Lovely! However this was the last of my worries, upon removing the gasket I found out that a corner of the manifold had corroded away. So, one landy that is going nowhere fast! I went to the local rip-off DIY store on thursday and got some metal filler/adhesive. I made a load up and stuck the 2 parts together this morning, hoping that it would make a watertight seal. It was still wet and wobbly at half 3, but the packaging does state it takes 6 hours at least to set, so will leave it the weekend to see if it creates a waterproof seal. I dont think the bracing temperatures help!
So, whilst that was setting itself, I set about changing the oil. After realising the drain plug would not budge I resorted to a blowtorch and hammer. Once implemented the plug came out, as did oil. But not as much oil as I would have liked. The engine can hold roughly 6 litres of oil, and about 2 came out! I left it draining for a few hours whilst I did the fuel lift pump. This went in simply enough, with the old one..
going straight in the bin! I need to get a new pipe to fuel pump, and new fittings, as the old ones were rusty and brittle as, and only just went back together with lots of PTFE tape and swearing. However the fuel guage now works (I think). When I turned the ignition on the guague moved up to the e mark (sod all fuel in it!) and went back down to rest when I turned the ignition off again. I'm hopefull, but won't know until I put some fuel in, which wont be for a while yet. I earthed the pump to the same point where the rear fog is (ring crimp on a bolt) as the old mounting point was falling apart.
Once done, I carried on with the oil change. Nothing special here really, put 6 litres back in. Haven't started the engine yet, due to no coolant so the dipstick shows waaay over full, as the oil's just sat in the sump. Hopefully with some revving and idling that'll go down and level itself out. Once I got cleaned up I moved onto the spark plugs. I'd noticed that 2 of them were covered in oil, so took them all out one by one and overhauled them. I dont think I dropped too much crud into the engine, and poured some redex down each hole in turn with the main HT dizzie lead out to clean it out, when I start her up tomorrow that should smoke and clean out nicely. The average condition of each spark plug was this
which is worrying to say the least. 10 mins with a toothbrush and some white spirit and they were good as new (still going to replace them though) and went back in. I need new HT leads too, as I pulled 2 apart getting them off, and not too happy with the way their crimped back together, but they still work (turned the engine over until it fired up then turned off again.)
I started to pack away at this point, and then did some more fitting to the cd player. I fitted the mounting bracket and ran a new earth lead out the bulkhead and earthed it on a washer hose mounting bracket. The CD player now works without cutting out due to the bad earth. Still got to work out a way to mount the 6x9's!
I found a rather nasty looking hole in the rear tub today as well. Was fitting the lift pump and noticed some filler. Stabbed it with a screwdriver and it crumbled away, and I hoovered up loads of wet claggy crap from under it. The rear tub HAS to come off at some point to properly assess things under there (job and a half though!)
Tomorrow I hope to do some more to the never ending brakes saga. I have all the correct parts apart from the brake pipes which I need to do some more research into yet, and brake fluid. Will see if the epoxy on the engine is cured too, in which case I'll fill the rad up and test it. If that doesnt work then I've been offered a whole new head for a tenner by a nice guy over at Land Rover UK Forum, only snag is it's in Herefordshire, and rather too heavy to courier down economicly. Still, one never knows!
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