Modifying a 300TDI Discovery 1

[Pig benis]

Hello people

One of my cars is a Land Rover Discovery 300tdi (manual). I use it for green laning, occasional trips over to Salisbury Plane and for going camping with. I've become attached to this car now, and regulary choose to drive it over my other car.

I've had this old girl for almost a year and the suspension is looking a bit saggy. I have been on the LR forums and there seems to be so much conflicting information about what suspension kit to go for. Here is what I am after -

1) Reliability kept as it is
2) I want more height under the diffs
3) To be able to fit bigger tyres for more traction off road + big tyres look awesome


Now I don't want to go crazy, a 2" lift would suit me, but what kits do you guys recommend? I have read about some kits will decrease axle articulation, which is not what I want to do. I also want to keep the reliability of this truck and have heard some lifts will damage the propshaft.

Cheers all
Vinny

[Hainey]

Pig benis said:

Hello people

One of my cars is a Land Rover Discovery 300tdi (manual). I use it for green laning, occasional trips over to Salisbury Plane and for going camping with. I've become attached to this car now, and regulary choose to drive it over my other car.

I've had this old girl for almost a year and the suspension is looking a bit saggy. I have been on the LR forums and there seems to be so much conflicting information about what suspension kit to go for. Here is what I am after -

1) Reliability kept as it is
2) I want more height under the diffs
3) To be able to fit bigger tyres for more traction off road + big tyres look awesome


Now I don't want to go crazy, a 2" lift would suit me, but what kits do you guys recommend? I have read about some kits will decrease axle articulation, which is not what I want to do. I also want to keep the reliability of this truck and have heard some lifts will damage the propshaft.

Cheers all
Vinny

Ok I have the same truck as you so in order:

1) I put a 2 inch suspension lift on mine with no loss of reliability.
2) A suspension lift will not give you that.
3) I have 205/85 16 INSA Sahara tyres on mine and they just what I needed. Thin enough to cut through the slop and get a bite on the solids below, 80% road 20% off road bias so not too bad to drive on tarmac with, look the mutts nuts and will (just) slip before you break a driveshaft.

I also put a 15mm propshaft spacer on mine. All good, no problems to report.

[KevinCamaroSS]

Pig benis said:

1) Reliability kept as it is
2) I want more height under the diffs
3) To be able to fit bigger tyres for more traction off road + big tyres look awesome


Vinny

Point 2 - The only non-hugely-expensive way to get more height under the diffs is to increase the diameter of the wheel/tyre combination. This in turn would alter your final drive ratios so you would need to alter your diff ratios as well. Take a look at a Unimog for the hugely expensive way of doing it

Raising the suspension by a 2" lift kit will also increase the distance from the centre diff to the front and rear diffs (pythagorus). The end of the prop shaft has less interface area with the diff so can cause problems. Thus the addition of the 15mm spacer will rectify this.

By 'bigger' do you mean in width? Say 255 instead of 205 or whatever is fitted? If so, how far you can go depends on wheel arch limitations, whether you buy new wheels etc. If in diameter, please look at the first section of my answer.

[NickColl89]

I'm guessing that a 205/85/16 tyre wont work on a completely standard discovery 1 then? what would be the best tyre size for mud terrains on a standard discovery using the standard wheels?

[Hainey]

NickColl89 said:

I'm guessing that a 205/85/16 tyre wont work on a completely standard discovery 1 then? what would be the best tyre size for mud terrains on a standard discovery using the standard wheels?

It did on mine. I put the tyres on before the lift as I wanted to trial it and see how far I could take it into the muddy bumpy wilds on stock suspension. The answer was bloody far indeed.

Hope that helps.

[NickColl89]

Hainey said:

It did on mine. I put the tyres on before the lift as I wanted to trial it and see how far I could take it into the muddy bumpy wilds on stock suspension. The answer was bloody far indeed.

Hope that helps.

Helps massively thanks.

[300bhp/ton]

Pig benis said:

Hello people

One of my cars is a Land Rover Discovery 300tdi (manual). I use it for green laning, occasional trips over to Salisbury Plane and for going camping with. I've become attached to this car now, and regulary choose to drive it over my other car.

I've had this old girl for almost a year and the suspension is looking a bit saggy. I have been on the LR forums and there seems to be so much conflicting information about what suspension kit to go for. Here is what I am after -

1) Reliability kept as it is
2) I want more height under the diffs
3) To be able to fit bigger tyres for more traction off road + big tyres look awesome


Now I don't want to go crazy, a 2" lift would suit me, but what kits do you guys recommend? I have read about some kits will decrease axle articulation, which is not what I want to do. I also want to keep the reliability of this truck and have heard some lifts will damage the propshaft.

Cheers all
Vinny

First off I'll refer you to this link.

https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/lifting-a-d...

It applies as much for a D1 as it does for a D2.


IMO - If it's for off roading, then I'd chop the arches and fit bigger tyres that way. Stock suspension is pretty good for all round ability. If I was going to go for more flex (not needed on any green lane tbh), I do something far more extreme and better than a 2" lift.

[Clivey]

A suspension lift will move the bodywork further away from the terrain and improve approach, breakover and departure angles, meaning less chance of damage. It'll also allow you to fit those larger tyres, although depending on the size, you may still need to cut the wheelarches and/or fit wider flares.

That's what I'm doing with my Disco 2. - I've got most of the suspension fitted (currently waiting on caster corrected radius arms) and am also swapping the standard 18" alloys for a set of 16" wheels that'll allow a higher tyre profile.





The last picture shows the air suspension in "off road" height. I went for ARB shocks and springs and am glad I did. - Both the off and on-road drive have improved!