no noise.
    Still not convinced when the light turned green I made the right turn. Drove to the first left and went down the street. Every thing shifted fine and there was no noise. But I did decide to take a slower street thru town. So I made another left and headed for it when the noise came back,,,,,Horrendous screeching!!!!!!!! But it stopped when I went to neutral. My thoughts went to the tranny again.
   Still deciding to go home, after all the motor and gearbox seemed to work fine, we headed down the slower street. At first there was no noise again then after a mile or so it started to become intermitent. It continued in this fashion up Hwy 9 thru Felton and there I could see the needle on the speedo dancing in time with the noise. So I figured either the speedo was going or the cable. Around 3 miles later in Ben Lomond the noise stopped, a look at the speedo showed the needle at 0.
    Once home the dash pulled and the speedo removed showed the cable connector to be frozen. So I removed the innards from the speedo and using some Triflow and leverage on the magnet I got the connector freed up.

Top pic shows the cable connector.

Bottom shows the magnet which I levered to get it to spin.

   I hooked an old bit of speedo cable to my drill to make lubrication easier and check function.

   Next up was checking the cable. This has to be the most miserable job on a Landy! Oh, you can get the 3 screws off easy enough, showing the broken cable still stuck in the speedo drive.

    It is putting it all back together that is frustrating, must have taken me a half an hour just to get the first screw in, my hands are just too big(short fingers and wide palms). Eventually it was done though. The dash put back together and a test drive done, all's well again. I wonder if the curve in the cable by the oil dipstick on the Xfer case had anything to do with it.
   I did refuel and doing the mileage check showed that I got 22.3mpg.

Land Rover 109 gets a Roamerdrive

   A couple of weeks ago I sold my 93 Range Rover LWB to the parents of a friend. It has moved on to the greater LA area. With the money from the sale I purchased a Roamerdrive (formerly Roverdrive) from Ray Wood at Global Roamer. http://roamerdrive.com/
   This overdrive offers the same basic gear reduction as the Fairey but with updated technology. While the Fairey uses helical cut and straight cut gears the Roamerdrive uses a planetary gear drive such as used in automatic transmissions. It is also used as the final drive at the wheel on the big Caterpillar dump trucks. The other major difference is the Fairey uses 90wt and has it's own separate oil supply while the Roamerdrive uses 75-90 synthetic GL-4 oil which it shares with the Xfer box keeping the od cooler.
   After a bit of fumbling with my bank on the international purchase, Global Roamer is in British Columbia, Canada, my od was shipped and recieved.

   I also got the redesigned Xfer case bottom cover designed to reduce leakage and increase cooling.

   Soon I set about removing the Fairey I had lifted from Ignotus my 88. That took some time but was fairly easy. The mainshaft nut was removed and the roller bearing taken off.

Then the new drive set up was installed with the well thought out tools provided by Global Roamer.

    The nut on the mainshaft gets torqued to 110ftlb so you need to put it in gear and block the engine from turning with the crank handle braced by a jack stand or something.

There is a very good instruction booklet included regarding the installation. I did have 1 final issue with the install. My od lever and the maingearbox lever wanted to occupy the same time space continuim when in 4th and od. An email to Ray and he said it was unusual(more on that later) but just bend it out of the way. So I was back and forth a bit bending and installing checking that it wouldn't interfer with 3rd over. I wound up with 2 bends.

    With the kit came a Xfer case oil dipstick, which you put on prior to the Roamerdrive. This I did. I have the low gear Xfer case with the big intermediate gear shaft. This case has the small oil fill/check port. So I couldn't use the adapter to get the dipstick tube quite out of the way of the speedo cable as it exits the tranny. There is a pretty good bend there. I don't know but perhaps the difference in this case made the interference with the main gearbox. The only other minor issue was with the screw holding the tunnel being too long and interfering with the lever bracket. I installed 2 thick washers to move it about 1/4" out.

     All buttoned up and ready to go!