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770 Posts
So I have been preparing my rover for another cross country trip. Last year I logged 12,000 miles through 23 States with truck and travel trailer fully loaded. I am getting ready to leave in a couple of weeks on a similar expedition and trying to wrap up what has been many many hours of getting this truck ready with the help from all of you on this forum as well as an aircraft mechanic friend of mine.
My 99 Disco 2 hit the 200,000 mile mark a few months back and what began as an investigation as to why my transfer case was not going into low snow balled into a full fledged project of sorts. At the time I was dropping the transfer case I got a phone call(coincendently) from the person I had recently sold my wife's previous 2001 Discovery to. They said the the truck had been in an accident and wanted to know what it might be worth as they feared it was going to be totaled. Long story short it was totaled and I ended up getting the vehicle back as it was very well maintained and up to the time it was wrecked it was in flawless condition inside and out. I decided to take the transfer case and transmisson out of the wrecked vehicle as I knew the full history of the vehicle having owned it for years and it only had about 70,000 on the transmission. It had never towed anything and had only been used off road a few times(minor stuff). I had a new torque converter lined up so we just went ahead and did the whole thing. It turned out that the only problem with the stuck in high transfer case was the solenoid by the way. Also, the 01 transfer case had the nipple for the CDL so I was able to still utilize the D1 linkage I had put in my truck years back. Getting the cross member off proved difficult.
Well, was feeling pretty good with how all that went and so I decided as a preventative to go ahead and do the head gaskets but then that turned in to deciding to doing the timing chain as DiscoMike had recommended, but then that turned into - might as well replace the cam. I had no idea how much work that would entail. I decided to get a 229 Crower cam. Also, went ahead and did a little port and polish work on the heads. Ended up doing a stud kit, new timing chain(from D and D)rebuilt the oil pump, new water pump, wires, coil, plugs, radiator(since it had to come out to put the cam in), alternator and while I was at it, removed the old nasty beat up exhaust and replaced with magnaflow cats and muffler. I cleaned the idle air control valve and MAF in addition to about every part I came in contact with as we went along. Cleaning the inside of the intake manifolds was time consuming. I actually had the upper and lower intake off the other truck cleaned by the machine shop which ended up being stolen the night before we installed them so ended up cleaning the old ones myself. I also used th heads off the other truck so that my vehicle had minimal down time. The machine shop shaved four thousands off the head and did the valves. I did the port and polish myself(for better or for worse). I also had to plug the holes(machine shop would not do it) for the secondary air because the 99 does not have it.
The head gasket was not shot from what I could tell visually but suspected it going at any time, the cam looked pretty good as well. The timing chain did have quite a bit of slack in it(thanks DiscoMike).
I am just about done doing the cam break in and relieved that after putting everything back together I have no codes and I passed emissions here in Utah. I was concerned because I had my ECU flashed/remapped years back and was not sure how it was going to do with the new cam. So far so good.
I replaced my fuel pump last year and so the starter is about the only thing I have not replaced that I can think to do. I replaced all the radiator hoses as well as replaced all the fluids in the diffs, transfer case and transmission.
I also pulled the third row seating out of the other rover and put it into mine in addition to a few cosmetic items. I sold some parts off the wrecked rover and towards the end sold what was left of the vehicle to a guy who wanted the whole thing for the seats/interior because it was immaculate on the inside. Point being, is that it funded the whole project and ended up costing me really nothing out of pocket.
Any suggestions as to what else I might do before heading off would be appreciated.
I will post some pics.
My 99 Disco 2 hit the 200,000 mile mark a few months back and what began as an investigation as to why my transfer case was not going into low snow balled into a full fledged project of sorts. At the time I was dropping the transfer case I got a phone call(coincendently) from the person I had recently sold my wife's previous 2001 Discovery to. They said the the truck had been in an accident and wanted to know what it might be worth as they feared it was going to be totaled. Long story short it was totaled and I ended up getting the vehicle back as it was very well maintained and up to the time it was wrecked it was in flawless condition inside and out. I decided to take the transfer case and transmisson out of the wrecked vehicle as I knew the full history of the vehicle having owned it for years and it only had about 70,000 on the transmission. It had never towed anything and had only been used off road a few times(minor stuff). I had a new torque converter lined up so we just went ahead and did the whole thing. It turned out that the only problem with the stuck in high transfer case was the solenoid by the way. Also, the 01 transfer case had the nipple for the CDL so I was able to still utilize the D1 linkage I had put in my truck years back. Getting the cross member off proved difficult.
Well, was feeling pretty good with how all that went and so I decided as a preventative to go ahead and do the head gaskets but then that turned in to deciding to doing the timing chain as DiscoMike had recommended, but then that turned into - might as well replace the cam. I had no idea how much work that would entail. I decided to get a 229 Crower cam. Also, went ahead and did a little port and polish work on the heads. Ended up doing a stud kit, new timing chain(from D and D)rebuilt the oil pump, new water pump, wires, coil, plugs, radiator(since it had to come out to put the cam in), alternator and while I was at it, removed the old nasty beat up exhaust and replaced with magnaflow cats and muffler. I cleaned the idle air control valve and MAF in addition to about every part I came in contact with as we went along. Cleaning the inside of the intake manifolds was time consuming. I actually had the upper and lower intake off the other truck cleaned by the machine shop which ended up being stolen the night before we installed them so ended up cleaning the old ones myself. I also used th heads off the other truck so that my vehicle had minimal down time. The machine shop shaved four thousands off the head and did the valves. I did the port and polish myself(for better or for worse). I also had to plug the holes(machine shop would not do it) for the secondary air because the 99 does not have it.
The head gasket was not shot from what I could tell visually but suspected it going at any time, the cam looked pretty good as well. The timing chain did have quite a bit of slack in it(thanks DiscoMike).
I am just about done doing the cam break in and relieved that after putting everything back together I have no codes and I passed emissions here in Utah. I was concerned because I had my ECU flashed/remapped years back and was not sure how it was going to do with the new cam. So far so good.
I replaced my fuel pump last year and so the starter is about the only thing I have not replaced that I can think to do. I replaced all the radiator hoses as well as replaced all the fluids in the diffs, transfer case and transmission.
I also pulled the third row seating out of the other rover and put it into mine in addition to a few cosmetic items. I sold some parts off the wrecked rover and towards the end sold what was left of the vehicle to a guy who wanted the whole thing for the seats/interior because it was immaculate on the inside. Point being, is that it funded the whole project and ended up costing me really nothing out of pocket.
Any suggestions as to what else I might do before heading off would be appreciated.
I will post some pics.
