Aftermath.

We've left this blog alone for a while after getting some pretty unpleasant "feedback" on some of it. In fact, we pulled the whole thing off-line for a while. It appears that our "attitude" towards the citizens of Morocco has been seen to be "racist"and "elitist", possibly because we decided not to hand out BonBons and Stylos on demand....

Anyway, as an update, when we got home we decided that Daphne had done us proud but had probably reached the limit of what we could do with her as an Expedition Vehicle. To be more specific, the seating arrangement in the original vehicle creates a lot of problems when trying to use the space for anything else. We'd done a pretty good job of working around this but having now had a lot of experience with her, we decided to revisit the "Stealth Camper" concept and bought a 110 Hard-Top.....

This is our new truck, which we've named "Willoughby" for reasons that we'll explain later. The pic shows him after quite a bit of work, including a respray - you might recognise the colour - I had a few litres left over from the last project! We'll document the details later, and Daphne has gone to a new home and we hope her new owners have as much fun with her as we did.
In the coming weeks we'll try to show what we've done to convert from Daphne CSW to Willoughby Utility. There's been some renewed interest in the project(s) from some guys on another forum so we'll try to show how Daphne came about and how Willoughby has benefitted from the experience. Like most of our projects, it's a work-in-progress so things will probably change as we do our troop-trialling later.

Just to start with, then, this is how Willoughby looked when he entered our lives:

This photo is taken from the e-bay ad I saw back in May of last year (2016). The rest of the ad ran like this:

Land rover 300tdi 110 1995 diesel 

EXPEDITION PREPARED, total mechanical rebuild

Key features:

Galvanised Richards chassis professionally fitted.

During the chassis swap all items replaced with brand new parts :

Chassis repainted on top of galv with POR 15 primer and black top coat . This process cost an extra £1300 in paint and labour. This transforms the galv look to original chassis colour.

New axles, brand new at cost of £1000 each . Whole car replaced with super pro bushes, £750

New Ashcroft gearbox , cost £600

Suspension: The best combination fitted, after numerous shocks were installed and subsequently binned!   Old man Emu expedition HD springs , Big Bore Terrafirma shocks, the best combination!!! And believe me, I have changed the set up 3 times. 

New wheels and the only the best tyres: BF Goodrich Mud terrain KM 2.  Spare BFG on rear door or roof (either possible)

Warn Powerplant winch HD: 6,000kgs winch with onboard compressor , cost £2000 plus £800 ARB defender bull bar not available in this country, imported specially. Extra genuine Warn air tank available it will drive power tools and pump tyres effortlessly. This is the most powerful winch by warn available and rarely seen due cost. 

Side bars fitted (could do with new powder coat) rear towbar original

Brake calipers and pads and discs and lines all replaced as new

Side access door , very handy when at camp under awning

Engel fridge 45L plus extra cool zone meaning its a freezer and fridge

New HD clutch with HD clutch , new steering rack. 

Hannibal complete roof tent set up at huge expense : original roof rack, 1.4M tent , jumbo kit, normal kit, awning which included the side tent. Over £6,000 new. This is an exceptionally comfortable mattress and used maybe 10 times. 

Inboard water tank, solar panel charging including regulator .

Cb radio and Alpine tuner with aux input for iphone

Extra fuel tank added to rear right skirt, extra 40L

Scheelman seats , over £2000 new , black suede , incredible comfort

Centre cubby box

Allisport intercooler and associated hoses , new altenator

Security safe for valuables . Red Optima battery 

The rear tray is able to slide outwards to 6ft!! fitted only to SAS special vehicles, brackets were £650 alone , aerospace luggage tie downs . This negates the awful usual access of 110 hardtops 

Special security immobiliser fitted , always garaged 

Paint work typical for a defender of this age but genuine 143,000 miles and always serviced meticulously with never any expense spared. This vehicle will last a lifetime and new baby forces sale.

This vehicle has been totally rebuilt with the exception of the engine (sound and reliable) and the bodywork. I have spent close to £30,000 over the last 5 years only ever buying the best possible parts manufacturers. WARN, ARB, Hannibal, BFG, Engel, Scheelman etc. 

I completed a 5,000 mile trip of a lifetime to Morocco without even a single mechanical failure.

It is mountain and desert proven (Rif mountains and Atlas)

This is a very very reluctant sale. Get in touch for further details , of course full mot and tax. 

So, looks good, huh? I thought so too, obviously. Standby for the next episode, folks......