Thread: New defender haters gonna hate..........

Originally Posted by DeanoH

Well I guess this release makes it official, Land Rover is no longer in the business of making an OFF ROAD four wheel drive.

The emphasis here being on OFF ROAD. Sure it may be a good SUV even an excellent one, only time will tell. At the moment it's just another pretty boy SUV, no more, no less. A totally unproven soft roader (by design) regardless of all the glamour and glitz and waiting. A better model designation would have been Discovery 6 in an attempt to rescue the name/product line after the Disco 5's lack lustre impact or even Freelander 4.

Personally I feel cheated as I (and many others) held hope that Land Rover would actually come up with an OFF ROAD capable vehicle. I've been strung along for 3 years by Land Rover who promised the world but have come up with a hairdressers car and not a serious OFF ROAD vehicle. Maybe there's no longer a market for vehicles with this capability ?, OFF ROAD capability that is. But if Land Rover (or anyone else really) actually thinks a monocoque construction, air bag suspension, auto only, lawn mower sized engine with it's neck wrung fitted with 18"-20" tyres is a serious OFF ROAD contender, then IMO .......... 'they're dreaming'.

If I wanted an OFF ROAD capable 4WD of this size I guess the 79 series is now the only option, that or a second hand traditional Defender. It will be interesting to see how the release of this new Defender effects the prices of older Defenders. I'd expect something similar to the value maintenance of the last of the 6 cylinder intercooled/turbo Landcruisers and Patrols.

Then again, if I was after a mid/large size SUV then the new Defender may just fit the bill.


Deano

I think this will run rings around a 79 series off road. You don’t really make any compelling arguments at all - every engine option is more powerful than the last Defender and there’s more to come, airbags are proven tech off road now, and if you’ve ever driven even a slightly modern Land Rover off road you’ll know that the Auto runs rings around a manual. Even my 2003 model L322 was way ahead of any manual models made much later - it creamed other vehicles off road - with 20” road tyres, air bags and auto and that’s 15 year old tech. After driving old tech and slightly newer tech, I know which I’d take - and I’m a bit of a Luddite myself.

Just try driving something newer and see how good they actually are off road - I think it would change your mind. 👍

Originally Posted by DeanoH

I don't really see a problem with this vehicle as a day to day medium weight 4WD/SUV, IMO it has the potential to be as good as any other vehicle in this category, only time will tell.

What I'm disappointed with is its (for me) total lack of serious OFF ROAD capability when compared with a traditional Defender. I consider OFF ROAD capability to actually be a vehicles capability off the road, not how well it can manage a formed road or track, however rough, washed out or whatever but actually off road. Particularly in the desert regions of Australia. Where this vehicle will fail miserably when compared to a traditional Defender is with it's air bag suspension and tyre/rim choices.

How do you reckon you'd go driving through this with the tyre/rim combo's that come with the new Defender ?




One of the hazards of driving through desert country is bloody Holly Grevillia. It grows like a weed, dies and leaves a carpet of extremely hard and brittle twigs all over the place. It's like driving through a layer of 3" nails with multiple staked tyres being a common daily occurrence.

The old Defender with its standard 7.50R16 8 ply tyres can handle this straight out of the box, even better if upgraded to 10 or 12 ply tyres and/or with 8.25R16's which can come with even stronger side walls. The new Defenders air bags would be lucky to last a day in this without at least one being holed. The old Defender's coils of course would be fine. An old Series would traverse this terrain better than the new Defender. There are no 18+" tyres that I know of that will fit the new Defender that would survive this and that's even before considering the new defenders comparative low profile tyres lack of air down capability.

This is one aspect of the new Defenders design which for me is a complete failure in that it is not as tough/capable as its predecessor. It may be able to drive through the snow in the mountains of Kazakhstan or wherever but useless in the Australian desert.

Deano

Agree. However the new Defender hasn't been designed for anything more than being an upper middle class [ high income earner] plaything. And it will be a magnificent plaything. Just don't expect it to do what the old defender could. One thing that stood out for me was the article that when they wanted to demonstrate the recovery points, which are behind covers which need to be removed before you can use them, and upon being told to get the ' defender' really bogged, it took 5 hours for the recovery. Now, this isn't a criticism of the new vehicle, but surely it highlights how little research was done in actual off road situations. How many of the prototypes were tested in Australia for example. A wonderful vehicle for the 21st century, but , at this point, until some one takes one thru the Simpson, up the Canning , or the cape the hard way, please don't call it a defender.