Unimog Club UK

Moose

Thanks a lot for the clarifications.

This is a bush truck, but I plan on keeping it going for a long time so I am very interested in babying it along. I thought the synthetic oil might be better protection. Oil’s and filters aren’t the place to cut corners.

We’ll be bumbling along at tractor speeds as it’ll add minutes rather than hours to any on road journeys. Offroad is what it’ll be doing most. I just don’t want to end up like the guy in the video, there’d be no living that down.


Thanks for your help.

Cheers,

Tom

Moose

Point taken on the oil.

Ref the video, I know that if it happened to me, a crowd would materialize with their iPhone's out. 5 minutes and everyone in the county would know and it would be on the evening news. Must remember to pay attention.

Cheers,

Tom

I know the old owner of that U1000 in the video. He was the first person ever to take me around an off road site in a Unimog - that Unimog! Tom was his name, a chap with lots of interest in everything unusual. I think he sold the Unimog and bought an old American Chevy pickup when he got bored of off roading.

It's a shame he tied it to that tree. I'm pretty sure it would have made it down there fine without the hindrance of that winch line pulling him over.

That pretty much sums it up. Apparently there was very little damage, he was ok and they carried on, so all was well. The only issue he had, and the reason for a lot of mucking about when it went over, is that the engine wouldn't turn off. Apparently he had to select a high gear and stall it?

Back on the original topic, I look forward to seeing your progress with your new 411. I really like the older Unimogs. That's where my interest lies and seeing them working is just fantastic. I must say though, driving Moose's 1450 brought a whole new experience of comfort and power compared to my 406!

Moose

Thanks for the explanation. I’ve been thinking a lot about it and the application to my particular Mog hybrid. I’m starting to worry about the clearance between the Nissan engine and the axle. I’ve attached some pictures.

The first pic shows the oil pan and diff. The most important question is; how much clearance is there with a stock engine? If the blocks are removed and as you say the dampers have a soft compression there could be damage to the oil pan especially if there was a load on the front, like a snow plow.

You can see by the pictures that even though the springs are blocked up in front, the dampers are in the original mountings. Also, there are rubber bumpers which I don’t think are standard. That leads me to think that it was done to prevent damage. The current bumpers are made from old conveyor belting with a 6 cm gap to the axle. This solution is better than nothing but, not much. I think that at a minimum they need to be replaced by polyurethane bumpers/pads. The problem would be that if the steel lifts are removed, there’s not going to be any clearance.

What would you suggest to avoid some sort of catastrophic failure?

Also, since the diff locks are already converted to air; Is it a good idea to operating in 4wd with only the rear axle locked? Some of the places I’ll be using the Mog have 1 or 2 k’s of steep uphill slogging. In a tractor it’s the way to go but what about Mog’s? Could it cause problems?

Thanks for your help.

Cheers,

Tom

Hi Tom,

Just a quick note, in the pics the front left hub is missing it's breather hose (You can see the clamp that holds it to the top king-pin) it's very important that this is fitted, especially in off-road situations, I would check the front right also to make sure it's got the hose fitted as well.

Cheers, Brian

you should put the rear difflock in when traction is reduced if you put it in when traction is good you run the risk of damage, best way to see if anything is an issue with axle clearance is take the front springs off.
Moose