Rebuilding our Defender 110 into an overland 'camper'

chroxy

New member
Hi everyone,

I've been reading a lot of threads on this forum, and I finally have something to share myself!

For the past few years my girlfriend and I travelled to different countries in Asia, the Middle East, Africa & South America. Most of the time we rented low-budget compact cars and drove around and found ourself stuck many times in sand, mud and more. It was time for a real car, but we've never owned a car before.

After looking online for months we finally found her: a '98 Land Rover Defender 110 with a 300tdi motor. It was sold in Germany and imported to the Netherlands in the early '00's, where it was transformed into an expedition vehicle with Tanzania as home base. When we bought it, it already had a Hannibal roofrack & rooftoptent, and still had the original 9 seats in it.

We call her Landy, and often encourage her to go a little bit faster: Go Landy! Here she is just after we bought her last year.

defenderfotokopie-2.jpg

Obviously a Defender like this is way to big for cities & towns in the Netherlands; so as we speak we've both quit our jobs and from May '18 we will travel through Eastern Europe, Russia, Mongolia & Central Asia, we have no clear final destination; we'll see where we'll end up.

For this overland-trip we want to prep both the interior as the exterior. We could use some protection (diff guards, steering guard), snorkel, household battery, inverter. Landy needs new shocks, and some minor repairs. We would also like to remove all the seats and build enough storage space for our trip.

We live in the city center and unfortunately don't have access to a garage, proper tools, nor do we have any experience with cars. But we are confident we can do this, in this thread I'll document all the updates & changes we're about to make to Landy.

20953557_10212017008412188_2305728085358353445_n.jpg

Last summer we did our first shakedown trip in the Balkan / former Yugoslavia. We travelled over 5000 miles is 5 weeks through Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo, Serbia, Slovenia and Montenegro. We camped in the wild; on beaches, ski-pistes and more. Our only problem was a broken brake disc guard, so we where quite happy as you can see ;).

More about the rebuild later this week! Or check out our instagram for photos from our trips: instagram.com/golandy
 
Last edited:

the deputy

Member
You two sure went "all in" on this purchase. Pretty cool start to an overland lifestyle rig...and a first vehicle in general.

Good luck, with your modifications.

Brian.
 

Kgh

Let’s go already!
Welcome! Nice looking truck, and sounds like you have a good plan.

We have a few Defenders, love them all. Even have one stored in Scheggertdijk we left when we moved back to the US. Eventually we will get back for some Euro touring.

A few tips on things you can do yourself for not much cost:
-Buy or find online the Defender Workshop Manual.
-Change every fluid over to new. Brakes, gearbox, transfer box, engine, clutch.
-Ensure your timing belt is recent and ensure injection pump timing is correct.
-Check condition of brakes, parking brake adjustment, clutch pedal adjustment, and condition of front swivel pins.

Here’s a good swivel repair video, Dutch travellers too.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s2id4_VcJ54

We found that having a tent annex is really helpful. Good place for cassette toilet use. Have tent open off the back of truck, and annex fits on rear, even allowing access thru back door.

James Baroud and others make 110 insulated window shades.

Strongly recommend you visit Abenteur und Allrad this year, too.
 

chroxy

New member
So, we've bought our first car ever because we're planning an overland-journey, but had no clue where to start.

First things first: we wanted to get to know Landy a little bit better, so we took it to Luxembourg for a long weekend. We've never driven a 4x4 and were used to small, compact rental cars, so it felt like driving a big truck - probably because it actually is a big truck. The rooftop tent was fantastic! But the interior of the car could use an upgrade. We're not the most organized people and soon realized we needed a lot more storage options. A water tank and second battery also ended up on our wish list, especially for those trips that last longer than a weekend.

Schermafbeelding 2018-02-27 om 22.05.56-edited.jpg

Our interior plans:
The car was still completely original, with side benches, seating 9 people in total, and old smelly carpet. Since it's just the two of us, we removed everything to start from scratch. We had a few basic ideas about the interior:
- as much storage as possible in cabinets, we don't like having our stuff just laying around
- being able to sit inside
- room for a sizeable fridge

Since we stripped the car's inside, we decided it was the best moment to also insulate everything, making the car a bit more quiet and climate controlled.

So it began; after an afternoon of taking everything out, it looked like this, quite empty!

From this,
IMG_5963-edited.jpg

to this:
IMG_1710-edited.jpg

We found a few spots with some sort of white dust and soon learned it was corrosion. So the tedious task of sanding the corrosion away began. We treated every spot with aluminum primer and painted everything black again. Luckily the previous owners gave the Landy a Tectyl & Ditrinol treatment, so apart from these spots, the car is almost without rust. For sound proofing we used Reckhorn ABX alubutyl and for insulation we used Armaflex (which is similar to but cheaper than Dynamats). It made a huge difference: the body panels stopped vibrating and the car was a lot quieter.

This is how it looked after insulating the car:

IMG_6069-edited.jpg

That's it for now, next step is covering it all up with wood and start building boxes.
Soon more about our rebuild! :)
 
Last edited:

chroxy

New member
You two sure went "all in" on this purchase. Pretty cool start to an overland lifestyle rig...and a first vehicle in general.

Good luck, with your modifications.

Brian.

Thanks Brian & Condor! We just a Land Rover, so we wanted to do it good the first time, or not at al . The car doesn't need much, and we have all the time to slowly adept it to our needs.
 

chroxy

New member
Welcome! Nice looking truck, and sounds like you have a good plan.

We have a few Defenders, love them all. Even have one stored in Scheggertdijk we left when we moved back to the US. Eventually we will get back for some Euro touring.

A few tips on things you can do yourself for not much cost:
-Buy or find online the Defender Workshop Manual.
-Change every fluid over to new. Brakes, gearbox, transfer box, engine, clutch.
-Ensure your timing belt is recent and ensure injection pump timing is correct.
-Check condition of brakes, parking brake adjustment, clutch pedal adjustment, and condition of front swivel pins.

Here's a good swivel repair video, Dutch travellers too.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s2id4_VcJ54

We found that having a tent annex is really helpful. Good place for cassette toilet use. Have tent open off the back of truck, and annex fits on rear, even allowing access thru back door.

James Baroud and others make 110 insulated window shades.

Strongly recommend you visit Abenteur und Allrad this year, too.

Thanks! Really good tips, i'll make sure we check everyone of them before we start our adventure!! I would love to go to Abentuer & Allrad, but i hope we'll be in Russia by then ;).

How fast to you install the tent annex? It looks nice, but we often only stay for 1 (short) night at a campsite, so we normally don't even bother folding out our awning!
 

LR Max

Local Oaf
Awesome! My only suggestions is to get the vehicle in top mechanical condition. This solves so many problems when you don't have breakdowns all the time. The old diesels are robust, simply changing the filters and keeping it serviced will go a long way. So many people don't even do this and then wonder why the engines fail. Cleaning out the diesel fuel tank will help keep things clean. All kinds of fun bits get in there/grow. Just yesterday I was on site dealing with a unit with bad diesel fuel. So even though living in the US, it still happens. (also I'm a fleet service manager, so all I deal with day in and day out are bad fuel systems and engines that are run on low oil)

Make sure your steering and brakes are in good condition. No one has ever complained about the steering and the brakes working. If they aren't...well...

Check the driveshafts for play. Its an easy fix but left unattended can result in further damage.

If you don't have a small air compressor, get one. A cheap one is better than none. Obviously the ARB twin piston compressor is ideal. That said, not every budget can sustain it. Also get the ARB tire plug kit. In my experience, repairing a tire without even removing the wheel from the car, is easier than changing the tire. With this plug kit, the repair is permanent. So once its fixed, you are good to go. I recommend the ARB plug kit because it comes with a bunch of other tools you'll need for the tire repair.

Other than that, enjoy your vehicle! Looks like its going to be awesome!
 

Kgh

Let’s go already!
How fast to you install the tent annex? It looks nice, but we often only stay for 1 (short) night at a campsite, so we normally don't even bother folding out our awning!

The annex is useful in bad or cold weather, and when wild camping with no facilities. Takes 10 minutes to put up, but longer to put away if it has gotten damp underneath overnight. That brings up your RTT. Always wait for sun to dry it off in the mornings. Folding it up wet will happen, but do not make it a habit or you will have mold.
 

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