Thread: How Reliable Is Land Rover Now?

Comparing Camry, Prius and Corolla is hardly an accurate measure

“Used more often” - guess not fact
“Have more issues” - guess not fact
“More Toyota’s as overland vehicles” - guess not fact

The chart is statistically balanced.... it’s per 100 vehicles.

Toyota production is fully automated - 1 **** up is every **** up. Hence the 100 series lower suspension arm weld issue etc.

So if a fully robotic line of mass produced vehicles is having issues in a ratio very similar to a low volume, bespoke manufacturer - that tends to indicate the small volume producer has pretty good QA and the robot manufacturer is slipping.

Remember Hitlers Revenge was the biggest selling vehicle in history for a while, volume doesn’t mean quality or reliability.


Here’s a poor analogy from a course we participate in regularly:

Perception and Reputation.
Toyota has a solid reputation build over 4 decades ago.
Land Rover has a poor reputation pre-2005

Toyota marketed on their reputation, and to this day people say “get an unbreakable toyota”
Land Rover develop bleeding edge technology and bring it to market first, the brand is known for its comfort and features but not its reliability.

Since 2005 it’s really neither here nor there. Quality and reliability is on par, surveys etc get it close enough to be negligible.

Then this happens:
A current LR has a problem and people go “typical LR”

A current 200 has the identical problem and people go “just a niggle”


This is a VERY real situation.


Buy one, don’t buy one. Drive a Toyota or don’t or a Y62 if it’s your thing.

Btw the Nissan reputation is rusting, rattling hulks with boring ultra solid drive lines. (Patrols). Crap utes (Navara) and boring plastic passenger cars (generic not high spec Skylines etc).

I wouldn’t say a Y62 is a rattling rust bucket, would you?

Anyhow, I’m tiring of this. I’m unsubscribing this and the other Defender thread. I forgot how ridiculous this place can be at times and I have far better things to do.

My 2 cents...

A mate of mine bought a 4bee somewhere in 2015. I thought he was crazy... "why on earth did you buy a tractor". We used to only drive and play with cars that had low suspension and skinny tyres. Also, japanese only Nowadays we have gone the opposite direction, fat tyres and high lifts.

In any case, he got into wheeling and after a bit of getting used to I thought to myself; let's buy one as well! Being a big fan of top gear and clarkson one line rang in my head immediately: " 'cause I'm in a range rover! " Turns out he said "in a land rover" when he drove a D3 or 4 up a scottish mountain, but close enough. So, I got myself a P38. One of the vehicles that gets the biggest stick in reliability talk.

Having said that: I have now owned that car since 2015 and driven it hard off road and long stretches on tarmac. I was prepared for the worst ownership experience ever but I wanted to prove the car could actually do it. (physically). Turns out that his pajero needed as much attention as my P38 did. (also 20 years old)

I found that all the 20 year old parts needed some sort of attention at one point or another, which I do not think is that weird after all those years of service. The brakes seized but with al that mudding I did not find that very odd. The wheel bearing gave up on me, again, not that weird with the amount of wading and km's done. I had the transfercase rebuilt and the engine was replaced with a rebuild unit but these were more securities for myself, not a need they still operated fine. The VCU unit locked up on me, but I guess that was unfamiliarity on my part. The list goes on

In short: Most of the parts on my P38 needed fixing were 20 years old AND had been neglected. The first owner maintained the vehicle by the book but the second owner was most likely someone who wanted to show of his non existing wealth by buying an expensive looking car without the money to properly maintain it. Something that happens to land rover often down here! Nearly all of the items I had to replace have stayed together quite well without breaking down again and I have done 75K since.

On my honda's (and I have driven quite a few) I never had to replace that much I admit but the newer my honda's get, the worse they are in terms of build quality. My 1992 prelude must have had the dashboard out a dozen times since I have had all sorts of gadgets in there. NONE of the clips have ever broken, all the screws still work as they should and nothing rattles in that car. The engine did 310K before I f'ed it up and used no oil whatsoever at that time and it got redlined daily. The more modern 2012 civic sport uses a litre per 6k which I think is ridiculous and my 2004 accord had all the clips on the plastic trim snap off when I tried to install something.

So, from where I am sitting the landrover experience has been a bit of a handfull in maintenance, what I expected but mostly more reliable then I expected. On the other hand the brands that I really valued have started falling behind. In my opinion it is not that other brands (like landrover) have gotten significantly more reliable, the japanse brands have started to fall behind making the gap between them less. It was to be expected of course when you can buy a citroen POS (sorry for the fans) for half the price of a japanese brand that will last just about long enough and then you simply run it to the scrappers. Who cares that it only lasts 6-10 years or so. People talk with their wallet and are not willing to pay more for a vehicle anymore so we ruined that ourselves. If the japanese brands want to keep on selling cars they have to start to cut corners somewhere because engineering and building for people that want quality is niche market that can not sustain them.

Finally, all that environmental crap is the final nail in the coffin for most cars. Pistons rings that barely touch the cylinder walls with oil that is as thin as water, EGR, DPF, PCV, you name it are killing cars quicker than ever before. Also NCAP safety scores make them heavy on the one hand and brittle on the other.

TL;DR I think, counter intuitively, reliability went up around the mid to late 90's for landrover as it did for other brands. The quality of brands has gotten better across the board but we no longer get the extremes (both good and bad) which is a shame since I for one would like the have the extremely good

Cheers,
-P

Originally Posted by Tombie

Comparing Camry, Prius and Corolla is hardly an accurate measure

“Used more often” - guess not fact
“Have more issues” - guess not fact
“More Toyota’s as overland vehicles” - guess not fact

The chart is statistically balanced.... it’s per 100 vehicles.

Toyota production is fully automated - 1 **** up is every **** up. Hence the 100 series lower suspension arm weld issue etc.

So if a fully robotic line of mass produced vehicles is having issues in a ratio very similar to a low volume, bespoke manufacturer - that tends to indicate the small volume producer has pretty good QA and the robot manufacturer is slipping.

Remember Hitlers Revenge was the biggest selling vehicle in history for a while, volume doesn’t mean quality or reliability.


Here’s a poor analogy from a course we participate in regularly:

Perception and Reputation.
Toyota has a solid reputation build over 4 decades ago.
Land Rover has a poor reputation pre-2005

Toyota marketed on their reputation, and to this day people say “get an unbreakable toyota”
Land Rover develop bleeding edge technology and bring it to market first, the brand is known for its comfort and features but not its reliability.

Since 2005 it’s really neither here nor there. Quality and reliability is on par, surveys etc get it close enough to be negligible.

Then this happens:
A current LR has a problem and people go “typical LR”

A current 200 has the identical problem and people go “just a niggle”


This is a VERY real situation.


Buy one, don’t buy one. Drive a Toyota or don’t or a Y62 if it’s your thing.

Btw the Nissan reputation is rusting, rattling hulks with boring ultra solid drive lines. (Patrols). Crap utes (Navara) and boring plastic passenger cars (generic not high spec Skylines etc).

I wouldn’t say a Y62 is a rattling rust bucket, would you?

Anyhow, I’m tiring of this. I’m unsubscribing this and the other Defender thread. I forgot how ridiculous this place can be at times and I have far better things to do.

I agree with nearly all of your points, even the nissan ones. Except the one regarding "use". It's my opinion more Toyota's get used for different work applications than LRs and this in turn would produce more vehcile issues.

As I have grown older and wiser I have started looking at vehcile manufacturers without rose coloured glasses. I'll never buy a Toyota because i 100% agree with your comments and I couldn't stand the idea of being part of the bogan club, I won't buy another nissan other than another patrol either but I'm not loyal to any brand anymore! Even LR, they don't give a hoot about you, me or anyone else and the reality is that my hard earned is what I value when purchasing a vehicle. They won't even provide a 5 year warranty! Not good enough IMO.

Originally Posted by Tombie

Whomever told you it’s $10k for body off is totally full of it. It’s only 8 hours off and on taking it easy. It’s the same for a Cruiser starter motor.

There was a certain workshop not 25 ks from me, ( shall remain nameless, but lot's of us remember ) who could do the job in less than five hours if the dealer was paying, and he used to take two days to answer the phone. Of course, it could take two months if the dealer wasn't paying. Or two years..

LR don't have service centres everywhere, and it seem they have reduced that number. Toyota are the new Holden in that regard, bloody things are everywhere. Not quite the same thing with Nissan, 1nando. Getting service for your admittedly brilliant Y62 won't be the same as if you had an LC200. Fuel could be an issue as well. Or am I wrong in reading they need more than standard octane? ( I could be, I don't try to keep up much anymore, I'll never drive one )

All the cars these days are good, but they are only as good as their support. LR is no different these days, and comparisons are basically meaningless.

My son always has a go at my brand loyalties. He's right, in a way. I'll choose Apple over MS, or Android. But that is his point. I have been Apple for 25 years. Is it better? How would I know? I don't have the luxury of trying both.
Cars are a bit the same.Someone, sorry I should go back and see who it was, mentioned word of mouth. And THAT is it, because we surround ourselves with like minded people. And that advances us exactly nowhere.

Apart from my D2, every LR I've had has got me home. Isn't that what reliability means? It is for me.

Oh, my D2 failed due to its German transmission.

I have a D2. 420,000 + Kms. Never let me down. Cost me $ 9,000, I like it, Couldn't give a toss for any one that doesn't. Stuff that wears out wore out, and if you don't take the time to learn how to maintain it, you deserve what you get.

Originally Posted by gromit

A lot of warranty issues are caused by parts from external suppliers.

My current daily driver (tarmac, Australian made) had a diff replaced due to noise (Dana) a wheel bearing replaced due to noise (no idea who the supplier was) and at 110,000km is just getting a driveshaft due to grease coming from the UJ (Dana again?). Same vehicle purchased 5 years earlier had no problems !

It doesn't matter how much testing a manufacturer does they are in the hands of their component suppliers. As each year goes by the cost they will pay is less for the same component, in theory because the supplier has covered some of the production investment costs. Does this mean the supplier will cut corners....who knows.
I'm sure the manufacturer will penalise suppliers in some way when their parts fail.

If it's not parts from external suppliers you can be let down on the production line...forgot to apply Loctite, forgot to apply grease.

I visited Ford just after the AU was released, went into a meeting room on the shop floor and on the whiteboard were a list of the faults picked up as they came off the line. Some were quite serious.
I'm sure the problems were solved as the staff got used to building the new model.

Another thing learnt many years back was 'steer clear of the new model'.
Until it's been out a while the problems haven't been discovered and ironed out.
The mules are not being built at the same rate as they will when the vehicle gets into full production and more care might be taken during their build.

Colin

Have you noticed they are running factory line built prototypes on the road in the uk and they are marked as such for this very reason i imagine

Originally Posted by bob10

I have a D2. 420,000 + Kms. Never let me down. Cost me $ 9,000, I like it, Couldn't give a toss for any one that doesn't. Stuff that wears out wore out, and if you don't take the time to learn how to maintain it, you deserve what you get.

You have a point, Bob, a good point. Sadly, the D2 was where LR started to veer away from home people being able to maintain. The ZF 4HP 22/24 E series transmissions were the start of this. Even an oil change in these needed knowledge most home mechs didn't have at the time. I can't swear to this, but I've heard that many failures were caused by people refilling transmissions without having the car perfectly level. This makes sense in a way because of the tiny sump the trans had, fitted to an off-road car that could be asked to take on many strange angles. LR stuffed up. The D2 was brilliant in so many ways, let down by BMWs desire for a prestige "British" car, in the market that the Range Rover started. The D2 was flawed from day one, because it could never be all things for all men, and it could never be a Range Rover.

That said, a well set up D2 is a weapon off-road. It's not so good as a tourer. Buy a D4, or wait for the "New" Defender.

I like mine, BTW.

Originally Posted by johntins

You have a point, Bob, a good point. Sadly, the D2 was where LR started to veer away from home people being able to maintain. The ZF 4HP 22/24 E series transmissions were the start of this. Even an oil change in these needed knowledge most home mechs didn't have at the time. I can't swear to this, but I've heard that many failures were caused by people refilling transmissions without having the car perfectly level. This makes sense in a way because of the tiny sump the trans had, fitted to an off-road car that could be asked to take on many strange angles. LR stuffed up. The D2 was brilliant in so many ways, let down by BMWs desire for a prestige "British" car, in the market that the Range Rover started. The D2 was flawed from day one, because it could never be all things for all men, and it could never be a Range Rover.

That said, a well set up D2 is a weapon off-road. It's not so good as a tourer. Buy a D4, or wait for the "New" Defender.

I like mine, BTW.

AULRO and a RAVE DVD is the D2 drivers best friend. The worst , and best thing I did on my D2 was replace every coolant hose my self. That , and the RAVE disc, taught me so much about the coolant system, and coolant flow. A necessary thing when your vehicle has an aluminium head. Then I fitted a Well tempered engine temp monitor, another essential. When fitting the new hoses, I found alloy fittings corroded almost to failing point. replaced them. I used to lay under my vehicle, and just look . That's how I found my hub seal leak, and the leak under my power steering pump. Fixed them. I think you can get my drift. Doesn't matter what vehicle you have, if you just drive it, don't even enter into reliability arguments.