www.Defender50th.co.uk

[Shooter]

Preview
Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 4:25 pm Post subject: Hi from new member GB108
I have owned it from 16 months old its 98 S like most of them,unlike most of them though its got a 570HSi engine fitted by Overfinch in 2001,They did the full conversion including re triming in charcoal leather with heated seats,electric windows, quick steering rack,sports exhaust,heated front screen,motolita steering wheel,sports suspension for fast road use,sumpshield,uprated discs,soundpoofing kit, push button starter,oil temp,clock and outside temp guage,built in speed camera jamer,handbrake moved to the passenger side, subwoofer pack under the centre consol,remote central locking useing the standard plip remote,uprated gearbox lock up spring and modify standard valve block,to give it higher gearing,(its still running the standard 4.0 litre gearbox),they did recomend i fitted a 4.6 RR gearbox but i said i would wait untill it goes wrong,i have a speed of 118 mph showing on the sat nav but by then then body work its rattling itself to bits,the doors are trying to release them selves from the seals, the rear sliding windows are ratling so much and i have draughts coming from places you wouldnt think possible, but i love it, it will smoke all 4 wheels from a standing start (its still got the original drive shafts to)and has surprissed many a sports car owner as the torque is immence, over 422ftlb (more than a 911 Turbo of the time) they told me! its in a low state of tune with 330BHP and has been a fantastic fun reliable car,the acceleration from 30-90 MPH is remarkable, unfortunatly the fuel consumption is not ,but as i only do around 2,000 miles a year im not bothered, its got two fuel tanks fitted,and i have managed to get £96 of regular petrol in to it which will give me a range of 250 miles on a run,its now on its 3rd battery 3rd speedometer,2nd coil pack, its still uses the GEM system,2nd air con compressor,new one peice rear door, four front windscreens,(stones)i have got it on smaller wheels with Avon "ranger" tyres on so it sits lower,and still have the original wheels and 1998 tyres which get fitted in the winter if i want to go off road,but to be fair its all over the place as its to hard to control the power i have had 4 rooster tails of mud about 15 feet high whilst giving it the berries on mudy field at a friends farm in Luton,Its been in EVO magazine issue 42, April 2002 and had a article written about it by Peter Tomalin,if anyone would like to see this article i am sure i can scan and e-mail it to you,its been on display at Goodwood festival of speed in 2002 as well,there is only one other 50th that i know of thats had some of this work done and it belongs to a very well known music manager of some major pop groups, The paintwork has now got blisters in all the usaul places,the sunroof has a occasional leak and a little water gets onto the drivers floor mat,the engine by the way actually weighs less than the one that came out of it, apart from the two Overfinch badges it looks like a standard 50th, when it starts though you can just tell its no regular V8 the induction/sucking noise is loud and on a light throtle the overrun sounds wonderfull as does the usual of belting it through the Hatfield tunell! Its no concours special it gets ussed for towing the odd clasic bike or car trailer,and has to go to Overfinch for its MOT as there is not a cat fitted,I can tell from this forum that you are all into your 50th,so i am i, as i have have owned nearly20 of them! i was buying them from central London owners who thought they were getting a cheap RR, HR Owen sold more than any other dealer and didnt want to buy them back as owners discovered the limitations of Defender ownership,it was no Rangie, this of corse was back in 1999-2002 when they actually dropped in price to around £8k, i paid for mine £10k when it had only done 12,000 miles.The profits i made just went back into the conversion work, the one i wish i had never sold, i think was number 303 it was one of only a hand full of V regs, i sold it to a farmer in Ireland he was doing a LPG conversion to it, i wish i had kept it as i had the registration number V8MUD to fit to it! The numbers incidently were not put on the cars as they were built,but when they left the factory, i dont know the story of the early single digit numbers,but my friend who worked at Broadfields LandRover in Cockfosters had been to visit the assembly line (joke) for them and said they got fitted randomly. I allso had a number of them with out the alli widow handles and gear knobs and i often rang LR uk and got them to send them to me, i did have quite a few spare sets in the end, the other parts that got changed was the ali chequring, the fist batch tarnished terribly and so if you compalined, your dealer would fit the later type, you can tell if yours has been changed as they were then screwed on not rivited but i expect you knew that anyway,i had about 6 or 7 sets replaced on various ones. Anyway i have just come across this forum so i hope you have found this interesting and not to rambling,if any owner wants a ride in mine,or wants pics etc i dont mind ,in the meantime for the record Overfinch/Evo gave it a 0-60 time of 6.3 seconds, that reminds me i need some more fuel!

[SIMON DURANT GB 067]

It sounds like a real beast .
I would like to see some photos and some of this awesome engine too .
_________________
Old owner of restored GB 063 .
Old owner of restored GB 067 .
Old owner of GB201 .

[Simon Whitaker]

wow .. it sounds quite a beast. It's not the silver/grey one that Overfinch did ? Maybe next year you'll bring it along to one of the club meets - I fir one would like to see it.
_________________
Cheers

Simon

50th #149 - G8 MUD
Series 1 rag top - 1958
Rebel Replica Series 1
Discovery Sport HSE
Freelander Mk1 3 door

[defender50th]

Hi, welcome to the forum

Sound a really fun vehicle, would love to see some pics.

I know of at least 2 other 570 overfinch 50th, but both have had colour changes! :
This one recently sold at Bramley:
http://www.bramleyweb.co.uk/carsales/details/Land%20Rover/Defender%2050th%20Anniversary%20Overfinch%20570%20HSi/901.htm

And 332 is a silver one:

[img]http://defender50th.co.uk/images2/GB%20332.bmp[/img]

GB 303 i dont think is a S reg but is in ireland, but probally one that went through your hands as its a Broadfields vehicle, is in the for sale section now.

Thanks for a great post all about your vehicle, its great when new people tern up with fab 50th's
_________________
James
Defender 50th GB 002

[PARBS]

Sounds brilliant......Would be good to see at one of the get togethers

Steve
_________________
PARBS
GB209 4.6 Supercharged / SOLD
Vogue 50 No62
1990 110 3.5 V8
Ex MEB 130 Quadtech

[Shooter]

Thanks for the kind coments! i am happy to e-mail someone pics of my car but as i cant grasp the uploading procedure on this forum.

Are there two 50ths in Aston Grey? I sold one to a buyer from Welwyn Garden City who had it converted by Overfinch but with the 4.6HSE engine, this car later got resprayed at a Aston specialist in Hemel Hempstead it cost £7k, i saw the bill, and the car on many occasions untill Overfinch sold it on his behalf around 3 years ago, that owner has had another 2 Defenders since then, one 50th which he had a TVR 500 engine fitted, a sliding webasto sunroof and the interior was done in a quilted leather like a Bently interior with a aluminium turned dash as well but was still Atlantis Blue when i last saw it.
He also had a LWB 4door in Epsom Green with a 4.6 HSE Overfinch engine conversion which i ended up owning and subsequently sold to a chap in surrey who wanted to sell it back to me a year or so later but for more than he paid for it! That ended up being advertised by him in autotrader and went within in few weeks.
A grey one or "the Grey one" is now doing the rounds in the "trade" at main LR dealers as it got mentioned to me a few weeks ago they were looking for bids in the £25-30K mark. I will call Overfinch next week and ask them if there are 2 grey cars, i doubt it so can only presume the one i new of had a 2nd conversion which would seem a bit extreem and expensive, i will keep you posted as soon as!
Overfinch dont offer the conversion any more as its not what they are about, which is a shame, nowadays its body kits, specialist interiors, 22inch Tiger wheels and other customising work with the main business selling body kits to China.They are now doing a Range Rover Holland and Holland limited to 150 cars @ £150k. I still have my car serviced by them and they do a great job the mechanic who built it has long since left but the workshop is run by a chap called Richard who did over see the bulding of mine all those years ago and he still gets a buzz once a year from road testing mine. I will try to look up the numbers of the cars i have sold especialy the late V reg one that went to Ireland, i bought that car in Wales of the LR dealer there it was the owners sons car and when it was delivered it arrived with out any side steps, they made out that it never came with any but in the end i got them as the son had removed them to go off road and didnt want them spoilt, i bet they are hard to get to-day.There is one more car that i see allmost daily parked at Stevenage train station car park.I will try to remember to stop and get its edition number,or maybe the owner is reading this! Go to go and burn some rubber!

[romanrob]

Jeez - nice history - how come it took you so long to find us?!
_________________
Rob

GB065 - since 2002
Currently on my 2nd 50th RR V8 GEMS
Nanocom unlocked for GEMS


Formerly a 50th RR, 200TDi CSW, and a SIII 2.25 Petrol

[SIMON DURANT GB 067]

[defender50th]

[Shooter]

Hi Romanrob, i just was not aware of the forum,is it advertised anywhere like in LRO?

By the way,in case you guys hadnt noticed there are three 50 ths for sale on e-bay at the moment,number 248, number 97 with LPG and ABS (err abs,i dont think so) and another where the seller hasnt listed the number,they all look nice enough.

[Shooter]

Hi James, you are correct, he bought that one off me, but first he had a 4.6 conversion done, the other one he owns has a TVR worked 4.6 engine in but i havnt seen it for nearly 2 years, i cant remember if i found him that one as well. He then purchased the green LWB as his wife didnt want the children in the side facing seats, i rang him the other week and tried to talk him into the grey one that bramley had previously sold but he wasnt even nibbling!

A few years ago i asked Overfinch to build me a 90 pickup with a 570 HSi conversion but they said it just wasnt there thing anymore, i bet if they were asked today by one of their premier footballer clients to do one they would but i should think including a new Defender there wouldnt be a lot of change from £70k! On a video on Autotrader last week was Cheyrl Cole taking delivery of a new 2010 model RR Overfinch in white,would make a great pair, a white defender pickup 570 as well for the Coles dont you think?

[shignett]

Folks,

I own Overfinch Defender 50th #332 (called Titan Silver, but its actually a grey metallic colour from Saab). It was a full Overfinch conversion from the time they offered the 50th conversion as a standard package. Talking with Richard Perryman, workshop manager he thought they did a number, possibly as many as a dozen perhaps, anyone know the total?
I saw some comments from other Overfinch 50th owners.
Can one of you tell me (and this is a serious question, mine finally split) the bottom rad hose on the vehicle, what does it come from originally. It is a standard 38mmm (ish) hose with a couple of 45 deg elbows. It hasa 2 Ts out to 16-19mm hoses, one to the heater, one to the expansion bottle.
I have trawled all the landrover hoses with no success. I own two other overfinches so I am used to playing "guess which hose we used here"
on the other vehicles. Has anyone else hit this problem.
I am fixing it at huge cost with a kit of silicone parts but its tight down there (so to speak).
Any help out there appreciated?
Good looking forum, should have signed up earlier.
Who is that in a blue 50th I keep seeing driving around in south Liverpool?

[Romadog2004]

Land rover part no. PCH116030 is the bottom hose for 50th

[shignett]

Thanks for that, yes I looked at that one in the catalogue and online but it appears, on paper at least, to be a single 38mm (ish) hose with a couple of bends but no T pieces off it. Is that the case? Does the "regular" 50th bottom hose have a couple of Ts coming off it?

The Overfinch hose is "similar" to the 300TDI hose, similar to the Japanese EFI defender hose (4.0 1996 on) but not actually the same as any of them from what I can work out.
I am currently making up a silicone kit jigsaw puzzle but its not ideal.
Should have bought a Ford Fiesta and kept things simple.

[BLUETHUNDER]

Are you running the Rover V8 or the Chevy 5.7 ??
_________________
Chrysler 300c Startech
Corvette C6 Z06
Corvette C6 Z51
Dodge Ram 1500 Laramie
Ferret Mk 2/3
1942 Ford Jeep

Former owner of the bastard 50th.(Always loved)