Most (if not all) Series Land Rovers had the spare wheel on the bonnet, which although it makes the bonnet hard to lift and it makes lots of popping and cracking as you lift it up, it looks pretty cool and is a great water trap for corrosion. Some classic Land Rovers have the spare wheel on the back door, (some do both) using a common 'three pronged' mount that bolts through the back door, however the general feeling is that this adds a lot of weight to the door and the hinges suffer in the process.  The tyres on the Landy Rover are heavy 16 Ply 7.50/16 and the tyre with the wheel weighs over 35KG each, so that is a lot of weight for the hinges.

As a solution, Britpart have created a swing out spare wheel arm, which bolts to the back chassis rail and the top of the back tub of the vehicle.  There is then a nylon slider that attaches to the door, so the whole assembly moves with the door. Although this is designed for Defenders, it also fits on Series Land Rovers, however I needed longer bolts Installing BritPart Swing Out Spare Wheel Arm,  was relatively easy and required the following:

• Britpart Swing Out Arm (Details Here).
• 3 x M12 (80mm) bolts and washers (The bolts included were too short for the Landy chassis rail)
• 2 x M10 (60mm) bolts and washers (The bolts included were too short for our back tub.
• 2 x M6 (50mm) bolts and washers (The bolts included were too short to get through the H frame of our back door. Other bolts were fine.
• 3 x Wheel Nut 1 1/16in 27mm - for steel wheels (Strange it doesn't come with them!).
• About two hours of time.

The installation is relatively straightforward, however you need to 'loosely' install the arm and once in place, line up the backing plate for the door, which the instructions did not really explain.  If your door is out of alignment, or your door opens at a slight angle due to worn hinges, then the nylon slide-out thingy (technical term) will not slide too well.  Worst case is that you will have to adjust the backing plate and drill more holes in the door, which would make a bad day even worse.  Measure three times, drill once and you will be fine.

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