Thread: 02/03 TD6 - What to look for on test drive?

Hi, I went from my soft dash (still own) to a my03 TD6 se, I do over 1000klm per week and have done since I bought it 12mths ago. its by far the best land rover ive ever had by a long way, have a drive in one and you will see what i mean. its been 100% reliable in this time, I do the services and repairs myself and find that parts ex uk are good value, its not a dear car to run. fuel consumption is great at around 10ltr/100klm. your right about the gearbox, just make sure there is no delay going into drive when its cold, reverse will be ok but its got to be cold for it to show up, change the fluid as soon as you can as well.
I would change the crankcase filter at the very least as this is not on any service schedules that I know of.
I change oil and filter every 10k
fuel and air filters 20k
diffs and transfer 40k
gearbox 50k
I tend to buy my service stuff in bulk to save on the freight and you use them up anyway.
I cant convey how well it drives, it just does everything so well, during the bad weather up here in january it never once made me nibble the seat so to speak!!
all I could say is get the lowest klm one you could regardless of spec and it will serve you well.
also if you get any weird electrical things like HDC inactive when you fire it up its probs just the battery on its way out as these are very voltage sensative. hope this helps and if i can help any more just ask.

cheers

neil

Thanks Neil sounds very positive!

I have just bought a MY06 TD6 Vogue.

I thing I did notice when looking at an 05 dark blue supercharged Vogue in Melbourne was the car had no reg or plates on it. When I asked were the RR came from the replied was, we buy and sell cars all over Aus so its come from interstate some were but couldnt tell me were.

As Im a mechanic by trade I checked all the obvious things and after having a good look around the car, apart from having a heap of chips/scratches in the paint I notices tide markes inside the tail and head lights along with stains from water/crud in the lights.

After checking the carpets which were damp the salesmans response was we have just had the carpets steam cleaned (which I thought is plausible). On further inspection the leather seats have all been sprayed (which I found odd on a car of this age as the leather in my 94 classic bush basher is still like new) and after a test drive I noticed there were a few electrical issues.

When I got back to the car yard I had a look at the service history and found the car had come from QLD. The service history was close to complete and all the stamps were from a dealer in Towoomba. All the dates that were presented coincided with the recent QLD floods hence the tide marks in the lights, damp carpets and electrical gremlins.

When I started asking a few questions on which auction yard they bought the car from and pointed out a few of my concerns the salesman was not interested in talking about the history of the car anymore.

My advice would not only be to check all the usual mech items but to really check the history of the car and were it has come from (if at a yard or private). It may to have been victim to the recent floods in QLD and sold on at auction. ECUs & BCMs dont like water.

Cheers and good luck in your hunt for a RR.

Mine is excellent,you'll look hard to find anyone who doesn't like them. Pat

Check the air suspension up/down function. Mine would go down normally but took ages to go back up again (2 or 3 minutes). The air pump needed replacing (thankfully under warranty) but would have been a couple of grand.

They are pretty bullet-proof. TD6 is the best engine.

Gearboxes are supposed to be sealed for life, but don't believe that. Change the oil & filter when you get it. Ours came out quite black after 130,000Kms. LR's definition of "life" probably means it'll get to the end of their warranty OK.....

HTH
David