Thread: Air suspension miss or hit?

Originally Posted by Brendan1477

Hi all, I'm looking to buy a second hand disco 3. I've noticed a couple for sale without the air suspension, given that the main problem with this car is the suspension I'm I wiser to buy one without?
The car will be going off road and towing a camper trailer.
Cheers

The air suspension is the best part of the car. Maintain it and it’s no problems.

Originally Posted by Brendan1477

I've noticed a couple for sale without the air suspension, given that the main problem with this car is the suspension I'm I wiser to buy one without?

Fake news

This has been popping up a lot of late. Russian infiltration of the website perhaps.

With the slight chance of replacing a compressor problems are almost unheard of (and not hard or expensive to fix).

Mine still original everything at 10 years and 180k kms.

Did change the desiccant in the compressor though.

From what I read.....potential owner is

Compressor, easy fix prior to becoming an issue, probably already sorted on a D3

Bags seem to be bulletproof proof

Other than that it’s the bushes that I read most about, again easy maintenance item.

I got 242,000km out of my original bags/shocks and have only changed them to guarantee reliability outback. They were still fine, though the shocks were a bit pogo-ish. Expected, same as on any car with that mileage.

I did a compressor rebuild on mine yesterday as well and it was in good condition and showing no issues. Desiccant was good. I decided I’d refresh it before it caused issues, again preventative maintenance only. I carry a spare front and rear suspension height sensor for remote travel, plus a front and rear abs sensor, but have never needed them. Again, for remote use.

They’re unquestionably more complex than a leaf spring or coil spring setup, but the ability for self levelling for weight change, the ability to raise and lower on the move, the extended height option when you’re bogged in sand, make it all worth it

Cheers for the responses, I've always wanted a disco and since moving to Australia from the UK there now is a legitimate reason to buy one, but wife is ringing in my ear about reliability and getting stuck in the outback "can't you just buy a Prado!! All our friends have them" "ohhh a Land rover not here in Australia mate" is all I'm hearing

I think you may find its an S model. Some D3's were made with coil suspension , but my understanding is they DONT have the terrain response system. - I may be corrected on this but think I am correct.

The D3's air suspension is a BIG step up from the D2. Personally I would go for the air suspension after doing several corrugated roads and seeing the difference to coil sprung suspension.

Cheers Ean

I don't think I have ever seen a D3 coiler optioned with Terrain Response advertised anywhere. On the other hand most of the manual D3's were coilers, but occasionally you found one with Terrain Response. See recent carsales advert below.

We've taken a wrong turn

I recently bought a 2006 D3 TDV6 after test driving a coiler optioned D3 as well. Not much in it between the two onroad, but a bit of difference offroad. Depends what you want to do with it. One of the guys at the gym just bought a D3 4.0L petrol on coils and absolutely loves it. Granted, he won't be doing any offroading (so no 2" lift required), but the versatility of the D3 was for him a winner.

Originally Posted by Brendan1477

"can't you just buy a Prado!! All our friends have them"

This sounds familiar. But I talked to the one friend who actually knows what he’s talking about. He’s on his third rebuild of injector system. He said whatever you do, don’t buy a Prado.

I’ve got a Disco 3. 😀