Grady rode in the front seat (shhh don’t tell mom) to his soccer match.
Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.
Oil Pressure Switch (Post #472) 3/21/2014
I found a loose wire and was not sure where it went. It had an odd funnel shaped plastic bit attached. After a bit of looking I found the sensor it went to. It was the oil pressure switch.
I was not sure if oil would come out when I removed it. It didn’t. I wrenched off the old and put on the new. You can see the comparison in the picture below.
The switch is basically a membrane that flexes and makes contact. I have not had any lights since it was broken and I don’t expect anything to change with a new one installed.
With 205,000 miles on the Range Rover you don’t want to take any chances.
This job was a one on the Difficulty Scale. I chose NOT to have a 6 year old help even though my grand children were at the house. Wrench off the old wrench on the new. Plug in a wire. Easy peasy.
Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.
Guthrie and Beyond October 2013 (Post #406) 10/30/2013
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| I loved the lines. High on a hill east of Guthrie. |
Mrs. Okierover and I love a good road trip. So when our oldest daughter (Fireball) told us our oldest grandchild (Pistol, aka Tater) was cheering in Guthrie, Oklahoma, we had to go. Guthrie holds a special place in our family’s history. Fireball was proposed to in this city by our now son-in-law J-man.
From our home in Norman, Guthrie is a solid one hour drive on the interstate. The first grade football game began at 0830. This meant both Fireball and her brood would need to roll out of their racks around 0630 in order to be more or less on time for the game. It’s no small task to haul a 6, 4, and 9 month old anywhere let alone at 0630. I’ve done it, alone, with only 6$(US) in my pocket, so I know. (A story for another time.)
I am not fond of “rolling out” at 0730 on my only “sleep in” day of the week. Add driving an hour on the interstate on a OU home football game weekend. Not fun. So I ponied up the money for us to stay in Guthrie over night. The grand kids had never stayed in a hotel so we knew they would have fun. Continue reading “Guthrie and Beyond October 2013 (Post #406) 10/30/2013”
My New Rover Buddy (Post #375) 8/9/2013
I was privileged enough to take my grand daughter, we’ll call her Pistol, to her first cheerleading camp in Newcastle. The lack of an air bag in the 1993 Range Rover affords her the ability to ride in the front seat. She cheekily borrowed a pair of sunglasses to complete her look.
Her mom, Fireball, was none to pleased about her riding position when I posted this picture to Facebook. +Mrs. Okierover had to point out that it was safer than when Fireball was riding on the armrest in her grandpa’s 1984 Ford LTD. The only thing holding her from going through the windshield in the LTD was grandma and grandpa’s arms as they instinctively went up when they had to brake hard.
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| Looks safe to me, wink, wink |
Pistol was perched on her booster seat in the Big White Bus and belted in. I remember the days before I was married to Mrs. Okierover and little Fireball was learning about safety in school and we had to all start wearing our “belt seats”. So we made a game of it to see who could get their “belt seat” on first. Before this I NEVER wore my seat belt. The legislature eventually would get around to passing a law requiring seat belts. Our youngest two children do not remember a time before mandatory seat belt wearing.
I had to remind Fireball that if we were going to discuss dangerous and unsafe behavior, that it was illegal for six year old kids to operate motor vehicles in the state of Oklahoma. She drove my 1974 BMW 3.0s on at least two occasions. I would let her drive the car across the field that served as the softball field for a women’s softball team I was helping coach. She’d drive us up to the gravel parking lot behind the Indian Hills Steak House (as of this posting it is now a bar called Mooney’s (Maps.google.com street view) . There she would stop the car and we would swap places.
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| I wish we still had this car |
So as far as safety goes, Pistol was as safe as a bug in a rug in the front seat of the BWB. And comparing her riding position to our habits just 20 years ago she was about as safe as you could ever expect to be. Besides, the air conditioning works better if you are sitting directly in front of the vents when it’s 106 degrees outside in Oklahoma.
I also posted on Facebook that RovErica was out and Pistol was in, as my new Range Rover buddy. This brought much scorn from RovErica and many sad and mad emoticons were exchanged.
I’ve had a quiet month of correspondence with Land Rover owners this month. I have made contact with a fellow Range Rover owner in my home town. We are trying to arrange a meeting to talk Range Rovers. More on that later.
The maps came in for a new trip I’m planning. I plan to drive across Oklahoma on all gravel and dirt roads. More on this later as well.
Buckle up, thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.
1 Million Facebook Fans | Land Rover USA (Post #369) 7/16/2013
I don’t have 1 million Facebook Fans….Land Rover USA does. And to celebrate that, they made a video. A video that I submitted a picture for and since you are reading this…yes, our picture made into the video!
The original post was a post about my grand kids and their fondness for playing in the Range Rover while I work around their parent’s house.
http://okie-rover.blogspot.com/2012/05/passing-it-to-next-generation.html
It included this low res version of a photo I took of them playing in the back. I posted the photo on their Facebook page and they contacted me and asked to use it.
So without further ado…here is Land Rover USA’s video and watch for our picture in the 44 second. They open the glove box and there they are.
They got to one million fans pretty quickly. They were soliciting photos when they were around 850,000 fans.
I’m really happy they used our image. Perhaps I’ll submit a photo of Fireball’s dogs for the pets video. The dogs, like the grand kids, are fond of getting in the Range Rover when it is parked.
Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.
Brake Caliper Failure (Post #364) 7/2/2013
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| I’m pretty sure that should be dry. |
Look what I found. No, not the rust on the splash guard, I expected to see that. The left front brake caliper is leaking. I’ve been hearing a pop on that side ever since I replaced the left rear brake caliper. I was just about ready to send the old gal to the shop for some fresh springs and air conditioning and then this.
I rebuilt all the calipers about three years ago, or was it four? I had trouble with the right rear staying together so I replaced that caliper with a “professionally” restored unit. I’m pretty happy with having 197,000 miles and one rebuild before a replacement for this part.
This may explain the ABS problem I’ve been having of late. When the brake is depressed (pushed down, not emotionally upset) it is hard (as expected) and is stopping but as the brake continues to be pressed it the braking really picks up and decreases the speed very quickly. That tells me something is not quite right time for a replacement.
More after the jump….
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| Upside down, stamped on the front axle. |
When ordering a brake caliper you will need to know your axle number. My 1993 Range Rover LWB is axle number 57L03581A. This will tell the parts man which caliper to send you. The differences are also noted by the type of bolt used to mount the caliper to the axle. Either a 7/16th bolt or a 12mm 12 point head. I’m sure if you pull yours off and inspect the bolts you’ll know which one to order.
I’m looking all over the internet for the part. Rovers North has a unit for 149$(US). Atlantic British has one listed for 199$(US). I’m hoping for a price match. There are some other units available under a hundred dollars. One was “out of stock” and the others did not give me any confidence in who I was ordering from. These are brakes (read that as mostly important) so I’ll stick with companies I’m familiar with.
My grand kids came over while I was researching parts. While their dad and mom ran errands and I was awaiting a response on a price match request from Atlantic British we ate Jell-O and made funny faces. You might say I was encouraging them.
At this point I’m wondering when the caliper will arrive, what with the Independence Day holiday being mid-week. I’m too cheap to have it over-nighted. And when I’ve asked for “priority shipping” it always seems to arrive on the day it would have if I just order the “whenever you get around to it” shipping. If it arrived on Friday I could work on it that day. Saturday is out, Sunday would work but I’m not sure it will arrive by then. So I’m looking at a weekday evening.
Phone rings….
Bully for me, it looks like Atlantic British is going to price match for me. So I got that ordered and I’ll be ready to swap it when it finally arrives. I always enjoy talking to Eric at Atlantic British. After we briefly kibitz and share a joke about my new credit card number and being on a budget, he says it will be here Monday or Tuesday. Indeed the Independence Day holiday has things mucked up a bit.
Thanks Eric (and AB) for the price match.
I told Mrs. OkieRover that I thought I was getting close with the repairs. I’m guessing that was probably in vain. The circumnavigation of Oklahoma is still in the works, with every repair I grow more confident. The Big White Bus is a twenty year old British automobile and I’ll probably have something to work on every week until the rust wins the battle.
Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.