The Rover

#1
Okay, I'll join the club and post up the story of my truck. The first vehicle I drove to and from high school was a 1989 mazda MPV. I don't have any pictures of that exact car because digital cameras and film were expensive back then, but here is a pic I found of a similar car (same year and color) online.

The car handled like a boat, needed new shocks, but it was rear wheel drive and was a stick shift. It was fun to drive and I tried my hand in some drifting on the back roads of Florida in it--rather scary so I didn't do that much. I didn't want to explain to my parents how I rolled the van. Anyways, my folks and I started looking for another car for me as the mazda had over 280k miles and was going to need the driveshaft bearing replaced again. I had been looking at jeeps and xterras, but that was the first year or so for the xterras so they were really expensive and any wrangler I could afford (under 5k) was old as dirt, had 300k miles, or was in poor shape (this was back in 2003). I stumbled upon my truck on some used car website and just loved the body profile. The car fit my budget being 6k and was located in Orlando Fl, I was in Fort Myers, Fl so it was about 3-4 hours away. One weekend we drove up to take a look at it, everything looked good, we tried to haggle them down to 5k but they wouldn't have it so we settled on 6k. My parents fronted the cash but I have since paid them back with earnings from summer jobs throughout the rest of high school. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures on my computer of what it looked like right then, but here's a photo of the truck a couple days before putting on my ARB bumper. I was going to college in Boca Raton, Fl (straight across the state from Fort Myers, a little north of Ft Lauderdale) at Florida Atlantic University and had the bumper delivered to that side of the state. My roommate's truck's transmission just happened to go out that week and he needed the truck towed back to his parents house (also in Fort Myers) so we rented a Uhaul flat tow trailer and towed the truck across the state with my truck. We stuck the bumper in the back of his truck to take it across the state so I could install it that weekend. IMG_1234.jpg
I also had snagged a milemarker 9k hydro winch off of ebay for $500 previously so we installed it with the bumper. IMG_1239.jpg

And Here's the truck with the new bumper, still stock springs,shocks, and tires; the front is sagging from the added weight of the bumper and the winch
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Well, I got a set of OME springs to level the truck back out in preparation for the Florida Land Rover Club Fall Rally for 2007
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By the Florida Land Rover Club Spring Rally of 2008, I had found a Safety Devices roof rack (for a Disco SeriesII, didn't know that at the time I bought it, but it fit on my truck) for $450 or so out of Homestead, Fl
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By the fall of 2008, I had finally worn out the tires the truck and opted to upgrade the size to 235 85/r16 which are the tires I have on it now. I got a set of steel rims that they use for the spare tire on the door of the Disco I's. However, these rims were too flexible and would go in and out of balance on the highway so I eventually went back to the aluminum rims that were stock. I made it up to Tellico for the second time right before they closed it, but I don't have any pics from that trip. This pic is from a trip out to the local wheeling spot in JW Corbett WMA outside of West Palm Beach, Fl. They have since closed this spot to wheelers, claiming they destroy the environment more than the hunters that go cross country/offtrail in their buggys straight through palmetto bushes and then drop their beer cans along the way.

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Thats pretty much been it for the mods as I've been tight on money since adding the roof rack. I've gotten longer custom valved shocks (doetsch, highly recommend them. Call 'em up, tell them what you drive, where you drive, and how you drive, they'll valve it and ship it out. They are very reasonable too, my shocks are 2.2 monobody and they were around $160 a shock. the typical brands of shocks, aka monroe, rancho don't work well for Rovers as they are much heavier then other trucks.) and spring dislocation cones for the rear in the past couple years, but thats been it. The only other Mods for me will probably be Rock sliders and possibly a KAM diff lock that's cable actuated (if I can find one still) I like the way the truck is setup and it suits my driving style. The next step is to build an offroad/expedition teardrop trailer to take with me on adventures. Here's how she sits today, well last weekend when I finally got around to washing her.
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#3
yep, new window and windshield, you can see the 'scar' a little bit between the back door and the window. I haven't gotten a chance to buff that out yet. The marks are actually paint that was on the tree root from other trucks. I think there's red and black, maybe some blue, kinda funny. Now I have to start my sticker collection over again with the new window.
--Justin
 
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