Questioni was reading through some of the questions and answers and found one about the vibrations in the disco at 75mph, but it did not give a remidy for the problum. Can this be fixed? I have since done the drive shaft conversion in hopes to cure this and still the vibration exists. How do i get ride of it? For i am constantly driveing at speeds of 80mph and up.
AnswerHi Adam,
I'm reminded of an old joke...
Patient: Doctor! Doctor! It hurts when I wave my hand like this!
Doctor: 'So stop waving your hand!'
Older Disco's are usually in need of suspension repairs since the suspension just can't last forever. I've always suspected that the steering damper was inappropriate to the forces generated by my Disco. I swapped in a top of the line damper and it seemed to do the trick - for about four years. The damper is started to fail again.
I recently had some under carriage work done and the mechanic marveled at the size of the suspension components and the supporting nuts 'n bolts. 'Its one heavy vehicle', he commented. In removing the wheels from the Disco, the mechanic also commented that the last person to have installed them had over-torqued the lug nuts. (Land Rover over torqued them!).
The mechanic then stated that on heavier vehicles, like our Disco, too much torque on the lug nuts can eventually cause an mis-balance on the rims. Warping and distorting the shape is common on over-torqued lug nuts. Couple this mis-balance with old shocks, failing steering damper, aging coilspring and you can have trouble with vibrations at high speeds.
So - have your shocks, damper and springs inspected, make sure your lug nuts are torqued correctly (95NM max!) and perhaps reduce your speed. Check your balljoints too!
Every sprint, a client of mine issues a warning to their truck drivers - slow down in spring and help us save on suspension repairs. We may not be driving Mac trucks but the same can be applied to us. Did you ever wonder why the lug nuts on our Disco are the same size as those found on tractors?
Best of luck with this, Adam.
Lastly, our Disco's have one major weakness - the brakes. A LR mechanic once told me that it takes our Disco much longer to stop the same distance as any other SUV. Our rotors should be twice the thickness they currently are. Most newer Disco's, including the LR3, have thicker brake rotors. Just thought you might like to know.
