Thread: '95 Tdi Disco opinions/buying/towing...

I have not heard about gearbox problems either.

I don't have diesels - but the Disco is a very capable vehicle - on and off road, and in my view between the Disco and the Defender there is nothing better for towing

250k's though.. ive seen a few for that price with 150k's and say in better nick.

Take your time and get a good lower k one i reckon

Camo

TDi Disco will struggle up hills
towing a race car

Yeap man gearboxs are a problem in pre 94 Disco's, my father-Law had one , cant remember what the issue was but Ive heard of lots have same prob, might have been week shafts....or was it no oil was getting to some gears or something like that......cant remember.

If you were disapointed with the man TDi, for god sake dont drive an auto, you would be very disapointed........, But I do and I would not have it anyother way .

Originally Posted by amshaw

Yeap man gearboxs are a problem in pre 94 Disco's, my father-Law had one , cant remember what the issue was but Ive heard of lots have same prob, might have been week shafts....or was it no oil was getting to some gears or something like that......cant remember.

If you were disapointed with the man TDi, for god sake dont drive an auto, you would be very disapointed........, But I do and I would not have it anyother way .

You must be kidding, an auto tdi will beat a manual any day, i'm still suprised how well mine does against angry morning traffic and it ****s all over my mates 05 playdo td.

Thanks for the quick replies. I'm not looking to buy just yet but I am keeping an eye out and getting a feel for the vehicles.

I was surprised at how 'slow' it was compared to the old mq. There really wasn't difference- '81 3.3d- 400,000km vs 95 2.5td 230k, I expected a bit of difference I guess.

As for towing. I don't expect one to hold 100kmh up, say Junction Hill/ Kinglake hills etc but just normal slight inclines, like on the Hume freeway.

Cheers, Glen.

The 300Tdi will have trouble keeping on the 100kph towing 1800kg. They are only 80-90kw and torque isn't anything to write home about. For towing the auto is definatelly the choice as the torque convertor pickup is set to come on at about the same time as the turbo, with the manual you have to slip the clutch when towing to get off the line. The manual gearboxes were changed to the R380 in the 300Tdi and the first ones pre 95 had a problem with oil supply to the rear of the main shaft causing failure. Having said that I had a 94 manual and did 100,000k's without failure, I put this down to running fully synthetic ATF from new in the gearbox the dealer agreed Land Rover repaired all failed boxes and they carried out a modification in 95, also they started recomending using fully synthetic oil in the gearbox oil. I doubt there are any 300tdi's out there that have an original unmodified R380.
As for a 4X4 I doubt you will find a better value for money turbo diesel out there. I have had my 97 300tdi from new and am reluctant to sell it. It is easy to work on reliable and unbelievably comfortable. We bought a 2005 GolfV 2.0l tdi for around town but have found it is not getting used as we prefer to drive the Disco. But we are thinking of buying a 6mtr caravan and I know the old girl will probably have to go then( I'll probably give it to one of my sons)
Hope that gives you a bit of insight

I will second what was said above. If you want something to tow nearly 2t at the speed limit up hills buy and F250 V8 diesel. If you want something that will tow it easily but will loose some speed up hills, and do it cheaply then buy a disco. I have towed loads well over 2t with the disco, whilst it wasnt a land speed record attempt it does it easily, and would quite easily sit on 100 or there about on the freeway to Winton, a trip to sydney would be somewhat different though.

The Disco's have a higher towing capacity than the other brands, this doesnt mean it has more power, more that the vehicle is built to tow heavy loads.

The poor accelleration is more than likely some slack in the accellerator cable, a few members have complained about poor accelleration in Tdi discos and then adjusted the cable using the adjuster on the fuel pump and taken the slack out to find that it goes quite well, it should most definitely be alot more spritely off the line than an old MQ.

I have a manual and find that as mentioned above i need to slip the clutch off the line, an auto would elminate this.

If you are after more power and have the cash, there are mobs in the melbourne and and sydney who do fuel pump tweeks for the Tdi's which i have seen dyno print outs for showing a 62% increase in power. This costs around the $600-800 mark to get done, put a larger diameter exhaust right through, and a larger intercooler and you will find they have more than enough power. For your money you can buy the car and get all this done and still have a few grand left over from what you would have paid for a cruiser or patrol.

I own a 98 model and love it, the only real issue with the Tdi is the timing belt, and the only issue is that it need changing every 60-80000km or there abouts, i would be changing it at 60000km if you are towing regularly just to be safe. Reliability wise mine has been spot on, never let me down yet, well appart from stuff i have broken off road. They are comfortable for long drives, handle like cars, use bugger all fuel. I recently towed a 2t caravan from lithgow to wagga and returned about 13L/100km fuel economy, but that would depend on how much of a hurry you were to get there, and might differ with an auto.

They have some niggling problems, like the fuel line from the lift pump on the side of the engine to the fuel filter housing on the firewall is about 5cm to short so when the engine is under load it puts the fitting on the lift pump under stress and eventually makes it leak, many people would simply keep changing the lift pump and call it a **** car, but anyone with half a brain would spend $6 on some fuel hose and make a new one, takes 20mins and completely fixes the problem. Oil lines have a tendancy to leak, dont replace them with LR items, take them off and go to pirtek and have them made up properly for half the price of genuine replacements and they will last for ever. Many people like to bag land rovers, but thats because they dont understand them. They are an awsome car, and if you hunt around and find a well cared for example it will reward you if you continue to look after it. Matt