Hi from South Devon - Just got a Fronty, any mod ideas?!

[DudleJam]

Hey I'm James.

I've just bought a battered old '95 2.3 Fronty for not a lot of money off eBay. I live inside the Dartmoor National Park boundary so I've got plenty of places to take it out and pretty near the coast so it's cool to have something big enough to strap the boards and kayak to and still have space inside the car for the kids and dogs.

I've got a couple of questions, as I'm sure you'll guess from the following, my technical knowledge is severely limited (put a broken guitar in front of me and I'm fine, but I haven't messed around with that many vehicles.)

I paid £550 for the car which is less than I was planning on spending on a new car, so I've got a bit of money to spend on it. There are some advisories on the MOT (one of which is light corrosion so I'm expecting I'll have to have to pay out a bit for welding) which I want to get sorted. One was tyres - according to the tyres I've got 255/75R15's on the front and 255/70R15's on the back - is that normal or should they be the same?! And where can I get a tyres this size for a not much money?

Like I said I want to take the thing to the coast and on the moor, so I was thinking about getting some pretty heavy duty bars for the roof (for the surfboards kayak etc) and maybe some extra lighting on a leisure battery for lighting up camping spots. So if I were to have say, £300 left after I've sorted out the welding and tyres, what would be peoples suggestions for these?

And beyond that what else would people suggest I do to The Beast?! (If I've gotta stretch the budget a bit I probably could) I've gotta keep it practical and family friendly but I'd like it to function well and look awesome too if I can.

Sorry to bombard you all with silly questions and a huge essay. Hope you're all well.

James

[stretch]

Welcome to fog James. Tyes wise does it have road or all terrains on it at the moment? if your planning on off roading a set of at/s would start you off, also a mild suspension lift ie 2" would be good as well. My lwb b series just has at/s and a 2" lift and i've been able to do lanes and also wales lanes as well. I've never owned a 2.3 so can't comment on what parts you'd specifically need to lift it but i'm sure someone will be able to advise.

[snapper]

Hi there James

The moors eh, some folks have all the luck! I come from Paignton, lived there for just over 20 years before the job took me away from Devon and am now kicking my heels in the Brize Norton area. Still manage to get home every few weeks though.

As for the truck, if it was me I would (in order) do the following...

1. Good service, changing all fluids, filters etc and do the brakes.
2. Deal with the rust and get some treatment on the chassis rails & cross-members.
3. Tyres, all the same size please. For what it's worth I run both of mine on Kumho Road Venture MT KL71 31/10.5R15 tyres which are a road friendly Mud Tyre, they are pretty quiet and apart from one Glass trip when I bottomed the truck between the ruts I havent got stuck yet with them on (to be fair, I didnt have the manual hubs locked at the time and the front of the truck was 'nose down' a bit so I was sort of ploughing with it). At the end of the day it's really down to the user as to what tyre to fit vs what the trucks going to be used for. A good ATR (All Terrain Tyre) would be quite happy in Devon for most of the year but you may want to review that for the moors between say Oct thru March/April or like taking it on the beach. I have no hesitation in taking mine anywhere (legal) in Devon.
4. Bullbar, you don't mention if it has one fitted (Most likely did have when new) if it hasent then get a OEM one and fit it, good for dealing with the wandering rocks (dartmoor sheep), dartmoor (killer) ponies, hairy cattle and the wild grockles that you find all over the place in the summer.
5. Extra lights, Oh yes... on the roof, fit some LED ones, min number four and make sure the outer lamp on each side is a work lamp (60 degree beam) rather than a spot (30 degree beam) the outer two lamps will light up the hedgerow really well when bombing down the narrow lanes while the spots give you distance. Mine has 2 x 27w work lights and 2 x 48w spots and makes a good job of lighting up Haytor and scaring the sheep! Don't forget that the LED ones draw less current than the old stylee spots too.
6. Fit a decent battery, forget what VX say in respect to Amp Hour, get the biggest thing you fit in the tray in both capacity and crank power. Halfords do good deals on batteries with a trade card and I believe that you run a small one man mobile mechanic biz in Princetown???? right....
7. Roof Rack, a couple of Thule (or Halfords) bars with the right clamps to grip the roof rails and the loads to go on them should do you in that respect. Noting that the OEM give the following max load reccomendations SWB = 60kg (normal roads) 30kg (off road) and LWB 100kg (normal roads) and 50kg (off road) this includes the weight of the bars. Can this be exceeded? I would think quite a few on here have, I have in the past but it's not reccomended and would I'm sure invalidate the insurance in the event of an accident, as always up to the driver.
8. Fit a Snorkel, not a real must, must do unless you intend wading the truck but it can be a confidence builder when it rains and the real puddles start forming (IIRC, it has a tendency to rain a bit on the moors sometimes and can get a bit interesting in places).
9. Winch on the front, recovery eyes on front and rear, and a selection of decent strops in the boot. Winch is good for self rescue (with training) and the rest can be used to either be rescued out of the mud or to rescue the unfortunate grockles out the mud/snow for a small consideration in the way of a thankyou.
10. Lift, is it needed? depends on what your wanting the truck to do and where. If your intending on raising ground clearence then you need to factor in bigger tyres otherwise you will not raise the rear diff (the lowest point on the car) the 31" tyres fit a standard truck (well they do my 2. any bigger then I believe a 2" lift would be in order. Easy to do and there's plenty on here who have done it. Don't forget the roof rack though, if your going to be putting loads up there then the higher you lift the vehicle the greater influence a load on the roof is going to have when cornering.

You got yourself a pretty capable vehicle there James for not a lot of money. It's not the fastest thing on the road but it will get there eventually. Oh and welcome to the site.

[westo123]

Fantastic and comprehensive reply!

[RatCav]

Hi buddy. I have had 2 off 2.3TD's now. Old work horses that just plod along doing their thing with little or no fuss. Love them.

Firstly the tyres do need to be the same size or you might wind the transmission up when in 4wd. 2wd you will be fine so long as they are the same size across the axle. To lift it all you need to do is read this thread and the link at the bottom of it:

viewtopic.php?f=41&t=44590

[DudleJam]

Thanks for all your help! Some great help and some nods in the right direction. I'll start pricing things up....

(I might have to start keeping a BBQ in the boot incase I hit any of those 'wandering rocks'...)

[snapper]

Ahh, yes. The 'wandering rocks' ....

Spent many a happy moment trugging across the Moors, both in me youth, while working for the Queen and more recently. I learnt the hard way NOT to throw a quick bearing out and select a 'rock' in the distance and on 'bearing' to then head towards... Spent a good few hours chasing the bl***y rock as it wandered over the hills! Oddly enough the dartmoor wooly rocks are pretty much the same colour as a lump of granite when viewed from a distance especially in poor light, sadly they do not stay put like the granite!