I am back (unexpectedly)!

A customer brought this Range Rover Sport to me after buying it bling and having never driven it!

Front strut had burst and it needed a new O2 Sensor as far as I was aware when it was due to be delivered, I spotted a few issues and before I went ahead and fitted the parts, after telling the customer that it really isn't worth putting anymore money into and I would sell it on as it is, he insisted that I fit the parts, so carried out the repairs, then a day later he asked me to go over it and then do a video call with what I found, and the list of problems although not massive, and not all solvable by me made him decide not to go any further with it.

The list included:

Plugged on the join of a tyre wall! (Passed the MOT apparently like it).
Oil leak from the front of the engine that was so bad, the engine was getting through oil almost as fast as it was going in.
Sidesteps rotted and falling off, inner sills rusting and almost through.
Air tank heavily corroded on a seam.
Air pump knackered.
Other 3 tyres heavily perished.
Corrosion on the rear chassis.
Rear crash bar rotted through in places.
Battery drain.
Water ingress somewhere.
Headlight leveller showing as faulty.
ACE system pipe leaking.

And with over 200k Miles on it. I will be honest, as a full fat and D4 owner, I was not a fan of the sport, especially after the last one I had a few years ago.

The owner was going to just scrap it and pay me what was owed from that, and being a sucker for cars and feeling bad that he was going to be doubly out of pocket, came up with a deal that worked better for him than me, as he has been a customer for over a decade.

I told him I will be restoring it myself and using it.

So, to date...

I have sorted the oil leak, and have now got the wheel nuts so I can fit standard sport wheels on.
If this wasn't the HST or a petrol supercharged, I don't think I would have fallen in love, but after a quick drive, I fell in love.

I am going to update the rear lights as well and remove the illegal front window tints.

After doing some extensive work, getting the worst of it done, I have now got this on the road as one of my daily drivers. I am genuinely surprised at how much I have fallen in love with this. It is very thirsty, but that might just be me getting used to it.

First strange problem was after putting standard E10 petrol in, the car felt like it had lost quite a few ponies under the bonnet, and it was misfiring! Ran diagnostics, nothing obvious, so after I got it very low on the E10 fuel, I put premium E5 in, Misfire now gone, power is back, and the car is much happier.

I think the battery is dying as well, so going to rob the brand new one I put in my TDV8 for now, and see if that solves sluggish starting.

So far though, I have done just under 1000 miles in it, and apart from getting used to having a vehicle that drinks fuel like it is going out of fashion again, I absolutely love it.

I need to get it back on the ramps in my workshop though to carry out some more minor work, but at the moment, a Freelander is hogging the ramps.

First real issue, this beast decided to throw a hissy fit on a fast road without any warning lights coming up, it acted like someone had hit the brakes hard, then had almost no acceleration, I managed to limp it to a safe stopping point, where I restarted the engine and full power again for about a mile, then it happened again, this was all after a successful 350 mile journey, left it overnight, drove it to the workshop without any problems this morning. Ran diagnostics, and it came up with Clutch Actuator Stuck error. For now I just cleared the fault code, but I have not come across this before, so got to investigate what it actually means further. I fitted external wind deflectors so parked it up and left it at the workshop and have hopped back in my truck, which is feeling strange not having to stop at the petrol station nearly daily Also found a genuine HST grill that someone had painted how I wanted to paint mine, so bought it so I could put the factory spec one safely in my storage in case I want to put it totally back to factory spec.