Green Land Rover

Twitter

Modchop — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 17:05:04 +0000

May we apologise once again to anyone that follows us on Twitter, although you’ve probably had a Twitter alert saying that there is ‘new stuff on GLR’ we still can’t access our account to ‘tweet’ or reply to anyone, hopefully we’ll be back up and running in the very near future.

Thank you.

It's broken!

JATE Rings

Modchop — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 16:42:08 +0000

Back in 2009 I bought and fitted a NAS style receiver hitch complete with drop plate, tow ball and a recovery shackle and very pleased with it I was too but (and there’s always a but) in all the time I’d had it fitted I’d only had cause to use it once when I dragged a car out of a ditch in last years snow. Also I’ve never needed to tow a trailer in the last decade so I think I can safely assume I don’t need a drop plate and tow ball stowed in the boot, so this got me thinking about stuff that I don’t need in or bolted onto the Disco; think less is more kind of thing.
On my previous Defenders I’ve always fitted a pair of JATE rings (Land Rover part no. RRC3237) and I still had a pair left gathering dust in the shed so I thought why not remove the (heavy) NAS hitch and fit these to save a little bit of weight dangling from the rear end? The JATE rings simply bolt through the longitudinal chassis rails where the towbar would normally be fixed so it really couldn’t be any simpler, they need to be tightened reasonably tight but loose enough to still allow a bit of movement, such as during a recovery for example. I also took the opportunity after removing the NAS hitch to wire brush and waxoyl the rear chassis section (internally as well as externally) to hopefully prolong it’s service life.

JATE ring fitted

Both JATE rings fitted in place

Unfortunately you cannot fit JATE rings to the front of a Discovery II without cutting and making alterations to the front bumper so I’ve only fitted them at the rear as I prefer the standard factory look. When using them in a recovery situation it’s always best to use a bridle between the 2 JATE rings (attached with shackles) then the recovery rope/strap would be attached to the bridle.
And just in case you were wondering what JATE means, it’s an acronym for Joint Air Transport Establishment, a department within the MOD, and if you’re really bored one night you can find a full explanation of the establishment here -

JATE explained!

Another view showing the improved departure angle when compared with having a tow bar fitted

The All Terrains go on

Modchop — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 21:17:13 +0000

We’re still yet to see the white stuff but in readiness (well that’s my excuse) I decided to swap my wheels and tyres over today for my ‘winter set’, they’re not the prettiest alloys and they’ll certainly not be winning any concourse competitions but they are fitted with a set of General Grabber AT2′s.
The weather forecast keeps promising us snow but as yet the best we’ve seen is a hard frost, hardly as much fun is it? Anyway, regardless of any snowfall or not the AT’s will be staying on for a while as I’m keen to see how they perform as ultimately I intend to have a set of AT’s fitted all year round; either the new General Grabber AT’s or maybe even some of the almost legendary BFGoodrich all terrains, although that said I have been hearing good reports lately about Cooper Tires’ A/T.
Finally, if you haven’t got one already get yourself a decent torque wrench and use it, often! As a matter of course I check the torque of my wheel nuts every month and obviously after every removal and refit; incorrectly tightened wheel nuts are dangerous; loose one’s for obvious reasons and over-tightened one’s for even more reasons; striped threads and or damaged studs and cracking of the wheel itself from using excessive force when re-fitting the wheel nuts.
The recommended torque for standard fitment, genuine Land Rover alloy wheels for the Discovery II is 140NM.

Here’s a few quick snaps of the swap-over (please excuse the poor quality phone camera pictures)

Trolley jack + gravel drive = colourful language!

General Grabber AT2 vs. Pirelli Scorpion ST

Bring on the snow!

Clear Side Repeaters

Modchop — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 17:53:16 +0000

Over the last few years there has seemingly been a trend within the motor industry to use light clusters that do away with the traditional red and orange coloured lenses in the light cluster and replace them with a coloured bulb instead so that the light unit appears a uniform silver in colour only showing the relevant colour when the bulb is illuminated. This has lead to the availability of clear indicator and light clusters as both genuine and after-market ‘upgrades’, something which has never really caught my attention up until recently when I stumbled upon some genuine clear side repeaters for sale on one of the stalls at the Malvern 4×4 autojumble for less than half of the usual price, well it would be rude not to…

Removing the orange side repeater

Removing the side repeaters is very easy, you simply push the repeater over to one side and then ‘pop’ the other end out of it’s recess in the wing, squeeze the sides of the electrical plug to release the locking tab then pull on the plug (not the wires) to release the connector from the repeater. Simplicity itself!

Old & new

The electrical connector - 'Plug & Play'

The new clear side repeater in place

I must be honest, I’m not entirely sure that I like the new look at the moment, maybe it’ll grow on me in time. I’ll leave them in place for a while and see how I feel about them in a few weeks or so, I’m so glad I got them cheap!
Maybe Land Rover got it right in the first place, my discovery is coming up to being 8 years old so maybe this is a bit like trying to modernise something that doesn’t actually need modernising, why change something for the sake of it? I guess time will tell.

I wonder if they'll look better if i wash the Disco?

A bit more perspective

Green Land Rover to ‘Go Dark’ on 18 Jan 2012 to protest against SOPA

Dubsta — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 09:45:13 +0000

On January 18 Green Land Rover will be going dark for a day to protest against the proposed introduction of the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) and its Senate counterpart, the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA) in the USA.

SOPA will not just affect those in the USA, it’s every website on the internet. It basically means that it would be illegal for anyone to link to any website without checking that the site does not infringe copyright. This means constantly reviewing your website links to make sure the sites they are linked to do not add copyrighted content to the original linked material.

This puts a massive amount of responsibility on to all website owners as it means that if a site is prosecuted under this legislation the following would occur: -

Domain name could be confiscated (US domains only I wonder?).
IP address added to a blacklist .
No legal process to carry out these actions.

This is a giant shift of responsibility and seems to be an excuse for wealthy companies to indiscriminately trample on smaller organisations who cannot afford to defend themselves. The US Government criticises other nations over suppressing free speech via the internet (China, Syria etc…) but they want to introduce a bill that will effectively do this!

We feel that this legislation is wrong and GLR will be protesting against it by ‘Going Dark’ on January 18th from 8am–8pm EST (1300–0100 UTC). Although GLR is a UK based site we have put the US time first as the campaign is about US law (albeit having global implications!)

Further information can be found here: -

Stop American Censorship Site

Reddit blog on SOPA

WordPress view on SOPA/PIPA

2012 Defender Pictures

Modchop — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:04:35 +0000

Do you want some high quality pictures of the 2012 Defender? If so why not check out Land Rover’s Facebook page here

2012 Land Rover Defender at 'Media Drive' in Scotland

Land Rover Evoque wins US Truck of the Year

Dubsta — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:25:33 +0000

The Land Rover Evoque has been voted ‘Truck of the Year’ by a panel of 50 US auto journalists.

Kim McCullough with Andy Goss accepting the North American Truck of the Year award for the Range Rover Evoque.

The panel based in Detroit has caused a stir due to the Evoque being more car-like than truck like. The New York Times ‘Wheels’ blog post reported – ‘The truck award particularly has engendered controversy, as nominees increasingly share more mechanical parts with passenger cars than with body-on-frame stump-pullers. Tony Swan, an automotive journalist and founder of the award committee, told the assembled journalists that a government agency ”classifies them as trucks, and we know the government is never wrong”.

With yet another award for the Evoque it seems as though the marque has been well received and will sell in vast numbers. This can only be a good thing for Land Rover and Tata and the world economy in general.

Malvern Land Rover Auto Jumble

Dubsta — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:16:16 +0000

GLR Staff will be off to the Land Rover Auto Jumble at the 3 Counties Showground on Sunday 15th January.

We have various bits and bobs we need for the GLR fleet so will be in full bargain hunt mode!

Details of the show can be found here. Anyone else going???

New Range Rover spy shots

Dubsta — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 09:50:54 +0000

Car Magazine has revealed its shots of the new Range Rover mules. From the limited view of the new model it seems as though the classic Range Rover lines have been retained: -

Range Rover Mule shots from Car Magazine

The emphasis seems to be on reducing weight and improving fuel economy as most models will have the V6 power plant. However petrol and diesel V8s will be offered in some markets. It is also reported that hybrid petrol and diesel units are in development. No news of when they will make their début though.

Mules have certainly come a long way in the past 15 years…

Fix it or buy a new one?

Dubsta — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 10:04:54 +0000

Land Rovers are probably as popular as they are due to the fact that they are so easy to fix, modify etc. That’s certainly the case for the utility models and earlier marks of vehicles. However more modern vehicles are full of electronics and this is generally viewed with some trepidation. This doesn’t have to be the case. The internet has opened up vast communities and websites containing all manner of information and the amateur mechanic can now look at CAN bus info, diagnostic readouts etc.

This leads us to the thrust of this article, fixing stuff. In these austere times it can be a great money saver to try and fix things yourself. It can also be great fun! As mentioned above Land Rovers are great for this. An example of this is when the GLR Freelander had the HDC, TC and Brake warning lights appear on the dashboard. The fix was found on the internet and credit given in the article. This was a simple gratifying fix that cost about £20. Garage price would probably been twice this and heaven knows what a main dealer would have charged!

For this reason we have started a section in the links to list repair sites. The one I found this morning which inspired this article is ifixit. There’s a vehicle section on there but no Land Rover stuff yet. Maybe you could add something? GLR will be looking in to doing so.

A warning! Although fixing stuff yourself is fun and can save money, you should only attempt repairs you feel competent to do so. Start small and build your skills. Safety critical systems such as brakes, steering and drivetrain should be left to specialists.

Finally a caveat!!! Green Land Rover accepts no responsibility whatsoever for: -

The advice given on any of the linked sites.
The consequences of you carrying out your own repairs or modifications to your property.

Have fun!