Off the Road for 30 Years: 1962 Land Rover Series 2A
This 1962 Land Rover Series 2A is described as being off the road for 30 years and remaining in highly original condition. Photos show a surprisingly solid structure beneath the faded paint, including a frame that appears to be rock solid. The seller notes this is an original U.S. market vehicle, leaving the factory with left hand drive steering and a soft top roof. While obviously needing a fair amount of restoration work, the bones appear sound and it comes with its original, numbers-matching engine. Find it here on eBay with a Buy-It-Now of $7,900 and the option to submit a best offer.
I have to remind myself that these interiors really did leave the factory this spartan and that there’s not some sort of a dash pad missing. It looks like it was bolted together by an underclassmen shop class, but I suppose that’s a large part of the charm. The seller does go into great detail about how the truck came to be off the road for three decades or who owned it in that time, but it really does appear to have not seen a ton of use in those years of dormancy. Mileage is reported as being 85,000 but no evidence is offered that it’s accurate.
Like most utilitarian vehicles from this era, these aren’t terribly pleasant to drive. It’s an ox cart on wheels, but given it has the aerodynamics of a brick, vintage Land Rovers aren’t exactly trying to fool anyone. The body looks super straight, and the small details – like the factory badges, lenses, and mud flaps – are all accounted for. I don’t see any reference to the soft top frame or the top itself, but that’s a relatively small concern once you factor in the soundness of the overall structure.
Having seen many of these in project form that are completely rotten underneath, this photo offers terrific evidence of what you’re working with for a foundation. This is one of those trucks where you can leave the paint and body alone and just focus on the mechanical refurb. The seller is including the original engine with the sale along with a spare 2.25 engine and transmission from a Series 3 model ready to drop in. Fo the money, this Rover seems like a great starting point and a potentially straight-forward restoration.
Comments
The body looks super straight? How about the left front fender?
Purchased a 59 w/ the Safari top for 700 a few years ago. A gentleman had to have it and offered 6k.
Needless to say I was happy to oblige.
This might be worth 5k to the right person…
I learned to drive in one of these when I was in high school. It was hard to drive, The manual steering was a bear, and you had to double clutch between first and second, and you had to heel-toe to do downshifts. My friends and I discovered you can open a bottle of beer using that crease in the bottom of the dashboard.
I’ve always thought these to be rather ugly, but with that they are unique. For all practical intention and purposes you’d be further ahead to buy a newer domestic 4×4 truck and refit the body of this truck onto the domestic. My choice would be a dodge chassis from 1989 to 93. And you guessed it a 3/4 cumins diesel. I’d prefer it to have a full metal cab but that would take more work than its worth effort wise alone. Good find though.
Off the road for 30years – was that supposed to be some kind of joke…? Always thought that’s excactly where any 4x4s were intended to be (ab)used?
When I was a kid we had a 64 rag top and then a 65 with the hard top with the roof vents. The 64 ran the best but both were rather gutless compared to other vehicles of the era but they got the job done. They were built fairly well with the exception of weak axles and springs. Very spartan as you have stated but so were a Willys Jeep of that era. I did have the fortune to get to drive ours a lot mostly off road because I didn’t have a license at the time. Unfortunately I don’t know to many details regarding one year from the next but this one looks a lot like the body style of what we had. I did notice that the yellow spring loaded push lever for four wheel drive was not in this one. Ours had two levers one yellow push lever that you pushed straight down on and one that was similar to most manual 4×4 transfer cases. I’m sure if I remember which done what but one was for high and low range and the other was for four wheel drive.
Also it was mentioned to move the body on a Dodge Cummins truck frame, I think that would be a real challenge, half the engine would probably be in the cab with you but still a pretty cool thought.
When US had the CJ jeep and Europe had the Land rover Series 1 & 2.
Seems cleaner than the other one we saw this week with the Chevy V-8 in it!! Does anyone know how hard it is to find a hard top for one of these trucks???