I think I will give up on this topic as nobody seems to take any notice what I’ve posted on this subject. , . If people want to pay crazy money, or give themselves so much grief, so be it

CED, its not that you’re being ignored on the subject, it’s just that you seem to be the only person saying it can be done that way, and it wasn’t you that did it but your mechanic.

If I hadn’t already dropped the tank before I started this thread I might have been tempted to at least try it that way. As it happens, curiosity has gotten the best of me and I’m planning on having a look at how that method you’re suggesting might work as I put the car back together.

Look what you’ve done now, I hope you’re happy..

Hello lowbrow…..I think the key factor has to be knowing what your fingers are going to be doing when your arm is deep into the tank and your probably lying in the car in an uncomfortable position .
As I said the mechanics did have details from Landrover specialist about the method
Also as the bill for the job was so reasonable it could not have taken long sorting the pig of a job ,which would be unnecessary if LR had not made such a pigs ear of the design In the first place. Never had this problem in 55 years of car ownership.
Hope you get everything working again OK.

To be clear, I don’t doubt you.. It’d be a pretty weird hill to die on if the claim were baseless wouldn’t it? As you say, knowing what you’re fumbling about for would definitely make the job easier. I have a theory on how yours was done which I promise I will test on reassembly.

I just have to clean up those mating surfaces on the haldex and diff, then once Local LR find me the correct brake line clips I’m ready to rock.

Before I reassemble, I’m a bit concerned about the level of pitting on the o ring mating surface where the diff meets the haldex.

It looks as though somebody has previously tried to fill the pits with epoxy or something similar, the more of the crap I chipped away the worse I realised the pitting was.. The pitting is all toward the top and I’m using a new o ring and maybe it will seal ok, but I was wondering, would I be able to get away with running a thin bead of Hylomar around there or would it cause me contamination issues?

I know these Haldex units are sensitive bits of kit.

Got everything back together and up and running before the rain started so that’s a result, Went for a test drive and there was an intermittent odd scraping noise, haven’t a clue what it could have been but it’s gone now.

CED, I had a look at the idea of dropping the tank onto the propshaft to get in the tank, I think there’s a possibility it could be done but would still involve syphoning all the fuel from the tank to remove as much weight as possible, remove the wheel arch liner and withdraw the filler pipe from the tank for clearance. The forward edge of the fuel tank cradle sits on the propshaft bracket but if there’s enough clearance it may be possible to clear the bracket and sit the tank on the prop shaft, from there it could in theory be rotated a bit for access.

With all that done It’d still be a massive pain to remove the tank pad the locking ring and gain access to the inside of the tank. With the fuel already syphoned it’s probably just as easy to remove the exhaust, disconnect the prop shaft and drop the tank, which is probably the least difficult part of the operation.

Just my 2 cents

Lowbrow… well done for getting it all together again. Thanks for your observations on the tank job, thinking about it I do think they said something about lifting the wheels whilst on the ramp to let them hang , not being over mechanicals blessed I’m not sure why. I did have to run the diesel down as far as I dear without having a reliable gauge to tell me how far I’d used up the fuel.
One thing I do know is, for what I was charged , there is no way I was doing it myself, especially at my age. Once again we’ll done on completing the job.

If I could have paid what you did, I’d have considered having someone else do it too! I’m actually glad to have done it myself, I made a few mistakes along the way (like cross threading one of the fuel cradle mount threads )

I learned a lot from the experience.

Does that make me slightly eccentric?

Dropped the tank one weekend to find out what bits were required, put it all back together on the Sunday so that could use the car to get to work on Monday.
Repeated the work next weekend when the new parts arrived - two new fuel senders. Tangiers Orange - gone, missing her
Replaced by Ewok what a mistake - now a happy Disco Sport owner

Not sure about eccentric, slightly masochistic perhaps?

Honestly though, there’s nothing wrong with getting stuck in. Now that I’ve been through the process of dropping the tank (and propshaft) a couple of times with the car on ramps it’s a job I’d be confident I could do quite quickly if I needed to.

I’m beginning to realise that this is what Land Rover ownership is all about.