1992 Land Rover Defender 90 – New Build with LS Power

For power, efficiency and reliability it’s difficult to beat GM’s LS3 V8 engine.  It puts out 430 horsepower out of the box and boy is it easy to crank it up further.  The LS3 runs an aluminum block and cylinder heads, which is fitting for the Defender – it and the old Series trucks featured aluminum alloy body panels, which was unusual at the time, and offered a Buick-derived aluminum V8 gas engine.  Part of the secret LS3 sauce includes computer-controlled port fuel injection which continuously self-adjusts to optimize power and efficiency.  The deep-skirt block with cross-bolted main bearing caps gives it tremendous strength.  LS engines are also fairly compact, fitting easily where Land Rover stuffed the aforementioned Buick-derived V8.

We know a thing or 3 about the LS engine family – the LS3 we hand built for our wagon puts out 500 horsepower and didn’t break a sweat on its way to winning the 2017 Holley LS Fest East burnout competition – but it did make the headers glow orange.

We mocked up the LS3 and Tremec T56 Magnum 6 speed manual transmission in that sparkly new frame for Holley LS Fest and we can’t decide which Holley intake manifold looks better, but we definitely dig the mint green engine color for that classic Land Rover vibe.  And if it were our truck we’d obviously have to run the T56 6 speed – this particular transmission was beefed up and converted for 4×4 use by the experts at Rockland Standard Gear – you know this thing is serious with a name like Tranzilla.