Thread: defender and 110 extreme difference

Originally Posted by Captain_Rightfoot

That's interesting. When getting mine I was advised by people within LR to avoid them and at the time I was buying the SA ones were available and better value than the English ones.

Most manufacturers that sell cars from SA have troubles with them. VW make all the Golfs sold locally there except for the German built R32 and 3door golf GTI (Polish?). The SA build cars are generally acknowledged to have more niggles.

Audi Australia imported one boat load of cars from their SA plant a few years ago and decided it was more trouble than it was worth. They are all imported from Germany now.

Ford build their Focus there and the SA built ones (not the German built XR5) are some of the worst finished cars on the market these days. You can put a pinky between the panel gaps, and the paint is atrocious.

I could go on but I think you get the picture. Let me say I'm not really convinced that it would make much difference with Defenders though...

May be the propaganda I was fed while living there

Although, the examples you provide are all comparing German built vs SA built. Let’s be honest, nobody in the world - not even Toyota will come close to the quality of build out of Germany. I also doubt that companies like Volkswagen would stick with building vehicles in SA if build quality was a serious and continuous problem. They've been building Volkswagens in SA for decades.

Some real world experience, comparing my SA built TD5 to the UK built Puma - I can see a remarkable difference in basic things like panel alignment, gaps and attention to detail. I let you guess which one is better ...

That must have been a hard choice .. SA or German built.