L494 Sport diesel V8 v V6

[Babw]

The missus wants one of these, is it worth having the V8 for the slight increase in grunt but higher running costs? The thing that bothers me the most is reports of the V8 feeling significantly more nose heavy than the V6.

I've only managed to drive a V6 at the local dealer.

[Babw]

54mpg? That's impressive!

How are these diesel engines with short journeys? We might go for a couple of months where it's used purely for very short sub 10 mile journeys.

This will be the first diesel I've ever bought due to this as the other option is the 5.0 V8 which is significantly more expensive in depreciation.

[Babw]

coetzeeh said:

If you are going to lease new with warranty then I guess it is a non issue but there are reports of the TD/SDV6 engines suffering from crankshaft failures.

I'm not going to lease but I was with my local dealer yesterday. After explaining the majority of the use he actually warned against buying a diesel especially as we have no dual carriageways or motorways within close vicinity for a blast to clear the DPF.

Back to the drawing board.

[Babw]

I've put a deposit on a March 2015 Autobiography V6. The tax bracket points to the SDV6 306bhp engine, can anyone confirm whether early 2015 cars had this for sure? A lot of the used 2015 reg cars on the Land Rover approved site seem to have the 199g/km engine.

Also does anyone know what the TL6 package is on the options list?

[Babw]

I bought the above car (March 2015 V6 autobiography) and it's definitely a 306 bhp engine with the lower tax bracket £230 p/a.

[Babw]

I checked my car on the official Land Rover Topix webiste for the spec and the engine is definitely the newer 306bhp/700nm engine. On the official spec list on the Topix site it states "Engine power source 225/700" (KW/NM obviously)

I have a friend who works for JLR and he said the engine was specced from MY15.5 which started around March time. 100% certain on this and I just paid 1 year tax which was £230 compared to a friend who has a MY14 which was £280.

[Babw]

kmpowell said:

Ok - long chat with the dealer which I had a deposit down with. In short there were two updates...

March 2015 (15) MY15.5 - which gave the new 306hp engine
Sep 2015 (65) MY16 - which on top of the new 306hp engine also made standard the All Terrain Progression Control, Auto Access Height, Hands Free gesture tailgate and Wifi. Plus the Software Interface update for the ICE system.

Good to have confirmation.

What is the auto access height feature? I have an Autobiography dynamic MY15.5 which has the all terrain progression control and an access heigh setting.

How much of an improvement is the software interface update for the ICE? What exactly is it?

[Babw]

Good choice. My car is pretty much an exact replica! Bought it for the lady primarily and thought the red would be a bit girly for me but it's growing on me.
Which dealer are you getting it off?

[Babw]

kmpowell said:

By any chance does your registration end TFN?

Not quite, why do you ask?