Been to Billing

I spent a very wet Friday at the Billing show, and took Helena and the kids again today as the weather was better. It was good to meet several members of a Land Rover forum I use a lot – www.landrovernet.com – a couple of whom came back to the car park to have a good poke around the 109.

The good news is that the trips to and from Billing allowed me to try out the Roverdrive. It’s very smooth and quiet. The lever throw is quite long – about 50% longer than the Fairey’s lever movement, but should be fine once I get used to it. I need to adjust the operating rod that connects the lever to the unit, so that the lever is closer to me in the detent positions – an easy job that is part of the RM design. The other thing is that engaging the Roverdrive is a tricky affair – sometimes the synchro teeth won’t mesh and it will not engage. It’s getting progressively better, and I think a lot of the problem is the fact that it’s running in. It helps to only press the clutch most of the way down on engagement. Disengagement, on the other hand, is easy.

On Friday morning, I also ran for the first time on 100% vegoil (SVO). I only put 15l in the front left fuel tank to run as an experiment. It got me to Billing, back home that evening, and to Billing again today. There’s still some left, but I haven’t adjusted the fuel gauge sender arms yet, so the gauge isn’t accurate. The engine ran beautifully. It was smoother and a lot quieter, with a little less exhaust smoke when working hard. Any torque or BHP difference was small enough for me to be unsure whether it’s really there or not, anyway. The photos show the small size and location of the heat exchanger, between the Hotstart and fuel filter. The heat exchanger cost £60+VAT from www.dieselveg.com . It’s the WT01, and is suitable for all Series and Defender engines.

Unfortunately, there is some uncertainty over the SVO duty issue. The BBC Working Lunch programme broadcast that SVO would be exempt from duty, just like bio-diesel, if less than 2,500l were used per annum. This information is also on Dieselveg’s website. The HM Revenue and Customs publications seem to suggest that SVO is a fuel substitute, and is thus subject to the normal full duty rate. However, a member of the LRnet forum has contacted HMRC, and their detailed e-mail response stated that the intention of the new guidelines was to reduce the bureaucracy and that SVO was to be exempt. The language used in both the publication and e-mail from HMRC seemed quite clear, and so the discrepancy is odd. I will be seeking a further, written declaration directly to ensure that I can legally run on duty-free SVO. If I can, then I will have completely free fuel. If I have to pay duty, then hopefully I should still be able to save about £1200 per annum as the waste used vegoil should be supplied free, and the duty is just under 50p/l.