What have you done with your Series 3?

[Neil Bymouth]

I checked the mountings of the heater motor housing and checked the voltage on my 18 year old slave battery. 12..58 volts.
No driving just yet as I had a cataract replacement 30th last month. Anyway there's too much salt and too many idiots on the road.

[Neil Bymouth]

80 amp WOSP alternator now fitted

[o4dn]

Today, I retrimmed the dash top... A pig of a job!

But I was very pleasantly surprised, the top dash panel has no corrosion!

Anyways, job done, it's back in place now...
I did my best, but It's not perfect... But I'll make do!

[Neil Bymouth]

Is yous the early pre November 1975 dadh top or the later one? I managed to buy an NOS pre November dashboard top.from Blanchard's. The later ones are unobtainium. I plan to fit the new one sometime and get the old one retrimmed locally. How fiddly is it to remove and replace the top?

[o4dn]

Mine was built in early '78, so I would assume it's of the later type.

Removing the dash top is actually quite easy, putting it back not so much! The screws on top are fiddly to put back in place because of the windscreen, and the demisters are a pain to put back in place!

Don't forget the two screws underneath the dash, above the vent levers...

[Neil Bymouth]

The early ones like mine have 4 screws under the dash. I bought a very short stubby screwdriver from Screwfix making access to the screws by the windscreen much easier. The earlier tops have bigger demister vents so hopefully it'll be easy to access the inner fixings. I've been putting it off gor ages but must knuckle down to it soon.
The pre November 75 dash has different demister vents but I never use the demister setting as I had heated windscreens fitted when the bulkhead was replaced in 2020. Well worth it..

[o4dn]

[...]
I've been putting it off gor ages but must knuckle down to it soon.
[...]

Hehe, I've been putting it off for almost two years!

Eventually, it took me less than a day of work to remove the dash top, retrim it and put in back in place... Go for it!

[Neil Bymouth]

Then I could all being.g well, swap them over in a morning even though it's a Land Rover. I'll wait for drier weather and a day of nothing to do.

[o4dn]

As I had some marine grade vinyl left from the dashboard, I decided to give a try at doing my own poor man's door cards...

My S3 being a base model, it has bare doors inside:

Bare door

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So I made my own door cards, reusing the leftover of vinyl I had, and some 3 mm MDF that I purchased from my local B&Q store:

My own door card

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And used some strong double sided adhesive tape to hold it into place:

Left door with door card in place

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Very pleased with the result, not only it looks quite nice IMHO, but the doors now makes a different sound when closing!

[Neil Bymouth]

Good idea and a neat job. I've got Defender doors on my Series 3 so door cards already there.