Land Rover Repair: Rear Door Hinges, wood planks, metal fragments

Question
Hello John,

The rear door hinges seem to be failing on my 1999 Series II Discovery - the door does not shut well and one of the hinges actually has pressed metal fragments coming out.

Land Rover quoted me $88 per hinge for parts.  Is the procedure fairly straight forward for DIY?  

Answer
Hi Darren,

you're in luck!  I had the same problem on my Disco I.  In fact, I used the series II hinges to repair mine as they have a better design.

You'll need two other volunteers to help with removing the door.  This 'beast' is heavy - probably why we have so much trouble with hinges and rear door latch!

Firstly, you'll have to remove the wiring harness that connects your subwoofer and other electrics (lights 'n lock).  I believe you'll have to remove the panel on the rear door to reveal the wiring harness.  Once exposed, its simple enough to detach and reconnect (later).

Once your wiring is free and clear, you get your two volunteers to hold the door while you remove the hinge bolts.  Less movement the better.  If the door ever twists, you could damage the body frame and hinge placement afterwards.  

When I removed mine, I only had one volunteer so we built a support system from two saw horses and some wood planks.  Ahhh...improvisation!

The first bolts I removed were on the rear door.  On my series I Disco, I could slide the door off the hinges which were still firmly attached to the main body of the Disco.  I did the reverse when I installed the rear door.

Make sure you have some spacers from LR as you may have alignment problems with the new hinges.  You'll notice this when you reattach the door and carefully close the door for the first time.  

We had a terrible time with aligning that rear door with the latching \ lock.  It took us at least 2 hours to adjust the hinges to allow the rear door to close properly.  I guess after 8 years, there were some changes to framing and I could have complicated things by using series II hinges.

So, I think you can do this but be patient when you reattach the rear door.  Make sure the latch aligns properly and you'll be ok.

Good Luck,

JohnMc