After laying down the final coat of paint yesterday evening, it’s time to sound proof the whole thing and refit the seat brackets.
Why sound proofing? The Series Land Rover is a noisy beast, although the petrol engined models are less noisier than the “hammer and anvil” 2.25 diesel, on long journeys they can still tire you out. And if you ever want to have a meaningful conversation with your passenger, then investing some time in fitting some sound insulation is no bad thing.
I happened to have about 1.5m2 of Dynamat Extreme left over from sound insulating the 110 hardtop. Its designed to reduce vibration in sheet metal and road / engine noise by adding mass. Dynamat is a thick, very very sticky butyl rubber sheet with a foil backing, which is handy for heat reflection. I used about an acre inside the back of the Defender and it transformed the experience immediately.
There’s a number of other noise attenuation solutions on the market one being the Wright Off Road matting system. I had one of these in a diesel Series 3 back in the UK and it did make a difference but for the original looks of the “naked trim” in the Series 2a, it would look out of place.
Seat box, extension pieces and seat frames ready to be fittedDYNAMAT left overs…We’ll start with the inside of the battery box with the offcutsI’ll line the inside with carpet before the end of the project but i ran out of time todayAnd the underside of the seatbox4 seat rails ready to fitThe two extension panelsRight hand extension panel offered up1 of 4 of the seat rails fitted with new stainless steel fixings. I won’t bore you with photos of 2,3 and 4 as they are much the sameI found the 1st extension panel rattled a little against the seat box so I removed the seat rail and panel and filled the gap with some amalgamating tape. Rattle cured. If only all Land Rover rattles were so easily so easy to cure… In the UK you would just drive through a pot hole… Bang.. rattle fixed 🙂Both of the swivel clips were also re-installed (in their original locations) with the aid of the new air hammer. I took a chance…. an air hammer is quite noisy and making a noise on a Sunday in Switzerland isn’t really the done thing. I figured, it’s only 6 rivets and there was enough pressure in the tank, so I don’t need to run the compressor… also noisy.And there’s the finished product. I’ll prep and paint the 3 covers this week.
