SashaGrace wrote:

RRSTDV8 wrote:

Have you considered having the gearbox flushed? The standard drain and refill method doesn't get all of the old oil out. I'd be tempted to flush it and then change the sump and filter if you're going that route. Uses a bit more oil, of course, but then you'll have a full fill of new oil.

Yes I will flush it with how bad this is and then likely do the oil again in the near future as I’m sure it’s original 20 year old fluid. There are signs of love in this car, I think it was mechanically maintained up till about 2020 and when it went to Bristol it lost any trace of love!

Interesting! I’ll look into that, no decisions have been made yet.

Cleaned behind the rear bumper and scraped the paint from its last partial respray off the grommets, the disrespect those people showed to my Nugget Rover, forshame!!! 😳





More pre production evidence (this went back on the car



Then all buttoned up

Ahh the trials and tribulations of painting panels. The Sport came with a big dent in the driver front door, red paint bleeding through the green on the driver rear door and awful lacquer peel on the rear quarter. I got some replacement doors to make life easier but it turns out the donor doors have quite a bit more paint fade than the car did as can be seen by the darker front wing. I can work on that over time but I’m happy that my painting efforts have come up well on the quarter, will give the whole side a flat and polish in a few weeks when the car is prepped for the LRO Show. Come and see it on stand 47 with the CVC Register!

Pics when clean coming soon!

Nice job that I'm finding my feet again spraying my cars poor paint think the roof turned out OK though.

Roof looks good! I’m still a little bummed that the doors don’t match but at least it’s the doors and not my painting job that lets the side down. Some angles they are spot on and others not so much but they have been painted before so I’m thinking of getting another half litre of the same paint mixed up and blend them in when I do the other side next year. Bonnet is also faded but I kept the old one to make better if needed one day. Will do my best to get the paint up to standard next year. It’s hard to appreciate it properly yet as the car is shoved up next to the hedge on that side on the driveway but I’ll grab more pics of it in other places as I use it over the week before the show.

Yeah rattle can respray it turned out pk, keep up the good work !!

It’s only been 7 months but the RRS has finally reached the status of ‘a car’. This is the basic standard that cars need to hit for me. All the doors lock, the windows all work, it starts and moves both forward and backwards and thus it has achieved the bare minimum standard of a car. Never has the bare minimum looked so good though 😂

I need to fix the broken parking sensors and A/C to complete the next stage of getting every system working but I’ll take everything bar those working for now. Sensors is just a duff rear buzzer which may be fixed by next weekend.

It’s going to the LRO Show at Belvoir Castle on the 7th so if you are there please nip over to Stand 47 and say Hi 👋

It got a pre show clean so it’s ready for the day and looking as good as it ever has!

Hi ,
Thanks for your posts here. I have a RRS 2005 - nothing special - but mine. I have always been a tinkerer and often to save money but most often just to prove myself I can do stuff myself. So far I learned all about the suspension system and installed a new compressor. My paranoia at only having one key when I got the vehicle has recently seen me buy 2 new keys ( one from china one from Amazon),had keyblades cut from a picture by a guy advertising on Ebay (excellent work ), Put the newly cut blades into the fobs. I Programmed the key fobs to the car using a Launch Elite purchased for the purpose (£82) took 5 minutes ! ( despite the company telling me it could not be used for programming the key/fobs ???) Job done ! very pleased with myself !

 I am the darkness before the storm

Thanks! If you have a 2005 car chances are it’s a very early production car, VIN 505 is the first production car so check the last 5 digits of your VIN and you’ll know what number yours is. Very few early Sport’s are left. I also need a second key still, just haven’t gotten around to it yet!

Updates since the last post - not much. The car made it to the LRO show at Belvoir which was very muggy but a lot of fun.







I then managed to locate a pair of Range Rover floor mat badges as one of mine was in poor condition and my other was missing so I wasted no time fitting those.







Then the car enjoyed some subtle greenlaning near home.





I’ve also been plugging away sourcing early Sport literature and now have quite a collection going.

Click image to enlarge