Thoughts and musings on the new defender

[BogMonster]

I can't get the videos here but for sport I have just been through the configurator. Ignoring the price for a moment the configurator tells the whole story.

You have options like "off road tyres" with no detail on size, type, tread (look more like ATs at best) - no useful info, and designed to appeal to people that will select that option without having any idea what they need, or even if they need it. It's all aimed to be digestible to the target market, which is people who think they need something but know nothing about it.

You have an electric deploying tow hitch FFS. And most of the rest of the configurator is filled with page after page of utter lifestyle tat that is massively overpriced and, if Land Rover history is anything to go by, usually not very good quality. No wonder it's running about 10 years late, most of that time has been spent building the accessory list.

£45k for a base spec model with steel wheels and a silly little 2 litre engine? Nah. Just not a chance.

What a shame. What an utter shame. It's what everybody predicted really. A lightly tarted up DC100 which somebody has let the mad engineers and the madder marketing people loose on. It's no Defender.

[V8 Freak]

Looks like all car mags / online car associated press were given the same two cars in the same location to record their launch reviews..

[Eightpot]

85 ECUs.

It has 85 ECUs.

Nah. Not interested. 

 

 

[Jamie_grieve]

Meh, I’m not getting caught up in the marketing hype. I agree with everything I wrote on the first post last year, 51 pages ago.

The best part of the whole new defender for me seems to be the non spill dog water bowl. The fake stick on chequer plate, the dc100 recovery eyes replaced with mere plastic adornments, the vulnerable front wing valences....snorkel is just a visual aid which has nothing to do with increasing the wading depth? Is it actually sealed against water ingress and they are covering their backs because there are exposed electronics ? 

I listened to all that design drivel at the unveiling where not a single practical word was spoken.

It’s a lovely car but it’s not a tool to take to work. 

[reb78]

I quite like it, but it isn't a defender. Like lots of other posts, this should have been called something else and then the criticism would be a lot less. 

The adverts have completely ignored the old models - look at the 5 series BMW, thats been an evolution from day 1, they could have attempted that with this but it probably wouldn't work.

Last week, my 110 (still with roof tent on top) spent its evenings dragging trees up the slopes on our fields with straps wrapped around the tree and hooked onto the landy. Tight spaces, scratchy branches/brambles/walls, jumping in and out with dirty clothes and wellies on each time the strap broke, dirty chainsaw slung in the back... I would be too scared of scratching/getting dirty, whatever this new vehicle really is to use if for that!

[Eightpot]

I'm mostly bemused by all that motoring journos, obviously all quoting from the same press pre-release packs,  keep quoting all the similarities and design queues with the Defender - like round headlamps (er, those aren't round), the completely flat bonnet of a Defender (they aren't flat..), Defender style rear lamps (eh?) and chunky heater controls with a rotary knob (thats a window winder).

It has an alpine rooflight. End of similarity. 

As they have designed out the essential tool holder, mug and sandwich table that was the front wings, I'm pleased to see they have incorporated a nice flat area on the side window area where you can put up a nice shelf, spanner rack, mug tree or donkey jacket hook though

[FridgeFreezer]

From some angles I like it but from others it's f***ing terrible or just looks like a D3/4. Also why paint it the colour of your nan's velour sofa?

 

The silver 10 with the snorkel and black arches looks quite smart although the ladder looks like it was made by Playmobil, the 90 with the chequer-plate looks w*nk. Rear lights / squared off corner look terrible IMHO, like someone forgot to move them. Front is too busy and just looks like someone (possibly CJ1) pimped a D3.

Interior looks decent, bit of a harkening to the FL1 in the chunky door trims. Touchscreen thingy can sod off, bet half the features are going to balls up in 2 smartphone generations and over the air software updates are a security hole that will bite sooner or later.

Looks capable enough for most real world use although breakover looks poor especially with those side-steps, I guess that's the price we pay for ever longer wheelbases. The fact they're showing so much off-road (and factory winch & snorkel) is at least moderately encouraging although I'm sure that will be dismissed as pure marketing, it's more pretence than a lot of 4x4 companies bother making in their marketing in case anyone actually tries it.

Looks practical enough in terms of space & seating etc.

Looked quite light on its feet or possibly just very stiffly sprung... or possibly just less massive than the rest of the current lineup?

The 85 ECU's thing is probably true for any car depending what you count as an ECU - if everything's on the CANbus then every light, button, and sensor could count as its own ECU.

 

Person of the day has to be the marketing type who unironically penned the line "Alpine lights flood the interior" I thought they'd fixed that by now!

[Cynic-al]

I looked at getting a transporter kombi but the cool tax was too much. Way over priced for what they are. Cars have jumped up in price but you can still get deals. Our citroen relay at work had a list price of £27,000+vat and we paid £14,000+vat brand new. OK its not a transporter but it's a works van.

The front wing reminds me of the little Jeep that fiat make. The back looks like a countryman. 

I would have one, I like the lots of seat options, the air suspension and the wash down kit, the storage rails, cool box, remote warm up, built in towing eyes, rubber liners, winch option, roof box garage storage, , also like the petrol option. I'm put off by the auto only gearbox and Land Rovers reliability record when it comes to tech. 

However the number 1 problem, the one I've just priced up online was £85,707. That is so far out of my league, i don't have that to spend on a car. Even as a company car it would cost me about £1,200 a month in BIK tax, I don't have that to spend on a car I'm never going to own either. It's also not far off a v8 G-class. 

[Eightpot]

I can't really figure out why they have introduced another model that is essentially the same as thier already overcrowded lineup in exactly the same niche?   What does this do that the disco or RR doesnt?  It's like the bad old days of Leyland when they had Toledos competing against marinas competing against allegros competing against Austin 1100s, while the customers quietly snuck off and bought Escorts..

[UdderlyOffroad]

2 hours ago, FridgeFreezer said:

The 85 ECU's thing is probably true for any car depending what you count as an ECU - if everything's on the CANbus then every light, button, and sensor could count as its own ECU.

This, microcontrollers are pennies in quantities...so your interior light has a micro controller that performs on/off/dim slowly that used to be a capacitor and resistor combination.  Does that count? It's largely an irrelevance, provided there's some resilience built into the thing.  So it won't leave you stranded if any of the non-vital ECUs goes belly up and pulls the rest of the network down with it.

 

2 hours ago, Eightpot said:

As they have designed out the essential tool holder, mug and sandwich table that was the front wings

No car will have this now, gotta protect pedestrians in a crash

Edited September 10, 2019 by UdderlyOffroad

[Bowie69]

50 minutes ago, Eightpot said:

I can't really figure out why they have introduced another model that is essentially the same as their already overcrowded lineup in exactly the same niche? 

Lack of imagination?

How many other manufacturers make only lifted luxury off road vehicles? 

....and you wonder why they aren't actually doing that well as a business....

[Anderzander]

54 minutes ago, UdderlyOffroad said:

No car will have this now, gotta protect pedestrians in a crash

Jimny, G Wagen, and the Jeep seem to have them ? 

[L19MUD]

All in all dissapointing, I was really looking forward to this but I can't see myself having the desire to own one

I admit I don't buy my cars new but I did buy my last Range Rover at 5 years old and I still have it. I just don't really see where I would fit this in my life instead of my Defender or Range Rover.

It will never be able to replace my 200tdi Defender as a general workhorse that can be hosed out, climbed on when putting the kayaks on the roof, tows all the trailers etc as it is just too posh and flimsy for that. I guess modern saftey standards are partly to blame for that - stopping steel bumpers like I have on mine which have taken their fair share of knocks but have saved the bodywork .

Equally if the prices are anything to go by - who would pay north of 80k for a Defender when you can have a Range Rover for the same money?

I suppose it would start to make sense if I sold the 200tdi Defender and the L322 Range Rover and replaced with one of these (once someone else has paid for the bulk of the depreciation!) but then I think I would have a 'Jack of all trades' and a master of none.

Also  - I presume there will be no chassis cab version? I don't expect that to be workable with the monocoque design?

It seems very strange to me that they didn't kick off with a double cab 110 as that seems to be the popular part of the SUV market that Land Rover are not already in

 

 

 

 

[UdderlyOffroad]

23 minutes ago, Anderzander said:

Jimny, G Wagen, and the Jeep seem to have them ? 

I'm no expert, but I believe all of those are still able to use their existing type approval, and therefore crash test results to avoid the need to meet the new pedestrian safety requirements.  The new Defender cannot, as it is a completely new design and will require new type approval.  It cannot use the old Defender's 'type approval' (if such a thing ever existed).

[Anderzander]

Seems odd though as the Jimny and G Wagon have had recent significant change - I’d have thought that they would need fresh approval after that degree of change.

 

The 110x starts at £78k

[Anderzander]

I’ve just configured the base model - with the petrol engine and all the off road options and it’s £52k

[FridgeFreezer]

8 minutes ago, Anderzander said:

Seems odd though as the Jimny and G Wagon have had recent significant change - I’d have thought that they would need fresh approval after that degree of change.

LR hit limits on things like the ancient design of the bulkhead where they couldn't move anything (wheel, pedals, footwells, seatbox, door pillars, elbow room...) to create space for modernising without falling foul of re-approval. Also the Defender was being assembled by hand (by necessity because of the ancient design) whereas the other two were designed in an era when robots were a thing - nailing leaky old Defenders together by hand wasn't viable no matter how much we might want it to be, and charging people 50k for them didn't help because then people (possibly those hipsters in the adverts) expect it to not leak or rattle as much as it does and keep coming back under warranty...

ISTR the Jimny is a monocoque despite looking like it hasn't changed since the SJ410, guess they squeaked it in in the 90's before safety regs got too strict.

G-Wagen I guess they've benefited from it being more modern and robust to start with and they just keep shoe-horning bigger engines / more leather / ugly trim into them without having to make major changes to the platform. Notice the new Defender can come with near 400hp, yet LR shied away from going anywhere near that with the old platform (apart from those few limited-edition very-breathed-on ones) which says a lot about the new setup Vs the old one.

[steve b]

....the cost of the options on the above would have bought 10x  80" when they were released , yeah I know inflation , time etc. , etc.  but holy heritage Batman !!

cheers

Steve b

[Anderzander]

The Range Rover Defender - with 85 ECU’s

[Challo]

I am enjoying this thread, although in essence its says as much about the membership of this forum as it does about the new vehicle.

I think a lot of us on here are hopeless romantic optimists harking to days past when life was simpler.

In a world where MP's don't take any notice of their electorate and ringfenced state pension funds are Maxwelled by the government, this new Defender could've been a helluva lot worse.

I would go as far as to say it could remove our reasons for having 2 vehicles. 

I like a lot on here have a second daily and a 110(currently in component form).

But the new Defender looks like it would serve daily duties, nipping to the tip, camping, family stuff and a fair crack at off roading.

So, it may not justify a second vehicle for daily duties as it covers all bases, which I expect was the design brief.

Looks like JLR just shafted us all....... and then the price!

Edited September 10, 2019 by Challo
Spelling whilst sober.

[deep]

8 hours ago, UdderlyOffroad said:

Long time no post...

I don't hate it, but £45k for a basic spec 110??  LR clearly not interested in the market that is farmers and tradesmen buying a mid-spec jap pickup for £26k are they?  A few grand more, possibly, but they've clearly made the decision to take themselves out of that market altogether, despite the 'commerical' variants.

 

One of the quick previews pointed out that the commercial variant will start at £35,000.  Highly academic to me.

[reb78]

28 minutes ago, deep said:

One of the quick previews pointed out that the commercial variant will start at £35,000.  Highly academic to me.

Always good for those who somehow wangle a 20% discount on everything.....

[Mo Murphy]

Well that was a bit of an anti-climax.

If you had one of those, what would you fix at the weekend? 

You'd probably end up talking to the wife !

Quelle horreur !

Mo

[Naks]

here's a link to the brochure, with all dimensions/capabilities, etc.: https://www.landrover.co.za/Images/Land-Rover-Defender-Brochure-1L6632000000BZAEN01P_tcm299-715173.pdf

[reb78]

5 hours ago, Mo Murphy said:

Well that was a bit of an anti-climax.

If you had one of those, what would you fix at the weekend? 

You'd probably end up talking to the wife !

Quelle horreur !

Mo

What would you drive at the weekend? Because I presume you mean you would have to talk to the wife because the 'DC100' is in the dealers having an electrical fault chased under warranty....?