Finding the perfect wheels is a difficult task. You will never find a tire without a draw back. Also the variety of different brands and types are just overwhelming. During my research I came across a few very interesting articles about the advantages of different tire sizes for each application. Really informative is the text from Expeditions West about tall and narrow tires.
A tall, narrow tire is a better choice for all off-highway surface conditions with the exception of soft sand, snow and soft mud that’s depth exceeds 110% of the vehicles minimum ground clearance.
If you have a look at most military vehicle as well as modified overland campers, you will notice they use quite skinny rubber for many reasons outlined in the article. The main goal is to keep the width as close to the stock as possible and just increase the tire diameter to get more ground clearance.
So lets compare a few available tire sizes to the original Delica tire (235/75R15):
235/75R15 = 29 inch diameter and 9.5 inch wide
245/75R16 = 30.5 x 9.7
31×10.5R15 = 31 x 10.5 (very common in North America)
235/85R16 = 31.7 x 9.3
265/75R16 = 32 x 10.5
Continue reading ‘Finding the right wheels.’
To get the van road-ready for British Columbia you have to change a few parts at first and then get it inspected by an authorized person. Without this letter you won’t be able to insure your imported car in this province.
- Headlights must have DOT marks on them which includes also a change of the lens-pattern so you wont blind anybody on right-side traffic environment. I bought ours for $225 from Mardy at Amazing Auto Imports
- It is also required to have a DRL (Daytime Running Lamp) module installed to have automatically the headlights on once you turn the engine on. We decided against installing it, because quite a few people having problems with them. Mostly because the high voltage of the modern light bulbs damage the old light switch on your dashboard. A friend build us a custom module which draws all the needed power directly from the battery and not through the weak switch. Price: $0, Help: priceless
Continue reading ‘Compliance Work.’
Finally after a few weeks on the open Pacific, DinoEvo is at the port of Vancouver, BC. Now the paperwork need to be sorted our. It’s my first time I imported a car, so I got support from Al, a broker at Courtney Agencies Ltd. After a couple of days back and forth and a bill over roughly $900 for all kinds of fees/duty etc, I picked him up at a warehouse in Richmond. The whole process went to my surprising really smooth.
We drove it – with a temp day insurance – straight to CVI who is in charge to do a few preventive work before the Delica gets used, but more about that later.
Owning a Mitsubishi Delica for almost two years and being an active club member of Delica.ca gave us enough information to know the exact configuration we want for our second l300.
- High-roof
- No Crystal-Lights (glass in the roof)
- 5spd manual
- Low mileage (under 100k km)
- No rust and very good mechanical conditions
- ‘94 model (with water-cooled turbo, fast glow plugs)
- Winter package (more powerful alternator)
- Limited Slip Differential
- White Colour
After searching the web, local dealers and Japanese auctions up and down with no luck we got a very interesting offer from Mark at Brave Auto International. After he sent us over a bunch of photos and having an inspection done we decided to go for it. His Delica with 87k km just met perfectly all our requirements and had even a lift, roof rack, additional lights as well as a ladder. So let me introduce DINOEVO:
I’ll try to explain how our decision process went. My girlfriend and I love to explore countries with a car, be outdoors and enjoy the beautiful nature. We try to go out of town for camping, hiking and all kinds of other activities as often as possible. For this reason we came up with a list of requirements for a new car:
- Maximum interior dimensions, minimum exterior
- Comfortable bed incl. seat area
- Carry all our gear (at least 800kg payload)
- Able to go off the beaten path on 4×4 trails
- Older, reliable Diesel
- As less electric as possible
- Be able to convert in to run on WVO
- Possibility to travel in it for an extended period (6 to 12 month)
- Reasonable priced parts available locally and in the countries we want to visit
- Meet the budget (fully equipped under $40.000)
- Should fit in a cargo container (not higher then 7′9″)
- Needs to work without problems in high altitude (turbocharged)
- With hot water (outdoor) shower and Diesel interior heater
Continue reading ‘Finding a vehicle for our needs.’
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