Series Land Rover (Australia & NZ)
Serving the Series 1, Series 2, Series 3 and other Land Rover communities worldwide.

The Series Land Rover gearbox started out life in a Rover car dating from 1932. Series I Land Rovers had permanent 4wd for the first 3 years of production; utlising a freewheel device in the front propshaft. Then a transfer box was introduced and the 4WD became selectable via two additional gear levers.

The main gearbox has remained fundamentally the same throughout the Series I, II and III Land Rovers from 1948 to 1984; there were modifications to increase strength of various parts and finally to add synchromesh to all gears. The IIA transfer box was retained as an unmodified unit, when full synchromesh was added to the main gearbox of the Series III.

It is debatable as to whether the discontinuation of the oil dipstick from the suffix B gearbox onwards was an improvement. It is widely held that the Series 3 all syncromesh gearbox is a weaker box than it's IIA predecessors, although some efforts were made to increase it's durability towards the end of it's life. The Series 1 gearbox also had a tendency to break shafts if worked hard.

The table below shows overall gear ratios for a range of Series Land Rovers.