by j,moore » Mon Aug 17, 2009 9:08 am
hi, there are one or two restorers about, the land rover centre in huddersfield are good, i know there's one in coventry but cant remember the name.
new 3.9 engines are getting hard to find and anyone with one wants ransom money for it. the same goes for a gearbox. if its a auto then that makes it even harder. land rover dealers sometimes have new old stock or service exchange units at good prices. or try rimmer bros. an alternative for the engine is to fit a later more reliable 4.0 litre unit. body panels and inner panels are becoming hard to find, rimmers or ebay being the place to look. famous four are good for pattern parts and have a good knowlege of range rovers. we can get new parts such as engines, gearboxes, axles new chassis,etc but they are expensive as our contacts know just what they have got and how rare its all becoming.
be aware of the cost of restorers too. to get my csk (034) chassis to the condition it is in now has cost over £8,000 and thats without labour as we do the work ourselves. i'm not even half way through the body now and it has cost well over £2,000. if we had done the same job for a customer there would be a large labour bill to ad to this too so you have to factor this into your negotiations.
hope ths helps, regards, james.