Front prop shaft is fouling the cross member, it is a shiny band right above the bar in line with the bell housing/ torque converter housing. There was a good gap when I looked. Anyone got any ideas why there may be contact?

If it's fouling the cross member then you have serious problems with the engine or gearbox mounts!
The most likely issue is the prop joint heat shield has bent and is rubbing on the prop.

Have a look at this:


That's how the metal shield should look, you'll probably find it's been bent slightly at some point and is rubbing. I know I bent mine back into place at some point.

Admin note: this post has had its images recovered from a money grabbing photo hosting site and reinstated

A photo or two sorry best I could do not as agile as I used to be

A picture is worth a thousand words, that has helped a lot.

There looks to be a couple of issues.

The rubbing does look it is was coming from the now missing heat shield. This shows the position of the heat shield on original design prop/front diff which is slightly different to what I posted previously:



Looking at your photos I can just about see the remaining pieces of the alloy heat shield around the cross member bolt.
As said previously the only way the prop can rub on the anti-roll bar itself (which sits above the cross member) is if the engine and gearbox mounts are seriously knackered (or anti-roll bar mounts but they look OK), in either case you would definitely know about it!

The other, bigger issue, is that it looks to me like you have the original design of front diff connection to the prop. The original design was just a splined shaft with the only movement taken up on the transfer box end with a CV joint. The splined joint suffered from premature wear failure (I believe if miss aligned in the factory) which meant replacing the front diff. Eventually LR saw the error of their ways after having to replace many diffs under warranty and re-designed the front coupling with a CV joint. Earlier cars should have been recalled and the diff/prop replaced. It looks like yours might have slipped the net.
I'm not sure if LR are still honouring the free replacement of the diff to the newer design any more....however if yours is still working fine now after all these years I don't see it being a major problem, it was obviously correctly aligned in the factory and if it was me I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

This details the diff recall much better than I can:
http://www.rangerovers.net/repairdetails/d...tdiff.html

There is no noise or jerking selecting D or R, in fact it is silky smooth compared to the excellent Toyota box I used to have and I thought that was good. 85K miles and still the original guess the drive shaft joint is ok.

So there should have been a heat shield on the cross member due to the exhaust? I'll get one to fit soon.

As there is little or no rust on the shiny bit it must have been recent. Unless the selling garage tried to remove the heat shield and left a bit, who knows?

So I'm happy it is not possible for the shaft to come in contact with the cross member. I'll be getting under once I get some new axle stands and sort the rust out will a coat of something.

Thanks for the input.

Your gearbox sump looks damp as well, if it is oil I'd get a gearbox service done asap...  Pete

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Unnecessary quote removed

That still looks like the old style diff coupling.

It should have been upgraded to the newer CV joint coupling under the recall program

I suspect you may be rather late now though

Spoke to Land Rover not turned down yet, although not looking like a free of charge upgrade as they call it.
I have been surfing, can get a recon diff and used prop for a reasonable price. I would have to pay to get it fitted and expect change from £500 all in.

Is it giving you a problem?
If not save your money. If it's been fine for well over ten years it's unlikely to give a problem now.
The problem was due to poor alignment in the factory, a CV joint was fitted so alignment would no longer be an issue. The only time yours would give a problem in the future is if the alignment is changed due removal of gearbox or transfer box from the engine and it's only then it might be worth changing the diff.