Cynic-al

Available from your nearest Ikea

They've certainly kept the shape of the old bronco with the straight wings that round off at the front but I think what makes that vehicle is the wheels, big, sticking out at the side and not completely covered in plastic trim front and back. Also ground clearance under the sills etc. It makes the visual distinction between offroader and school run SUV in a lot of ways. The separate front bumper is obviously going to get pulled off for a clipped steel winch bumper which is easy for the home fabrication types, it is harder to do on a car with a fitted plastic bumper but not impossible if you look at things like the Rhino bumper for the amarok for example. Although if that's where LR have put the various radiators & coolers it creates a bit more head scratching. I think the big problem for car manufacturers in Europe at the moment is they're all struggling to meet the Euro 6.2 and they don't have the freedom to have one off the wall product at the moment as it pulls the whole range down.

I watched the start of the video of the old 110 and thought yay the guy has got some decent steel to protect the body on the rocks, keep it tidy for the road. Then it fell off. Atleast he thought about it though!

Pfft, I pulled one of those up sutton bank with my pickup. Gearbox was begging for mercy by the top though. Never knew it had so many fans!

When I was a kid my friends dad got a brand new J-reg discovery, i used to love it with the side steps, 7 seats, two sunroofs with high head height and storage pockets, bull bars and huge amounts of body roll when you cornered. They were towing the family caravan once, just a little 2 berth thing, a lorry overtook them a bit too close, the draft pulled the caravan and the discovery ended up going down the motorway on its roof. Ironically the caravan remained the right way up. As much as I don't like the D5 I can't imagine it would go over as easily as that so it all comes down to what you want from the thing I guess. The insurance put the discovery back on the road though 🙋‍♂️

I'm not surprised that Mercedes want to reduce the model range, have you seen how many they do? It used to be C, E and S class and G wagon. Then the vans and commercials. Now it's A, A saloon, B, GLA, GLB, GLC, GLC coupe, GLE, GLE Coupe, GLS, G, C saloon, c estate, c coupe, c cabriolet, cla coupe, cla shooting brake, cls coupe, E saloon, e estate, e coupe, e cabriolet, S saloon, s coupe, s cabriolet, slc roadster, sl roadster, maybach. Then the vans and trucks. Half of it is made from Nissan and Renault parts which are the lowest of the low from my experiences. They started expanding the range to get new customers, then they extended the range to get customers they already had into products they didn't know they wanted. The other manufacturers have done the same. I know common platforms and smart manufacturing can give all these ranges with limited new parts or production lines but there has to come a point where there is no business advantage.

Mine was still going at 20 years when it was stolen. Who would've thought someone else would want it!

'Off road' is a bit generic. My Range Rover was bought for knocking the heck out of it for fun. I would never use it as a road car as it was too battered and there was always the worry of a wheel bearing giving way or a brake pad falling out. This would be perfect for an old defender or jimny with modifications like body protection and better tyres but you certainly wouldn't use anything with any value, ie a new Defender. My pickup is a work tool, it has to carry people on motorway runs of hundreds of miles, 600kg parts as well as access construction sites in all weathers. That's the offroad bit, in summer you could do it in a transit, in winter you need all terrain tyres. It doesn't need a suspension lift, roll cage, snorkle etc etc, infact those items would make it worse it its motorway work. I wouldn't buy a new defender to replace this as it can't do the carrying and loading by forklift. Both are driving 'off road' but both a very different vehicle requirement. Which is why the person mentioned above preferred the Dacia to the Jimny. Don't forget as well that people on forums do so as they want to know how to use off road or maintain themselves. For every one on the forum there will be several owners who don't know the front from the back and bought it as they liked the look of it.

You can spend $25,000 in the UK on a ford fiesta. My Amarok was more than a Silverado and it's half the truck, literally We have a new shape Jimny at work and it's certainly not a car for the masses. Anything over 50mph and you feel like your thrashing it, especially if your used to a big lazy diesel. It rolls in corners and you can't corner fast. However it's acceptable if your buying it for what it was built for as they aren't the number one attribute. If you want a vehicle which can go up a muddy lane or into a flat horse field but otherwise is a normal car it's perhaps not for you. Your better with a car with 4x4 and longer springs like the the Panda or Dacia. The great thing about them is you can sell them for more second hand than they are new at the moment. The Skodas are a great choice as long as your not brand conscious. I think they're better finished than the audis. The ssangyong are good for the money too.

Yeah they do have more expensive pickups, I think these were up around the $100,000. What the heck you'd use it for I don't know but I want one! LR could export them, they just have to pay the tax which would make them even more uncompetitive. Or import them as a kit of parts and have them finished locally so you wouldn't have to have to setup the whole operation. With the Freelander 1 for example they could've import as a car, take the back roof off locally and panel out the back to get around it. Sell it as a small half tonne off road truck. I guess the other angle to look at is LR aren't LR. They are LR subsidiary of Tata / BMW / Ford / Rover etc. who will all have their own agenda. Ford for example sell premium and working level pickups in the US so they probably wouldn't want another product, but a Range Rover SUV has better street cred status than a Ford SUV so it gives them something different. The production facility in the UK probably doesn't have the capacity for 0.5% of the US pickup market so it comes back to where can they make the most money per vehicle down the line, US pickups or Dubai Range Rovers. Either way all we can say is LR didn't go that way!

A bigger car is allowed a bigger limit. Then there are extra credits available for manufacturers who make low emission cars. It's all very complicated so I don't pretend to know the exact ins and outs. The fleet average will be 95g/km so for every jimny they sell suzuki need to sell 2 cars at 65g/km for example. The suzuki swift is 115g/km so even without the jimny they need to get some credits somewhere. Although demand out strips supply its still not going to be a huge seller in the UK. There was talk of bringing in a commercial version which, i think, is allowed 147g/km. They also have a smaller engine version they sell in japan. Obviously there could be a lot more to it than that, I'm sure there is a business centred reason too! Part of teslas income is selling their credits to people like Fiat/Jeep. Toyota can offset with their hybrids. Land Rover are far behind but are starting with various hybrids. The Americans buy a lot of pickups, but they are also cheap. Last time I was there I had a look at a silverado HD, double cab, 6 litre v8, locking diffs, leather, tows 6 tonnes and who knows what else for $47,000. A 5ft person could stand infront of it and you would run them over without ever knowing they were there. That's about £37,000, for that Land Rover have to make a modified version for the US market, ship it, pay any duties etc etc. When faced with that or pushing a $100,000 range rover down the production line destined for China or Dubai where the modifications are different wheels and leather colour you can see why they did what they did.

You could hire a nail gun. I borrowed a pallet nail gun, works off compressed air and fires annular ring nails. Very strong joint and very fast, like a machine gun if you hold it down. My most recent shed I just fired them in but on previous sheds I've gone to the effort of putting them under the lap so you can't see them.

The Jimny is also going to be discontinued in the UK as it pulls Suzukis range average CO2 figure above the acceptable limit for euro 6.2 in September, so sadly, even Suzuki can't do it! It seems if Suzuki made lots of hybrids, electrics or bigger cars, they could make the numbers work on paper, but they don't. I drive a pickup in the UK, they are popular with councils, construction companies, farmers etc as they are good enough for the job and cheap enough to throw away which works on balance sheets. I can't see Land Rover wanting to compete in a race to the bottom but they might do a funky utility truck based on the defender. There are some posher pickups but not many want them as a car replacement as they are a bit too big, thirsty and uncomfortable for the UK. VW shareholders have never liked the Amarok as it doesn't sell like the other products in the range, they're dropping it in Europe for the same reasons as Suzuki and using the factory space to make electric vans. Fiat have almost completely dropped the rebadged L200 due to poor sales. Mercedes have dropped the rebadged Nissan due to poor sales. That leaves the L200 and Isuzu which have strong markets in Thailand. The Ford which is going to be made with VW in the future, Nissan are still making in Spain and offering a Renault badged version too. Toyota obviously, big in Australia. Then the Chinese LDV / Peugeot, Ssangyong, Great wall, generally all global products rather than UK specific. America is a big enough domestic market not to need to worry about exports so they can do their own thing.

Or like making a 4 door all electric saloon then calling it a mustang I think the elise is a good example, it's not the most powerful thing ever made but it's stripped down and basic which makes it a lot of fun. You can floor it out of a bend at 40mph and have an absolute buzz. The 150mph supercar isn't a patch on it as you can never get near enough to its performance limits on the road to get that buzz. Your so removed by the tech to keep in under control when going from 0-60 in 3 seconds that it takes all of the driver experience away. I think that's why the older basic 4x4s are more fun, feeling the terrain and pushing the buttons at the right time is the skill of it, but if the average person just wants it to go through a muddy field whilst the heater keeps them warm and their iphone plays them music then clearly the more modern vehicles are what is required.

I think it's fair to say you've nailed that one. Now I want to see you achieve the same quality whilst lying upside down under a land rover with mud falling in your face, everything rusty, covered in oil and next to the fuel pipe

Looks in great condition, tyres look scary! Have fun!

Ugh, hate snow. It's fun for about the first 10 minutes then it just makes life tedious. Typically my 4x4 pickup would be off the road whilst the snow is here. I have a choice of a FWD hire van that i've already had stuck on wet grass, my RWD van with snow tyres on or my wifes bmw x-drive on wide low profile sport tyres.

I think the fact that it didn't fall over despite all the slamming on of the brakes and bouncing around means that it's stable enough for what it will be used for, I think they could've driven it smoother to reduce passenger clenching. I wonder is there is a safety sensor on the seat to monitor that? A clenchonometer? The advantage I would say is has over the other comparable vehicles, like the nissan quashqai / x-trail, kia sportage / sorrento, ssangyong korando / rexton etc, is the angles the bodywork gives and the 4wd computerisation. **pokes and runs away**

I think cars now in general are so clinical and uninspiring that for most they're just an everyday commodity. Your so far removed from the driving experience that most of them are no different to driving on an xbox. When I started driving you had to nurse your first car around and tinker with it to keep it going. It had a personality and you got to know its ways. I think thats why fewer young folk are interested in cars, they're just a box that works and the only way they can make them appealing is to make it connect to an iphone to continue their online life or make them appear more exclusive so others think your something special. I think that's why the most expensive cars are the most hideous. To make people stand out and be noticed rather than for being nice to look at.

I know all the reasons manufacturers like touch screens, but I hate them, unsafe whilst driving and look at the finger marks, that's people with clean hands. You'd have to start using a pen like on an ipad. Must admit though I'm warming to it now that i've seen land rovers latest concept. Look like the VW ID van, or those driverless cars that get you to Heathrow airport form the car park.

I think things like the ladder and side boxes are to make it look offroad ready for marketing purposes. Make people feel they are buying something roughty toughty. I doubt many owners would have them and use them. I dont like the rear lights, or the rear end, the rest of it's fine.

Well the teslas start around the £40k mark which you can spend on a 3 higher end series or lower end 5 series. The v class electric is going to be around £60k compared to around £56k for the diesel so again not far off. The problem is when it comes to the smaller cars that £5k - £10k is a much bigger difference % wise so makes those look much worse.

I think if you compare a new Tesla to a BMW, Mercedes, Audi etc they're comparable. Not sure how leases compare, I've always preferred to buy cars but I don't think electric are developed enough to risk being stuck with something worthless as something better is released. Things like the little Nissan Leafs are significantly more then the equivalent Nissan Micra so I would agree there. It is solvable, it just takes £££ and time. The problem the UK has over less developed countries is that we have an age old infrastructure. Take internet services for example, for years we have been trying to limp on a copper wire network designed for analogue voice and find ways to force lots of digital data down it. Less developed countries don't have that history so they're skipping that technology and going straight to something better. I remember a few years ago the power company were trying to upgrade the power network somewhere along the M4, put new lines in somewhere in the Bath area / Hills & Downs. The public objections were huge relating to spoiling the view. They wanted it all under grounding or not at all, what we have works etc etc. I don't know what happened in the end but imagine that wrangling all over the country and all completed by 2035? And paid for by whom? It would have to be private sector as the state won't fund it. They've been building a 200 mile railway for 10 years and only just put a spade in the ground. A charging network would probably have been a better use of money too. I think for it to work they will have to sort the connected chargers so that they can manage the charging of the car based on generation country wide. You pick a time you want it ready for and the longer you give it the less a charge costs otherwise everyone will just say they want it as soon as possible.

The odd tyre sizes seem to be a common thing. My wifes X1 has a tyre size which can only be got in run flats at £190 per tyre. If I want to go away from run flats I have to change all 4 tyres to a different size. A guy at work has a mondeo with the same problem. Spirited driving indeed, just like I used to do when I was 17 in my Fiat Uno. I think for most people it will be fine, I think people who want to trek across Russia should buy something local.

Before we got our own substation at work we had a strip across the car park which never froze regardless of how cold it was. That was where our old electric supply ran. Then imagine that with 20 electric cars plugged in. A lot of premises don't have enough electric and the land lords won't upgrade, the tenant has to pay. Then pay more rent as they are now in a better building. The difference at the moment is I don't need the jerry can at home as I can set off in the morning, stop for 5 minutes and add 400 miles range to the car. The electric option currently is stop for 40 minutes and add 100 - 300 miles range. I don't want to do that in a morning, or during the working day (although it's going to be the next excuse!), or on the way home. So I have to be able to charge 2 - 3 cars at my house fully overnight for most journeys and I want a range of 500 miles. So it has to charge faster than 40 minutes away from home or have a real range of 500+ miles before I can say it compares to the car I have now.