Thread: Choosing the RIGHT VEHICLE for Overlanding Video - Interesting....

FWIW spring steel is notch sensitive, the outer surface is highly stressed, so any scratch is a stress raiser and potential failure point.

This is why they are epoxy painted or powder coated, it gives some measure of protection

Had a bit of a chuckle about Andrews sponsorship. Where he is complaining about the off road height dropping down above 50kph he is wearing a JEEP shirt. Talk about having a finger in all the pies!

Originally Posted by dirvine

Had a bit of a chuckle about Andrews sponsorship. Where he is complaining about the off road height dropping down above 50kph he is wearing a JEEP shirt. Talk about having a finger in all the pies!

Geez, that's a bit of an assumption there..... just because he's wearing a Jeep Shirt......??? I assume you're just joking around?

How about we get back to basics and the topic at hand of "Choosing the RIGHT VEHICLE for Overlanding".....

Having grown up driving Toyotas and using them for all my remote touring when I was young and still using them up until recently, from my experience I can't fault them. I'm hoping now to use my old Defender as our touring vehicle into the future until the kids are off our hands, then I'm open to what vehicle the wife and I will get..... At present, even though its another 6>8yrs away, my mind is thinking either a Defender still or a Toyota Troopy and this is mainly for the fact that it can be setup to sleep in if required. I can;t really think of any other make of vehicle other than those 2 that would really suit our needs in that way.....

I agree with his criticism of LR for the early TC and the removal of the lever on early D2s and LR responded to the criticism by refitting it. TC has since greatly improved.
Airbags seem to work fine on heavy transport so it's just a matter of checking them during servicing. People ignore failing compressors until they stop working and are then surprised if the airbags get pinched.
Springs can also fail of course. People fit stiffer springs to make their fourbys handle more like cars and then wonder why they fail on corrugations. A Defender, for example, is meant to have a soft ride over bad roads. It's not a sports car.
I saw Andrews comparison of a Troopy and Defender and thought it was fair about their pros and cons.

Its an interesting video. On the airbag side, I dont really see a difference between the actual airbag itself and a coil or leaf spring - they could all fail but in general are fairly reliable. The D3/4 airbags are surrounded by and alumiumn skin so theres little chance of damage from an external source. The control system reliability is another matter and I total understand where Andrew is getting at in regards to a simple vehicle, there is in theory less to go wrong. Of course nearly all modern vehicles are a lot more complex than they really need to be and as far as I have seen not many manufacurers have decent DIY diagnositc tools available like the options we have with LR (nanocom, IID tool etc..), most would be lucky to only have a basic scan/fault clearing available.

Interesting point about preventivitve maintance vs reliability. Even with a decent reliable car I would still excpect that you would be doing some sort of preventive maintance and replacing items if you plan to head to remote areas, thats the whole point to me is that you dont want to take any chances and stuff gets repaired properly to avoid a break down. I suppose Andrew may have been refering to some vehicles requiring less new parts and therefore is percieved to be a more reliable car.

The Airbag Man airbags in the rear of the Defender have been totally faultless so far. I check the air regularly and they don't seem to lose any air at all.

I dont think its the bag themselves he has issues with but instead the airlines , joins,fittings , height sensors and compressor that are part of the system. With a coil its just the coil, not a whole system. You have to remember he is also talking about a remote area overlanding car. If your off into the middle of nowhere for 6 weeks and not panning on seeing anyone what would you want? The fewer things to go wrong the better.
Personally i dont do that so id love full airbags on my defender but id be looking at protecting parts of it even for weekends away.

The L322 airsprings last about 10ys it seems. Coil life and leaf life will break in harsh conditions. We broke the rear leaf springs on a 2A twice on a Tanami / Kimberly trip. I saw a spring mount on a patrol snap and cracked 110 coil in workshop broken at top. I’m sure I’ve seen a pic on here too.