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-   -   Our Land Rover Series III 88" and Series III 109" (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/4x4-vehicles/264133-our-land-rover-series-iii-88-series-iii-109-a-2.html)

Drooling on this thread since it's gone live!
Not everyone gets a chance to get what they want! People may call you lucky, but it's your hard work and ambition that has paid you off.

Rated 5*

My hard work has paid me this -rl:

I think you should change your handle to LandRoverBaba! :D

Congratulations on both the Landys, magazine feature and the well earned certification.

As an aside, buying a 40 yr old car to beat ULEZ is a masterstroke lol: Though not sure how many will be willing or even able to follow in your footsteps.

Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate. Sometimes its a pristinely maintained Rover which is older than most people in this forum !

BBC posted a video recently on the ULEZ expansion:
https://youtu.be/2RqAwpjJatw

You are the first person to have called me ambitious, my parents will be very happy seeing this rl:

Thank you for your generosity sir!

That is a beautiful Series II and love the colour. You are the intelligent one, you know how the old Jeeps are like to drive as you have plenty of experience in the Kolkata OTRs. These old Land rovers are no different. By the way, one of the owners of Rover Social, Ian has a Series III SWB in this colour. It is absolutely gorgeous. Posting a photo.



Thank you Dry Ice!

Ha ha, I am yet to get the ULEZ exemption, will apply for it soon.

Thank you Samfromindia!

Absolutely ridiculous idea, the air quality in greater London area is much better than central London, yet the Mayor is hell bent in expanding the ULEZ zone based on a report by Imperial College that was funded by him!

Enjoyable thread. I'm always messing around with old vehicles, but have never owned an old Land Rover. Neat to see you keeping them on the road.

Happy 40th Birthday to Munchkin!

The British Heritage certificate says that our Series III was built between 17th and 19th August in 1983. Since I like the number 17, I will take that as the birthday of Munchkin :D

Happy 40th birthday Munchkin, and great thread BlackPearl! Rarely is even the most dedicated motorhead so deeply entrenched in their brand of choice (passion?). If I were from Tata / JLR, I would be tracking this thread closely to do an article on your sheer insanity. And when I say insanity, I say it with jealousy and admiration. You've somehow managed to do what most of us only dream of - have more cars than people in your family.

Your steeds and their photographs have now got me curious about off-roading in the UK. I might trouble you for a ride as a passenger on one of your greenlaning expeditions, when I'm next in town, assuming it is both allowed and amenable to you. :)

Thank you AKTransAM!

Thank you v1p3r for the nice words!

Sure v1p3r, you will be more than welcome to join. In April Bhpian Debuda had come to the UK and we went for a greenlaning day in Surrey. Photos from that day, quite a few photos are from Debuda's phone -

Very impressive write up of an iconic automobile. I am from old school and grew up travelling in the deep jungles of south India in late 60s with my father on his Government vehicle Willys Jeep ( Roads and Buildings Dept). Later we moved to Africa and used to see lot of Land Rovers as Government work horses.

When it comes to maintenance of these vehicles in those days, one needs a fleet of mechanics maintained by Government. Private owners are on their own and may not be economical to maintain.

I wish that Land Rover and Jeep would release these original retro style shapes now with all modern features and it would be an instant hit just like mini and beetle.

I owned a Scorpio VLX for more than a decade which has an iconic box like shape of Land Rover.

The images of Jeep and Land Rover are permanently implanted in my subconscious mind which can never be erased as indestructible vehicles. Jeep has world war nostalgia and Land Rover has African jungles and safari nostalgia.

After seeing your photos, it was like a time travel to those good old days.

These old SUVs are timeless beauties and you cannot stop admiring them especially when they are in military green colour.

Munchkin is now officially a "Historic" vehicle in the United Kingdom.



The process was quite straightforward. Since our Series 3 is an ex-army vehicle, the registration year in the V5C document was showing as 2000. A vehicle has to be 40 years old to be classified as historic and I was not able to show the registration date as proof. So I had to get a heritage certificate from British Motor Industry Heritage Trust and had to send the certificate along with the V5C to DVLA requesting for the tax class to be changed to historic. They needed proof of MOT and insurance which I forgot to send. But they were kind enough to find out by themselves that the vehicle has MOT and insurance. DVLA updated the V5C and sent it back showing the tax class as historic.

Heritage Certificate


Updated V5C showing tax class as Historic

About a couple of months of back I took the Series 3 to a pay-and-play day in a place called Broxhead Common. This place is used by the MOD for their testing and training, but sometimes they open the site for civilians. A Land Rover club that I am a member of had booked this place for a day.

It is a huge area with a lot of places which only heavily modified vehicles can tackle. But there were many places where stock vehicles could have a lot of fun. Getting stuck was not a problem as the club had quite a few marshals on site.













I made a really bad mistake and had almost toppled the vehicle. I tried to avoid a place by trying to go around it. Completely forgot that it is a long wheelbase vehicle, turned the steering earlier than I should have and rear started slipping. Within a few seconds the whole car was almost on its side. Since these cars are made of aluminium there is very little weight at the top, so that helped it along with the rut that held it in its place. The vehicle was swaying for sometime and my heart was almost in my mouth. I could not believe what I had done after so many years of off-road experience. No matter what experience one has, a momentary lapse of concentration can turn tricky very quickly!

https://youtu.be/BUBTZDKN5UY