2003 Land Rover Discovery 2 Build

[kevinh26]

Well, like all great Land Rover improvements one issues goes away and a few others fill the void. Remember, the 4.6 is just a stroked 4.0. Nice thing about the Discos is the wealth of information out there and the trucks are old enough that they are much easier to work on. Download the RAVE manual find some good vendors and start tinkering. I would not trade the experience for anything.

I just installed a top hat lined 4.6 in my '04 and a rear 1/2 frame N/E truck. Love my disco

 

[disco_unchained]

Hold my beer.... Using this quarantine time to build out a fridge / stove / drawer system in the back. Starts today...



Going to put in a wooden plate (mounted via the existing tie down ring and jump seat bolts) for mounting the drawer system to. Might actually leave the trim off on the right to save some space. Going to make the drawer system out of 8020. Swallowing my pride and ordering some HD drawer slides from accuride and knape & vogt. here goes.

 

[KC_Rover]

Can’t wait to see this. Great build so far.

Any issues with the front housing swap for the cdl?

I have a CDL case sitting in the garage but haven’t worked up the courage to tackle it.

 

[soarvet]

Awesome! Can't wait to see it all come together. I'm slowly getting mine together. My father gave me his old 94 Ram 2500 Cummins, so I'm bouncing between that and the Disco.

 

[disco_unchained]

Any issues with the front housing swap for the cdl?

A second set of hands would help. My only issues were self inflicted. I didn’t take apart the new output housing that I got off the salvage transfer case and inspect and clean all the pieces. So I got the whole thing on and had a vibration. I had put on an output housing with a bad bearing. So I had to swap that after the fact.

The other issue was with the studs that connect the down pipe to the exhaust manifold. May be obvious to you, but this is my first rodeo: order new studs and pinch nuts, and have a stud extractor on hand.

Good luck and let me know if you have any questions!

 

[Turnerxc]

View attachment 77160

Ended up going with the warn vr12s on a holiday special.

View attachment 77161

Also got the roof rack and lights on. Ready to gtfo of dodge now.

Still in love with these tires.

So I am way behind on all of the comments on your beauty of a build. However, I must first start off with you are making my heart ache because my first vehicle love was your exact D2. Same year, fit and finish. We got rid of her when gas shot up to and over $4.50/gal and we ran out of room for infant carriers. So I’m so happy to see someone take the exact same rig and make it even better. Can’t wait to see the adventures this one goes on. CHEERS!

 

[Turnerxc]

View attachment 77160

Ended up going with the warn vr12s on a holiday special.

View attachment 77161

Also got the roof rack and lights on. Ready to gtfo of dodge now.

Still in love with these tires.

I’ve got a buddy that is trying to wire his safari rack lights. How did you run the wiring from the lights into the cab and engine bay? Any details including photos would greatly be appreciated.

 

[KC_Rover]

View attachment 77160

Ended up going with the warn vr12s on a holiday special.

View attachment 77161

Also got the roof rack and lights on. Ready to gtfo of dodge now.

Still in love with these tires.

I’ve got a buddy that is trying to wire his safari rack lights. How did you run the wiring from the lights into the cab and engine bay? Any details including photos would greatly be appreciated.

Curious on this as well.

I have 4 Hellas I need to mount. I was planning on running down the A pillar into the engine compartment then into the cab via a negative-switch set up. Going down the pass side makes plenty of sense. The problem is those A pillar covers getting ripped off on the trail despite limb risers.

I saw that @Michael has a nifty water tight connector he used for routing his old Hellas. Goes from the roof into the cab. Not sure if he still did that with the KCs. I think there’s an older OB vid about it.

 

[disco_unchained]

I’ve got a buddy that is trying to wire his safari rack lights. How did you run the wiring from the lights into the cab and engine bay? Any details including photos would greatly be appreciated.

I ran it down the passenger side A-pillar. It’s a super tight fit. I have loom at the top, no loom under the A-pillar, and then start the loom again as soon is it comes out of the A-pillar and goes through an existing wiring hole to the engine bay.

 

[KC_Rover]

I’ve got a buddy that is trying to wire his safari rack lights. How did you run the wiring from the lights into the cab and engine bay? Any details including photos would greatly be appreciated.

I ran it down the passenger side A-pillar. It’s a super tight fit. I have loom at the top, no loom under the A-pillar, and then start the loom again as soon is it comes out of the A-pillar and goes through an existing wiring hole to the engine bay.

Good to know! Thanks!

 

[disco_unchained]

Good to know! Thanks!

Realize I didn’t totally answer your question! Here are some pics and more detail:

I ran it down into the a-pillar like so(broke a bit of my roof gutter on the corner as you can tell).

I then ran it into the engine bay like this:

Ran it across to the driver side like this:

Down into the drivers side of the bay like this, through an existing boot into the cab down by the pedals:

I then ran it over to the coin tray, which I pulled the front off and drilled through to install switches:

 

[KC_Rover]

Nice install! Very clean. How did you mount the switches on the coin tray?

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

They are extremely heavy (about 60-70 pounds a piece) but I love them. Painted them with raptor liner. Here are some photos I sent to the guy that made them:

View attachment 133851
View attachment 133852View attachment 133853

Who made your sliders. I'm in the market for them now. I like the protection your getting and they look good on your rig.

 

[disco_unchained]

Who made your sliders. I'm in the market for them now. I like the protection your getting and they look good on your rig.

Dark crow designs out of Ohio. You can reach Chris at +1 (614) 554-5112.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

Dark crow designs out of Ohio. You can reach Chris at +1 (614) 554-5112.

Thanks friend, I will reach out to him tomorrow. So far I have bought everything from Lucky8 and they too have some nice sliders. I will have to compare quality and strength as I feel they are important for protection. I have just about gone as far as I will go on lift, tires and armor when I get some sliders. Now I can concentrate on the equipment more although I have a ton of stuff now that I will be using for my adventures.

 

[disco_unchained]

So far I have bought everything from Lucky8.

I’m on a first name basis with Lucky8 at this point, lol. Even have their stickers on my daughter’s Care Bears electric car. I wanted something a little more substantial than the terrafirma ones they offer, and I’d possible, a little cheaper than the tactical rovers ones. I was also particular about a square profile. If money were no object, I probably woulda gone with the tactical rovers ones. But dark crow offered either round or square profile and I’m confident the strength is comparable with tactical rovers. You do have to prime and paint it yourself though, which I did with Raptor Liner.

 

[Turnerxc]

I ran it down the passenger side A-pillar. It’s a super tight fit. I have loom at the top, no loom under the A-pillar, and then start the loom again as soon is it comes out of the A-pillar and goes through an existing wiring hole to the engine bay.

Any Video of that install? I’m a very visual learner and any help with this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

After burning a hole in my north face shell on the y-pipe reaching up to lock the diff by hand, I finally broke down and got and installed a cdl linkage:

View attachment 123707View attachment 123708View attachment 123709

As usual, nothing about the process was simple for me, but it was fun. Pretty sure I got a sinus infection from breathing 15 year old dust from under the console, but now I don’t have to get out of the truck to lock the diff!

Your build scares the hell out of me. Is there nothing you won't tear into ?

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

it actually is my 3rd vehicle. I have a Tundra, my dad gave me his old 94 2nd gen Cummins and I picked up my Disco for $900. I end up going back and forth on projects between the dodge and disco. I need to just pick one and stay the course. I barely drive my Tundra anymore. That’s a nice Tacoma you got there. Is that a front runner rack? How do you like it. I like the modularity of those. Debating on that for the disco or the traditional Baja Rack.

I have the same problem. Never can figure out which project to work on and finish. Finally the LRD2 is what I'm concentrating on.

 

[Lanlubber In Remembrance]

View attachment 124497

New sliders from Dark Crow Designs just showed up! Amped to get these primed and raptor lined and on.

Did they come welded ? The ones I found on Dark Crow were just a kit and unwelded or painted.