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What angle can you get to before tipping over?


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Just out of curiosity, what angle can various defenders be at before they begin to topple over?

I have standard suspension on my 90 and have been at approx 40 - 45 degrees to the right with my left wheels up a steep slope. Sitting inside I was convinced that I was about to tip the truck but on getting out to inspect my position I was surprised to see that it looked pretty solid.

So what are the known limits and do suspension upgrades improve them?

Cheers

JB

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There are no absolutes when it comes to side-slope angles, as the terrain, vehicle weight & centre of gravity all play a major part.

Having purposefully driven over every type of terrain imaginable, side slopes are the only type that scare me. I really dont feel very comfortable driving them.

Land Rover themselves, and anyone worth their salt when it come to giving sound off-road advice, will tell you to avoid driving a side-slope if you can.

I reckon 45 degress is about as much as you want to go IMO. If you have a load on your roof rack (i have a roof tent & heavy Patriot rack) then I would drive a LOT less than 45 degrees.

Also the terrain needs to be considered. If you are driving over a concrete side slope (search for the OCC Land Rover Experience video on You Tube) and are unladen, then I think 45 degrees would be fairly easy, but still hair-raising.

If you were on sand or mud, then I would go a LOT less....and still have white knuckles.

I might be wrong, but I dont think a suspension upgrade makes much difference for this particular terrain type.

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Try it and let us know :)

Les.

Ha ha :lol:

Believe me, I am never going to go as far as I did again, I was cr@pping myself! I didn't do it on purpose either. I actually slid sideways down the slope due to the mud as I was driving forwards round an embanked corner. Thankfully, the slope increased in gradient towards the end of the ditch which is where I managed to stop. If I had slid down the bit I ended up at, I would most certainly have rolled it.

It wasn't the best bit of driving to be honest, I've learnt my lesson. To be fair, about an hour later a white Disco came round the same bend, slid down the same slope and ended up about 2 inches from my rear bumper so I wasn't the only one that day to get stuck.

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For pre Puma- engine Defenders the factory gives the maximum bank angle of 45 deg for standard vehicle, with no roof carriage. Lifted suspension and roof carriage both will suffieciently worsen that angle. In Puma-engined Defenders the center of gravity lays a bit higher because of the engine, and factory will not allow it to run over 35 deg bank because of the lack of oil circulation over that angle.

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So what are the known limits and do suspension upgrades improve them?

Most suspension "upgrades" are not really upgrades anyway, and very few will improve your rollover angle. Most of them are designed to make the truck taller for more ground clearance.

45 degrees was always the angle LR quoted although they did revise it down in later years to discourage people from testing the limits.

In fact, have a very informative Land Rover training video that shows quite clearly how close to the limit you can get:

(4:45 onwards shows some classic side-slope driving)

Contains the classic line "Remember, a Land Rover immobilised is a moral defeat for the driver, and bad publicity for the vehicle"

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As Ralph says your backside will give out before the car goes over

unless you are trying to get somewhere and you ignore all the signs and all of a sudden you are stood up inside your car looking out of the passenger window with the river running in the drivers window (well that's what happened with me)

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T1G UP, I like the arm desperately grabbing at calmly reaching for the steering wheel, visible through the windscreen. wink.gif That break-over point always widens my eyes...

been trialling for years so no big surprise but that hole was deep! not sure what my arms are doing, not allowed to hand your elbow out on a tria just incase you hve a roll.

can't find my finest moment caght on camera, had the 90 balnced on 1 wheel for what felt like an age! decided to sell the after that and get one with a cage!

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One of the mods I am working on is airbags in all four springs, the idea is to use the onboard air to allow forced articulation on things

like sideslopes to make them a little less scary, not that I will really want to push the 110 to test it, they're mostly for towing and stiffening up the suspension on long highway rides :)

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  • 8 years later...

i can't actually believe that I've graduated to this level already. anyway i just had a look because I've got a track that goes around one of my hills that isn't flat i think at worse it's - 20 deg. but having never done it before, and if it does roll it will be a long way to fall and then increasing in angle. i agree with anyone here that days out scares the s... out of .anyway as I've just seen my newest mother with her calf, i don't need to take the risk but id like to have the use of that track. I'm near to fregenite in granada, Spain if any of you are passing by and want to camp. i can supply water and a place to pitch. t box still running nicely although I do drive like someone who doesn't want to break anything

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My dad let me borrow his shiney new Range Rover once (and only once) when I was a kid - took it off road showing off to a girlfriend  and tipped it so far over in a deep muddy ditch that water came in through the side window!  

When you get anywhere near the limit it starts to get pretty difficult to keep arms and legs on the controls anyway.

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