For this year's Muddy Truckers Trophy I've decided, time allowing, to make a couple more modifications to my motor.
One of them is to try and give the front wings some protection as, I'm sure anyone that's competed with us will agree, trying to minimise damage to the front wings makes life so much harder in among the trees.
"Challenge wings" seem to be the "bolt on" solution but having helped fit them to Mike's 90 and seen numerous variations on a theme from a number of suppliers I've gradually come to the conclusion that I just don't like them. They look "wrong" and destroy the iconic Defender look to the front end. They also take ages to fit, lead to all sorts of compromises and, in most cases, cannot be removed from the vehicle without major surgery. Not to mention having to relocate, modify or simply remove a number of standard parts.
I also have the added problem on mine that they are mostly designed to link into the front roll cage hoop which, with mine being external to the wings, won't work.
So, all this has led to me pontificating for a couple of years and, as a result, I was no further forward than I was two years ago !
The best wings I've seen in terms of "stealth" are the ones on Matthew's 90 and it was those that I wanted to reproduce (ish) on mine. We had to take Pam's 90 over to Protection and Performance for them to measure up for the roll cage we're fitting to that so while I was there I got them to bend up 4 pieces of tube, each with a single 90 degree bend that roughly follows the curve of a standard wing. I also got a "bridging piece" bent that would go around the front edge of the bonnet to link the two wings together.
So, my cunning plan is to build the tube into the existing wing, giving them the ability to run along trees without damage but at the same time trying to keep as much as I can "standard".