Land Rover 110 Project: Securing the alternator

When I was checking the Land Rover to see why the temperature gauge was reading high, I discovered the fan belt was loose.

The reason it was loose was because the alternator wasn't secured correctly to the engine block which allowed it to move and slacken the tension off the fan belt.

The only bolt holding the alternator in place was the one used for adjusting the tension on the fan belt. (see the pic above)

The fan belt drives the water pump (or doesn't drive it in this case!) , so hence the higher temp reading I had seen on the gauge in the cab.

So I set to work to secure the alternator.

As you can see by the photo on the right, there was no bolt holding the alternator to the engine block.

As well as securing the the alternator, the bolt allows the alternator to swivel around it so the correct tension can be placed on the fan belt.

After I had removed the alternator to get the correct bolt size, another "bodged job" that a previous owner came to light - the power steering pump!

The power steering pump was secured to the engine block with 2 jubilee clips, and the pulley wheel was slightly misaligned with the belt.

As the Land Rover has been fitted with a Daihatsu diesel engine, whoever installed it decided not to get the right part to complete the job.

As it turns out you can buy the correct bracket that will accept a Range Rover steering pump, and this is what I will be doing shortly, but lets get back to the alternator!

I had a load of long bolts lying around in the garage and found one that would fit. I sourced some nuts to fit it from a local hardware store. Cost: 20p!

It took two of us to manoeuvre the the alternator into place and line up the bolt holes to accept the new bolt. The jubilee clips made it difficult to get the bolt through (probably why the previous owner had left the bolt off in the first place) but after a couple of attempts we got it through and secured it in place.