Thread: Replace a Defender with what?

Originally Posted by JDNSW

The G-wagon does look like it is worth looking at - are Iveco and Oka ANCP 5, and do they come with a full length closed body?

The biggest downside to the G-wagon is, of course, the price - I don't know what he paid for his Defenders (a few years ago now), but I believe both were second hand - the older one is a 300tdi, and the newer an ex-army Td5. Both would have been a small fraction of the cost of a G-wagon.

As an aside, an indication as to the sort of driving he uses them for is that a major concern of his is finding tyres that don't stake as easily as the ones he's tried (a typical selection of the tyres you would find used on Defenders).

ADF never bought TD5s, they were trialed and rejected in favour of Isuzu.

Originally Posted by solmanic

And opening and closing the doors on a G-Wagen is better than sex.

Originally Posted by ozscott

Are they really based on Mitsibishi? Based on as in a Chinese take on them or actually using old Mitsubishi presses for chassis etc but still Chinese steel and Chinese copies of chassis, steering etc etc. Really Mitsi and Gr8 Wall shouldn't be mentioned in the same sentence. Mitsubishi tend not to fall apart easily...

Cheers

But Tritons did bend chassis.

True mate. Trouble with having wheels so far forward. I have heard that Mitsu have reinforced the current model Triton. Cheers

Originally Posted by solmanic

MB are trying to coerce me into upgrading my G and I keep telling them I am only interested if they have G-Prof wagon for me to test drive. You are correct in that there are just NONE around to do this in. I got a call from our closest dealer who had a G-Prof wagon in for delivery to a customer so I got a good sticky-beak but no drive unfortunately. The dealer told me that there are "one or two" doing the rounds of the dealerships and they would call me when it was up our way.

Maybe Land Rover are going to try and match the G-Prof spec. to stay in that segment of the market, but they have a loooooong way to go before I would consider their quality to be anywhere near on par. My G-Wagen is "only" a G350, W463 model not the W461 that the Professional is. Still, the solidity and overall quality of absolutely everything on it is way beyond anything I have seen from Land Rover. Things just don't leak, vibrate or fall off it! And opening and closing the doors on a G-Wagen is better than sex.

Been a while, eh?

Over 2 tonn payload for tray back...man that must be stiff. Impressive load though.

Cheers

Originally Posted by V8Ian

ADF never bought TD5s, they were trialed and rejected in favour of Isuzu.

They used a couple in the early 2000's.

The Perenties were going to be re-engined with the TD5 in the late nineties/early 2000's but the Poms couldn't make them electronically 'quiet', apparently they spent a lot of sterling trying to do it and failed.
A good mate was tasked here to try it, and he and his little team did it with a new loom for under A$100,000.
Just as it was being presented to the ADF, Ford bought Land Rover and military was shelved.

The UK wouldn't believe it, so LRA flew him there with the loom in his case to prove it to them.

So Rick in your experience the Ranger is a good bit of kit?

Cheers