Andy Cunningham

A job that I’ve neglected for a while is to replace the speedo cable on the Dakar.

Well, I say I’ve neglected it, but the truth is I replaced the broken cable soon after getting it.  And the speedo still didn’t work.  It’s finally risen up to a job worth tackling, and over the period of several days I worked out that the square drive on the end of the cable clearly hadn’t engaged properly in the mechanism on the side of the transfer box.

A post on the LR4x4 forum describes the fit better than I can.

After much exploration, not to mention removing the gear from the transfer box, I discover the problem – the end of the cable is 3mm across.  The hole in the transfter box is 2.75mm across.  I resort to using the Dremel to pare down the end of the cable, and hurrah, it fits. I just need to replace the drained out gear oil now, and all is happiness.

I still have a couple of other jobs to tackle to make the Dakar rather more pleasant to drive.

• Replace the broken wing mirror – with the poor rear visibility the wing mirrors are vital.
• Replace the worn and clunky wiper mechanism.
• Fix the dash gague lights.

Parts for the first two are en route.  The third is still at the troubleshooting stage.

Once that’s done it’s time for a complete set of fluid replacement – well not quite, as the axles were done last year, but engine oil, auto box oil, transfer box oil, and brake fluid all need doing.