Thread: Which is better Off Road a D3/4 or a late model Defender? ... Puma 110

Originally Posted by frantic

Celtoid.
Wrangler stock is not better than equivalent defender. Your back to TerryO scenario of "Ohh to match a defender I've got to increase tyre Size by 10%" BUT you can't do the same"!
As to a stripped D4, without the special electronic traction control, stability, wide fat.body and love axle imitation suspension it would have same ability as a 2003-16 pajero.
A d1/2 is great offroad as.it's a rrc chassis and axles which in.turn is a stretched. Series.3 swb on coils with a.5 speed manual or auto. but again LR equipped it with small tyres as standard which means mods to match.

Wrong on the Wrangler front ..... They are woeful ..... actually dangerous on the road at times. Aren't very practical .... but do rough stuff real well. They also laugh at sand ....


On the stripped D4 .... I was taking the mick ..... however, take out the soundproofing, stereo, airbags, ABS ..... get it as close to a Deefer as possible ...... you've then got a much, much lighter vehicle....

Scouse who is one of the senior Mods on this forum used to lead almost monthly day trips up around Lithgow, Jenolan etc for members several years ago before his Rangie died. He had a pretty much standard RRC and from memory he even had some old style skinny Michelin A/T' tyres fitted.

Where Scott could take his almost standard Rangie without fuss was often truly amazing to witness and he often out performed modified vehicles.
My point is while a old Rangie is still a good old thing there is something just as, if not more, important than machine capability and that is driver experience and skill and Scott often showed that he had off road driving skills by the spade load.

Unfortunately in this thread so far to date that is something that has been totally ignored as everyone focuses on how good their particular choice of vehicle is.

Having been off roading with a number of excellent drivers, who I freely admit are more skilled than me, I would put my money on a good skilled driver in a average vehicle over a heavily modded vehicle with a lesser driver nine times out of ten.


Anyway back to the thread. ...

The marvel of the D3/4 is the breadth of the things they can do and the level to which they excel when doing them. Of course the Defender excels in its specialist area. If you want more than just a "truck" then you want a disco.

This is just for those that don't believe in the capability of the late model discos (too much uncontrollable power/torque, broken drive trains, shopping trolley yada yada yada) and I'm not implying a Defender can't do this. Plenty of controlled torque at low speed demonstrated here:
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEd4qdvN8_U[/ame]

PS I hope you defender lads are wearing floaties along with that one arm tan because if you're not then you are going to drown along with your defender if you attempt to ford anything deeper than a kiddies wading pool.

D3/4s are very capable, there's no doubt about that.

Sbd4. I have seen that before. It shows well their capability. Cheers

Originally Posted by LandyAndy

A tad rude MrLandy.
You ever had your vehicle featured in a 4x4 mag???? Only a few here can put their hand up for that.
Andrew

All in the spirit of Land Rover camaraderie and the constant flow of jibes both ways in this frankly ridiculous but very enjoyable thread. No offence meant Andy. Clearly we all enjoy a bit of flying mud.
Cheers brother

From observations of friends the Wrangler isn't that great on sand - for their size they are quite heavy (2t).

Originally Posted by Tombie

From observations of friends the Wrangler isn't that great on sand - for their size they are quite heavy (2t).

Oh, that's interesting.


A good mate of mine and his son are into competing heavily modified 4WDs in varying sizes and often go on beach 4WD holidays. His son's girlfriend has taken her (unmodified soft-top) Wrangler along on these trips quite a few times. My mate was saying that they have literally tried to get it bogged on numerous occasions and often failed. He spoke very highly of it. And we're talking Moreton and Fraser Is where the sand is very high silica content.


He's also commented on it's weakness on road, as another friend has concurred with in regards to his ..... that Wranglers drive horribly on the road (relatively) and can lull you into a false sense of security when it comes to corners .... and then things get ugly, very quickly.