Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
soon to be new member in the family-
I was warned after buying my D3 that you can’t just have one Land Rover. You gotta have one to drive and one to fix after you broke it. I laughed it off.
But in my adventures out in the mountains I realized that tho the D3 is quite capable, more so than some D1 & D2’s, I would avoid areas that body damage was certain.
Maybe Ill buy a trail truck? A truck that I can run those other 20% of the trails I don’t touch in the D3? Something that the D3 can tow so I can have both at club events. A truck that already has a little character. Something that I can modify body work with a rubber mallet. My DIII gets awful lonely at night.
So here we go!!
1997 D1 SE 4.0 125000 miles fully kitted with ARB air lockers, drive train mods, lift, tires, rack, winch, yadda yadda yadda. Oh, and a boot full of spare parts.
The only problem is that it’s on the ‘wrong side’ of the country. 2500 miles away. I could find one closer but not one like this for the price. It is more than worth my while to go get it. So, Im off for Seattle Saturday morning. I plan on doing a little sightseeing along the way home. Im taking a bunch of DVDs to watch on my laptop to keep me awake while driving tho.
Don’t worry, the D3 is still gonna be the daily driver and will continue to get its share of off roading!
Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
Looks great Tim, plenty of kit on that one, won't be long before there's D3s kitted out like that (I'm getting there slowly)The End
23rd Sep 2005 10:40 pm
freeflytim
Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
Im gonna name it the 'White Whale"Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
24th Sep 2005 3:26 am
simon
Member Since: 11 Jan 2005
Location: Shropshire
Posts: 18296
Tim... very cool.
By the way, good to have you back. Where you been man ?
-s
24th Sep 2005 8:04 am
freeflytim
Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
Oh, just had a lot going on lately. This crazy purchase was a little bit of it!
Got the D1 today and drove the first 300 mile leg tonight. Seattle to Spokane. All I got to say is that its gonna be a long, rather long, trip home. Runs good and all but even with street tires on its still a handful to drive with its 3" lift and the cargo Im carrying. Im gonna be lucky to have an overall average driving speed of 65, I was hopeing 75. Im gonna rent a trailer tomorrow to redistribute the cargo and get it off the suspension. Inside Im carrying 2 rims w/off road tires, 2 diffs (at least 100# each), spare axles, a "Tuffy" steal cargo box that fills the rear of the truck and its FULL of tools and other really heavy , and yada yada yada. All that weight is causing it to be awful bouncy driving down the highway. Oh, and three more tires w/rim on the roof rack... so you can image the CGs!
I wish I had my D3's nav unit! Microsoft Streets & Trips with GPS on my laptop sucks compared to it! Tho looks cool having a laptop mounted in the truck and the Delorme Topo software will be sweet in the woods and on the trails where the D3's off road navigation stinks.Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
25th Sep 2005 7:48 am
Gareth Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26774
Like it If you don't fancy the journey, pay my expenses and fly me over, I'll drive it back for you
25th Sep 2005 8:40 am
freeflytim
Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
Who turned on the kiddie filter?? I thought we were all adults here!!
Much better today…
Day 2...Spokane Washington to Bozeman ‘Big Sky Country†Montana. 9 hours. 400 miles.
I got a good 8 hours sleep last night after literally 3 the nights before. First thing was the morning pre-flight of the D1. FLAT TIRE. Muther, err, Damn! Glad I got 6 spares, well, only one in the right size unless I wanna change all 4. No puddles, just a small drip under PS reservoir, which I knew about. No others. Oil good. Moment of truth for the battery… it fires up absolutely perfect, albeit it isn’t a ‘click to start’ (still trying to get used to that). Tranny oil good. I change the tire and check out of the hotel. Hoping to improve the truck’s handling I head toward a UHaul trailer rental store to get the cargo weight into a trailer and off the roof. Got the trailer and Muther, err, CRAP WHERES MY IPOD and CELL? Back to the hotel... Got em. Whew. Unload 3 tires off the roof and the 2 inside and stick them in the trailer with the 2 diffs. Finally off around 12:30. WOW truck handles much better. Not great, but better enough that the trailer was a very good idea. Stop to air up installed spare that’s low and the flat tire. Drive. Stop for two cans of fix-a-flat (you never know), splitter for the cig plug, locks for the trailer, gloves (Im tired of getting my hands dirty). Top off the tank. Hit the road. Hmm, funny smell. The cig splitter is smoking. Great, Its just an Ipod and a laptop. Jeez. BTW, The truck has an added volt-o-meter which reads a constant 13.8-13.9 volts. Nice. Drive some more. And drive some more. Its so windy in parts of Idaho that a couple of bridges actually had wind-socks on each end! Ive never seen that before and it was pretty stinking windy! Going up some of the mountain passes I would take it easy and only go 50.
I ended up in Bozeman, which is just north of Yellowstone, for the night. I could have made another 120 miles but the next town is 140 (REALLY!)
Getting the three monster tires off the roof rack and into a trailer made it handle a lot less scary. It doesn’t change lanes when the body rolls anymore. My gas mileage when all that was on the rack was roughly 10 and with the trailer it’s up to 12. Now that’s some drag up there!
679 miles down, 1900 to go. With the stuff in the trailer and only a couple more mountain ranges to go I hope to be picking up some speed from here on.
Ya know Gareth, I offered that to a couple of friends of mine… fly to Seattle with me then drive home 2600 miles home and they all laughed! Oh well. I would have had it shipped but if I was gonna buy it I needed it back to get ready for a 400+ Landy rally in two weeks. The auto-shippers would only promise 4 weeks.
Look how goofy the stock tire look compared to the big spare!
Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
Who turned on the kiddie filter?? I thought we were all adults here!!
Guilty, we do have some younger members
Brilliant Tim, keep updating us with your epic journey, maybe they'll make a movie of it soon
You're right about the standard rim/tyre, quite a contrast
Cheers
SiThe End
26th Sep 2005 9:47 am
freeflytim
Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
Day 3. Bozeman Montana across Big Sky Country down into Wyoming and leaving the Rocky Mountains through the western South Dakota Badlands (think ET’s Devil’s Tower) and then almost all the way across the high plains of South Dakota. 770 miles, 14hours. I actually took some pictures today- albeit from the driver’s seat!!!
Temperature at start this morning was exactly 32/0 degrees and the White Whale cranked beautifully this morning.
Uneventful. Mile after mile of not seeing another vehicle on the highway. The rolling but straight highways the entire day were something else. Mile after mile “if I go off the side of the road it may be years before they find me!â€
1500 miles down. 1100 to go. Id love to make that last bit nonstop, but I don’t think its gonna happen. The 14 hours getting 770 today was pretty tiring.Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
27th Sep 2005 5:37 am
Gareth Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26774
This would make a good road movie! Keep it coming, lets see the photo's .
27th Sep 2005 7:02 am
freeflytim
Member Since: 18 Feb 2005
Location: Chattanooga, TN
Posts: 297
I don’t know about a movie. It would be pretty stinking booooring. You’ve never driven across the US…. Some states are hours and hours and hours of absolutely nothing… Stretches of interstate where you don’t let you’re tank get below half!! Montana, for awhile, before a few bad apples caused bad press, had a speed limit of, get this.. “Safe and Prudentâ€!! There were stories that cops would pull drivers over before they left the state to remind them neighboring states DID have speed limits!! Too bad the D1 was nowhere near the now posted and not enforced 75!
Day 4. 14hours 760miles. 2200 miles down 360 to go.
The roads of the western US are incredibly straight. As they were laid out on longitudes and latitudes. Yesterday was due east. Today was due south than east. More traffic on the roads as I got out of the middle of nowhere and passed through Sioux Falls South Dakota, Omaha Nebraska, Kansas City Missouri and then Saint Louis with the Arch. If you remember “National Lampoon’s Vacation†where Chevy Chase made the wrong turn and got the wheels stripped off the family truckster, that was Saint Louis. Actually East St Louis but you get the idea. The worse signage and highways in the entire US.
With more traffic I learned something today… drafting works! I had been getting 10mpg and today after drafting some semi’s (lorries) I got 12mpg on one tank. WOOT!
Still running good. 2200 miles and the beast may have burned maybe half a quart of oil. Not bad with 124000 on the clock.
Other than the anemic power, abysmal handling, and the oven of a center console which turned a bag of food goodies into mush today, Im growing quite fond of the beast. The rumble from the hole in the exhaust. The normal clunks in the tranny (the D1’s clunk ‘feels’ comforting while the clunk in my D3 doesn’t!). The REAL clock. The cargo nets on the roof. I used to always defend our rear hatch to older Disco owners but Im beginning to think that they might be right, something about the swing hatch is inherently better. Irregardless of where the spare is located. This beast turns heads and makes for conversation at the often fuel stops!!
Tho I was still 400+ miles from home, when I crossed the Mississippi River tonight I ‘felt’ like I made it… I was now on the ‘right’ side of the country…
Tomorrow is Southern Illinois, Kentucky, Nashville Tennessee and home! YEAH!Wa Hoo
-Tim
Chattanooga Tennessee USA
D3 V8HSE7HD
D1 kitted trail truck.
A Hummer is just a Hummer. A Land Rover goes all the way.
28th Sep 2005 5:54 am
Gareth Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26774
You should compile this and send it to LROI mag, sounds great. God I must be sad! You make it sound so mundane, I would love to have enough time to do this
With more traffic I learned something today… drafting works! I had been getting 10mpg and today after drafting some semi’s (lorries) I got 12mpg on one tank. WOOT!
I learned the craft (and skill required) of lorry drafting when I had my old normally-aspirated 90. Makes a big difference, especially when the top speed was only 65mph!
The technique was also super when I used to cycle race on our A-roads, although you had to be a bit careful ...Discovery 3 tdv6 7 seat Buckingham Blue
Had it since new - sold Jun 17 after 12 years and 214,000 miles
If we did the same thing across the UK it would have ended days ago
I know. 868 miles from LE to JoG is the largest span. It's been done in 2 days on a bicycle.
Puts our puny little country into perspective reallyDiscovery 3 tdv6 7 seat Buckingham Blue
Had it since new - sold Jun 17 after 12 years and 214,000 miles
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long, trip home. Runs good and all but even with street tires on its still a handful to drive with its 3" lift and the cargo Im carrying. Im gonna be lucky to have an overall average driving speed of 65, I was hopeing 75. Im gonna rent a trailer tomorrow to redistribute the cargo and get it off the suspension. Inside Im carrying 2 rims w/off road tires, 2 diffs (at least 100# each), spare axles, a "Tuffy" steal cargo box that fills the rear of the truck and its FULL of tools and other really heavy 
If you don't fancy the journey, pay my expenses and fly me over, I'll drive it back for you 
