Thoughts on the D5
Getting my 2015 D4 serviced, the dealer generously loaned me a brand new HSE D5. My impressions continue below:-
Getting seated in the comfortable leather seat, the steering wheel seemed too skinny cf the D4. Started up OK and moved up. Surprise, the fuel saving stop/start had me fooled. Gentle pressure on the throttle allows the car to remain stationary, more and the engine stops. anyhow off the brake and onto the throttle, and the restart is instant. The cruise controls have moved to the right on the steering wheel and are mixed with the lane-change controls and the adaptive cruise, somewhat fiddly and too close together. Following vehicles on approach set off little indicator lights in the nice large rearview mirrors. The rotary gear selector seems too forward to reach easily. EPB now is totally automatic. The indoor handles have a strange capturing handle to hook your finger into. There is no longer a shelf over the glove-box. Seated, the forward and rear view is good, and of course the rearview camera, with ridiculously high resolution. The 6 turbo diesel seems smooth enough, and yet strangely thirsty (hence the stop start stuff I guess). There is an add-blue port under the bonnet. The info screen is fussy and not always intuitive. Deleting other phones was tricky, as was finding contacts.Bluetooth connection was lost with the Ac on max.
Now moving to the middle row. These seats are definitely too low in the rake, with no upper thigh support. The third row I didn't try, but they have nice electric controls.
The real deal-breaker for me is the one-price tailgate, especially those dangerous sharp lower corners. Coming from the offset spit tailgate of the D4, with it's multifunctional ability, the loss of all this in the D5 is significant. To me this is major design flaw and the devaluation to D5s MK1 will be expensive for LR to rectify in any update. What a blunder!
2003 D2a Auto TD5 good Landy gone
2015 D4 probably the most amazing yet, why get a RR?
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