I bought this little beauty back in the fall of 2019. She's come a long way since the day I bought it. Not really body/interior wise, but mechanically. The ad on CL made sure to mention "AS IS" and "I don't recommend it as a daily driver". It was listed for $2950.00 and I had honestly seen it for sale earlier in the year, but the ad vanished rather quickly. I attempted to contact the seller, and I was ready to call it a fake CL ad. I sent em a picture of my 97 XD to let the seller know I was not a virtual tire kicker, and I got an instant reply. He said he was going to ignore my text as I was from out of town, but when he saw my XD he changed his mind. After that communication with the seller was excellent. We talked over the phone and he only had the 95 D1 because it was part of a package deal. An older man from the San Antonio area had 2 LR's for sale, a 95 RRC SWB, and the 95 D1 (both were gold). The older man would not sell them separately. The guy I purchased it from was a RRC guy so he bought em for the RRC. The D1 sat in his shop/garage and was rarely driven (explains why it was in such great shape). He wanted to clear up room in his shop for an FJ60 Project. When I mentioned I thought I'd seen it for sale earlier in the year he said yep that was him, but he was swamped with online tire kickers so he took the ad down. I told him when I was free to come up and look at it, and the following weekend I drove up to Austin. The owner never clearly gave me his address and I was told to call/text him when I was at a certain intersection near Lakeway, TX. I was then told to enter a private gated community and I had to show my ID and then give his house number or I would not be allowed in. It ended up being a very $$$$$$$$ neighborhood with it's own private golf course. I pulled up to his house and the 95 D1 was sitting there under a large oak tree looking absolutely beautiful. It was indeed 100% rust free and it never left the TX hill country. It fired right up and I handed the man his $$$$. I arranged to leave my vehicle I drove up at the Country Club, and I was going to drive the D1 up to my friends at Austin Roverworks. I left, stopped at a gas station to fill it up, and of coarse gas poured out of the vent line above the tank (very common). I drove up to Austin Roverworks with no issues, but when I exited I-35 I heard a knock. I pulled over into a parking lot and sure enough the engine had a pretty nasty knock to it. Oil was good, and no idiot lights, or oil light. I dropped it off, and I got a ride back to pickup my vehicle. I left the D1 up at Austin Roverworks, and planned on returning when I took some vacation time.




It's parking spot at Austin Roverworks




Tearing it down



Down to the block



Problem presented itself!



Some LR shop somewhere messed up big time back in 2007 lol



Well fast forward to my vacation time, and I headed up to Austin Roverworks to see my best friends, hangout, and to inspect the 95 D1 engine. We all agreed I should just tear it down and work my way down until we find something. So I set upon tearing it down. We all noticed the drivers side head had been replaced as the head bolts were marked, and the passenger side was un-touched. Well once I got it down far enough the problem presented itself on cylinder #5. From the service records I had (went pretty far back at least 14 years). It appeared in 07 it was taken in for new valve cover gaskets, and an valley gasket. Then the next service ticket for an oil change mentions engine is ticking, then after that it listed engine knocks badly at idle. Well the cylinder #5 piston had bolt marks all over it, a crack down the middle of the piston itself (once the carbon was removed it was very clear to see), and all the rings were broken in at least 2 places. We ordered a new Piston from Atlantic British (complete with rings), and had it shipped overnight. It arrived the next day, and when we opened the box our hearts sank. The piston was a complete rust bucket including the rings. Apparently the box got exposed to moisture and then just sat on a shelf and it rusted inside the plastic bag inside the box. We quickly called Atlantic British, and got a refund, but they didn't have anymore 3.9L pistons. We decided to try letting it soak overnight in some solvent they had and we'd see what it looked like the following day. In the meantime I removed the passenger side head and got it down to the block. The next day we inspected the piston and it looked brand new! It didn't have any pitting on it, and we slapped on some new rings. We got it installed, and sadly I ran out of time to put it all back together. My good friends Billy, Ken, Chris, and Luis put it back together for me. I got a video of it running, and then I got a text that it refused to idle lol. Well I was able to drive up the following weekend, and the issue was a large vacuum leak from the TBH I removed from the intake. They didn't see it missing so when they slapped it on it was sucking air from 2 of the 4 TBH bolt holes. We installed 4 nice bolts, and it idled perfectly. I replaced the fan clutch, and the belt tensioner pulley, and took it for it's maiden voyage. Besides a kick down cable being out of adjustment she was good to go! No more knocking, and the little 3.9L was a happy camper. I once again had to leave it up there because I couldn't drive it back.





Several weeks passed and it was killing me that it wasn't in my driveway. Then everyone was reporting a massive storm was going to pass thru TX and it would cause twisters, and large hail. Well on a Friday afternoon I decided to haul butt up there and grab my baby. I was in such a hurry I didn't call my friends at Austin Roverworks. I arrived at the shop around 4PM to find nearly 15 LR's crammed into their shop with my D1 being one of them!! It just made me SO happy to see what true friends I am blessed with. They were shocked to see me, and when I told em I heard about the storm and hauled butt they were like oh man we gotcha! I chilled out until they closed and we got the 95 D1 out and replaced it with another customers $$$$$ LR. Then I left my work vehicle out on the lot. I had dinner with my friends, and then I was excited to be driving my 95 D1 on it's first 5hr test drive.

The drive went flawless. I was cruising at 70-80MPH in a 25 year old LR and enjoying every second of it!! I made it home, and then on Sunday a friend picked me up and we went up and grabbed my work vehicle. The storm btw did nothing lol...

The next weekend I wanted to work on goldie some. I grabbed a perfectly good set of OME 2inch coil springs they had sitting out back. The OEM coils on goldie were awful. The ride home reminded me of a 70's caddy, it was comfy, but it just floated down the road lol. I got up early and had the lift installed in about an hour by myself. She looked like a LR again vs a car (sat like 1.5 lower than stock due to the worn out coils). I replaced a few light bulbs, and set on cleaning up a few things under the hood. The main thing that was driving me nuts was the fan shroud was sitting like 2mm above the fan belt/alternator pulley. 94-95 have about a 10 wider diameter pulley and you could see where it was rubbing into the upper shroud (so much it busted the clip on that side completely off). I did some research and the 96-99 GEMS alternator would bolt directly in, but the Tach would not be accurate unless I swapped the pulley. Well I decided to take that a step further. I did more research and found out if I simply swapped out the alternator (I used a 120AMP model from a GEMS P38) and I swapped out the Tach with a 96-99 D1 my RPM's would be normal. That was a win/win in my book as I'd gain more clearance at the fan shroud (had a good non broken replacement to install) the RPM's would be correct, and I'd have 20 more AMP's. Slapped it all in and everything works perfectly. I then fixed a few hose connections, and re-routed a few lines.

She sat like that for a month or two as there was nothing to do to it really. Then a friend snagged me a TJM front bumper off of an 04 D2. I yanked off my OEM front bumper, ordered some new rear bumper lights, and then went by my friends in Houston to pickup the TJM front bumper. At the same time I ordered some new 245/75R16 Thunderer MT's (which are actually not bad tires for the $$$). After that I got the TJM installed (wired in the orange parking lights on the bumper), and the tires mounted. The tire shop could not for the life of them get the tires to break off the bead on 2 of the old tires. They eventually got them off, but they did scratch up my wheels pretty good in the process which kinda sucked as the finish on them was flawless, but it is what it is. After that I recently installed some Type 74 LED's in the upper gauge cluster illumination spots, the HVAC control head, and I installed a pair of Auxbeam Eagle Series LED bulbs (fan mounts inside the headlight housing vs most where it's outside).







That's all I've done up to now with it, and I don't plan on modifying it any further. I might add a set of classic looking Hella's to the TJM, but that's about it. I want this 95 D1 to look like a classic LR.

 

Parts List so far:

HG Kit
Lifters
Fan Clutch
Belt Tensioner Pulley
120AMP GEMS alternator
96-99 D1 Tach
99-02 D2 Headlight Assemblies
Barely used OME 2inch Lift Coil Springs
Used Upper fan shroud
TJM Front Bumper
4 Thunderer 245/75R16 MT's
Vacuum Advance
20 Used RRC Solid Lug Nuts
9003 AuxBeam Eagle LED Headlight Bulbs
3 Type 74 4K LED Bulbs
3 6418 LED Bulbs for the interior (dome & glove box)
Rear Bumper Lights
Sylvania Zevo LED Reverse Bulbs
3ft Gates 3/4 Fuel Line (to fix tank vent line)
K&N Fuel Filter

I also have a brand new set of Britpart 40MM Extended SS brake lines I'll eventually install.

Only issues it has right now is with the ABS. It now has a fault and I'm 99% sure it's due to the RF Swivel Ball preload or wheel bearings. It has a little play in it I need to fix. When I had the engine torn down we were all shocked how clean it was inside. The TC, and diff's also have perfectly clean fluid in them.

I did forget to mention that I did have a funny issue with the transmission dipstick constantly popping out once the engine was running. Eventually tracked it down to a P38 dipstick being installed vs a RRC/D1/D90 4Spd Auto dipstick. I performed a drain/fill on the transmission, and that is good to go for now.

 

Gauge Cluster with just the top two illumination bulbs swapped over to 4K LED bulbs. The needles and gauge faces are much brighter vs before. My camera phone did a poor job of catching it, but it illuminates evenly.

 

Clean looking Dl.

Many, many, many moons ago, was rebuilding a 366 chevy big block in a stake truck. Didn't notice it when it happen, but while l was pulling intake, 1/4 of a broken lock washer from an intake bolt fell into intake port of head. This was a in frame rebuild, for a bad piston (hole in center). So, pull the head, pan, piston and reassemble. Start it up and sounded great for about two seconds, until that tinny piece of lock washer worked its way past the valve. Then...it didn't sound so good...lol. Luckily, it was embedded in the center of the piston, and didn't damage the rings. Yeah, it took me a bit to figure out where this tinny bit of steel came from, but after inspecting the intake bolts...came across one with 3/4 of its lock washer still in place. So, that little mistake/overlook on my part when l was eighteen...and long before tilt hoods...so, after another few hours being bent over that fender and lifting that stinking head out/in again...it caused me to be a little bit more **** about inspecting things in the future.

As soon as l looked at the first picture of your piston, you could tell the rings were broke...by the position of the piston in the bore.

Sounds like you got a pretty good set of friends down there. That shop looks familiar, see it on facebook often...l believe...can't remember the owners name right off. Anyhow, nice build.

Brian.

 

Beautiful truck, looks good with those wheels. Picture of the piston looks like an indention of a 12 point bolt, possible valve cover?? Whaddayathink?

 

Yeah once we got a peek inside that engine we talked about cylinder #5's poor health due to a little mistake that turned HUGE. One friend noticed how it was sitting before he noticed the bolt marks, I noticed the bolt marks, and went straight into inspecting the liner, while my other buddy was like yep those rings are toast lol. We all agreed the bolt looked identical to a short valve cover bolt. We also found 3 of the little metal rings front the valve cover inside the engine. 2 were in the pan, and one was in the drivers side head sitting quietly in the corner and it never bounced around inside and made contact with anything.

D1 wise I am seriously happy. I didn't realize how good of a D1 my 98 LSE 50th Anniversary Edition was until I sold it (which sold in 2 days on CL for 5500.00 no questions asked). I've kept in contact with the buyer and the 98 is doing fantastic. Only issue they've had was with a brake line. After that I vowed to myself I would never sell another clean/original/rust free TX truck if I ever could get my hands on one again! The 97 XD I knew immediately was a rust bucket, but it's an XD and I just had to have it regardless. Then my 95 popped up on CL and quickly vanished. When it popped up again everyone local to me was like oh it's just an online scam, dude never returns any emails/text/calls. Good luck with that. Well I took a chance, and thank goodness it turned out not to be a scam!

At first I was truly not a fan of the gold color. In it's saggy stock form it just looked extremely outdated. I also did NOT like those castor rims when I got it. The XD has the same wheel but being black they look totally different. I was going to install some RRC GDE 5 spoke wheels vs the original castor wheels, but then I saw a pic of the stock wheel with bigger aggressive tires and I liked the original yet more modern look so I stuck with them. I wanted to update it's appearance so the free 2inch MD OME lift certainly helped to fix that. It was already riding on a set of brand new TF shocks, and steering stabilizer, but the original coils were sagging really really bad. Then someone had replaced the grill because the original busted and they didn't paint the bottom gold and it kinda looked odd up close, so I started looking for an ARB or similar replacement. My good friend in Houston had a D2 TJM on his D1 and I really liked the look of it. Finding one of those for sale is pretty much like a needle in a haystack vs say an ARB. 2-3 months later my friend sent me a pic of a TJM on an 04 at a LR shop up the street from him. He grabbed it for me & I slapped it onto the 95. Now the all black grill doesn't stand out. I've updated stuff like the reverse lights, headlights, and a few other things to make it more modern. The original sunvisors which were more like older RRC's were deformed and sagging badly so I had a spare set of D2 units that I bolted right in. I haven't wired up the courtesy lights on them, but they have a mirror in each like the originals so that's fine. The manual rearview mirror fell off the windshield when I bought it, and I had no idea the manual mirrors were apparently so sought after which I found funny (apparently only a 94-95 D1 thing).

My friends LR Shop used to be near Cedar Hills, TX between Bastrop, TX and Austin, but they moved a little over a year ago to a larger shop with a lot more storage space around it near Pflugerville, TX. The main upgrade was the entire shop has HVAC!!!!!!! They even scored one of the original LR Austin Lifts which we all find pretty cool. I've known one of them since I was 15, and when I moved to Austin I met the rest of em when I was in my early 20's. We've been best of friends ever since and I normally take a week of vacation a year to just go up there, hang out, work on LR's, and enjoy life. We all have a passion for LR's and if I could I would drop what I was doing and go into business with them no doubt. When I first moved to Austin and hanging out with my LR Buddies the super nice Service Manager saw how much I loved LR's and offered me a job as an entry level tech. The pay was awful, but he said in a few years it would really pay off. I always wonder where I'd be had I gone that route.

I did get the honor of upgrading all of Land Rover Austin's T4 diagnostic units (5 of them) to the latest upgrade they ever got before the T4 was replaced. None of the local IT/PC shops would touch it. So the LR Service Manager asked me if I'd be interested since I was computer savvy and I was honored to do it. Took me 5 days to do it (a unit a day basically) so I just had one T4 down at a time. I installed the red box VCM, more ram, netgear mini hub, and the software. Then we'd test it out on every single model LR. Once it worked I'd move onto the next one. The only complaint anyone ever had with the upgrades = they ran slower. That was mainly due to the older Dell/Panasonic Laptops which the units had at the time.

 

That D1 is a clean gem.

 

Yes it is and thank ya for the compliment

 

Well on Friday I decided to drive the old gal to drop off a gaming PC to a friend. It drove fantastic on the way there, but on the way back it did that weird thing it's only done once which was it wouldn't rev past 3K. It felt like it was bogging down or had a rag in the intake. I limped it home still at normal speeds (just no pep in her step). Got home and discovered an aftermarket ignition amplifier with silicone on the back of it vs thermal paste. I installed an OEM Lucas ignition amplifier, and added a small amount of thermal paste to the back of it (LR recommended using that to help em dissipate some heat). Then I also slapped in a brand new LUCAS coil I had. Then it wouldn't fire up at all lol. I rechecked my wires and found the plug for the lead to the dizzy was not fully seated (actually didn't mess with that one at all originally). She fired up, and it still wouldn't rev past 3K without just bogging and stuttering. I then heard something hit the ground behind the D1. I walked back to find some kind of fiber mat, and silver flakes coming out of the exhaust! Checked the muffler and it was fine. Then I banged on the passenger side cat and BINGO. It was totally loose inside the metal housing. Apparently it would occasionally block the exhaust gases and cause the 3.9L to just stop revving up. I tapped on it and yep a small piece of the core fell out the tailpipe. When I bought the D1 someone had recently installed within the past year the entire Y pipe with an aftermarket unit which I never liked due to the poor flow and smaller tubing vs the OEM setup.

Some of the larger internal pieces I got out had melted and completely sealed off. So I can only imagine what it would do if it sat in there sideways. Glad I caught it early! I also had a blown out Y pipe upper gasket so at least some of that excess pressure could leak out of that.

Today after all the Mothers Day stuff, I was able to loosen the 3 exhaust studs/bolts from the Passenger side Y pipe. I then just cut it before the Y down below the TC, and disconnected the Oxygen Sensor. I removed the Oxygen Sensor, and tapped on it with a rubber hammer. However the best approach was dropping it into the grass as the guts broke into smaller pieces. I replaced the gasket at the top, replaced 2 studs with bolts and lock washers. It lined up perfectly so as a temporary fix I secured the two pieces of exhaust pipe with a hose clamp. Fired it up and besides the hollow sound of the cat she had revved up great. Took it for a 20 mile drive and it did fine. I'll go by my local muffler shop and see about having a new cat welded in or just go with the off road pipe install for now aka hollowed out cat for a while until I can replace the entire Y pipe with a better quality unit.

 

Well I guess both my D1's wanted to have brake issues within days of each other lol. My XD had a rusty rear brake line start leaking, and the 95 decided to start seeping pretty good from the F/R valve just below the MC. I ordered a replacement thru Lucky8's Ebay store and I am extremely pleased. It showed up 3 days sooner than expected so kudo's to Lucky8 on their super fast shipping and handling!

Today I got a little free time so I swapped out that F/R valve assembly very quickly (gotta love a TX zero rust truck!!!!!). While I had the system all torn apart I went ahead and installed the brand new braided & extended SS brake lines I've had for that D1 since just after I bought it (got a super deal on them new in the box for 35.00 for the entire set shipped). Once all the new lines were installed, I bleed it manually by myself the old fashioned way and she's all good to go!

Tomorrow I'm hoping to make 2 new rear brake hard lines for the 97 XD and get it back on the road as well.