need defender 90

[andrewdunn]

hello all,
i am looking for a defender 90,something like a 1996 onwards.have a tight budget just getting into the hole thing, i have roughly 3grand to spend or someone willing to p/x a 2003 clio dynamique in black. please help

Edited by andrewdunn on Wednesday 10th December 21:00

[Jim44]

Hi, I have a 1996 300tdi 90 for sale, for about that money at the moment. It is a County van in green but has side windows fitted but no rear seats.

Contact me if you are interested.

[andrewdunn]

hello mate, could you send me some details please and would it be cash or would you consider taking my car in against it?thanks alot adam

[heightswitch]

at the risk of being flamed by the poor hapless afflicted souls on here....

Save yourself all the aggro, grief, breakdowns, frosty fingers on a cold morning, earache due to the constant drumming at 70mph, The boynggg the roof makes at motorway speeds in windy conditions etc etc etc.

Buy yourself a short wheelbase Isuzu Trooper Instead. Cheaper to buy, reliable, cheap bits from Milner offroad, just as good offroad, warm, faster, more powerful, just as good to tow with


I will guarantee the following with your Defender purchase.

1. You will need a cylinder head in your ownership
2. You will blow at least 2 head gaskets if you do anything like a 12-15k annual mileage
3. You will need to get your gearbox fettled because it rattles itself to bits.

A land rover is only any good if you are a farmer driving 30 miles a day across fields carrying sheep feed and hay.

That said their is a 200Tdi with all the expensive gay bits in the classifieds at the moment for £3750

The best of the bad bunch is a pre 1998 300Tdi, before the anti roll bars were fitted.

its a disease and you must at all costs prevent yourself from catching it. I still periodically get drawn into a dealership to look at the new improved transit van version. I am resisting.

N.


N.

[ta23]

Strange how mine has done 140k driven hard all its life and done none of what you describe.
Had 2.5 N/a-300TDIs and TD5 all fine.

[Psimpson7]

heightswitch said:

1. You will need a cylinder head in your ownership
2. You will blow at least 2 head gaskets if you do anything like a 12-15k annual mileage
3. You will need to get your gearbox fettled because it rattles itself to bits.

No you wont!

You will only get problems like 1 and 2 if you run them out of water and overheat them.

Gearboxes are also fine. There are Discoveey 1's over here with 400-500k km on, and a lot havent had any drivetrain work done

[heightswitch]

Psimpson7 said:

heightswitch said:

1. You will need a cylinder head in your ownership
2. You will blow at least 2 head gaskets if you do anything like a 12-15k annual mileage
3. You will need to get your gearbox fettled because it rattles itself to bits.

No you wont!

You will only get problems like 1 and 2 if you run them out of water and overheat them.

Gearboxes are also fine. There are Discoveey 1's over here with 400-500k km on, and a lot havent had any drivetrain work done

This was mine.



Low mileage, bought at 50k and ran to 135k. Fully specialist serviced and everything lavished on it. i am sorry but I maintain you all have an incurable disease in my ownership It needed swivels, tie bar bushes, wheel bearings, head gasket and head was found to be cracked between heater plugs.

I still get drawn into the landy garages but c'mon fellas 35k for a 50's designed ladder frame, alloy riveted body and transit van engine. someones having a laugh.

the "feeling" you get driving a landy is another matter but don't delude yourself into imagining they are any more than a utility vehicle for crossing fields. The driveline is just not upto long distance towing and motorway work. it simply shakes itself to bits.

Yes it is supremely good off road but My L200 was just as good albeit slightly compromised with the overhangs and my trooper if anything is better.

All I can say is that if you really have driven defenders for long distances without problems then you are very very lucky. Don't try and delude yourself that they are as good as a modern jap equivalent though.

This is what I have now. and I bought it for 1/2 what a 12 year old landy would have cost. do you really want to send a poor lad out to buy a landy in the danger area territory of budget available without telling him what else is available.



And this is where I live to test out the drivelines before anyone asks.



My L200 bought brand new, fully serviced, steering lock like an aircraft carrier. needed new diff, new turbo, new drop links all within 3 year of ownership and serviced on the button. good heater though and a lot more comfy than any landy.

I have stated though I still occasionally feel the uncontrolable urge to go into a landy dealer. no other car has given me that!!!

N.

Edited by heightswitch on Saturday 13th December 10:27

[Psimpson7]

HS,

Ok, ok. I fully admit that you do make some very valid points. I fully agree that given the OP's budget there are 'probably' much better options out there. Thats not to say I wouldn't still buy the 90!

I also agree about running costs. I have had mine since 11k miles, it has now done 61k and it has cost, as yours did, a bloody fortune! I have a folder with an inch of parts receipts, all from LR. Whenever it has needed something it has had it regardless.....

That list covers almost every aspect of the car alathough having said that the gearbox and TC has been faultless!

I do however use it immensley hard off road, so I cant really complain! It has probably done over 10k miles off road now. It did 5k miles in 3 weeks back in June on some really attrocious tracks

Must admit I really dislike those earlier l200's. The ones I have used haven't really endeared themselves to me!!

The trooper looks good though, although I do think you are being overly optimistic with its off road prowess!!

Stupid thing is I am not sure I can bring myself to buy the new one.... The new dash really puts me off!!

Rgds
Pete.

Edited by Psimpson7 on Saturday 13th December 13:04

Edited by Psimpson7 on Saturday 13th December 13:08

[heightswitch]

Psimpson7 said:

HS,

Ok, ok. I fully admit that you do make some very valid points. I fully agree that given the OP's budget there are 'probably' much better options out there. Thats not to say I wouldn't still buy the 90!

I also agree about running costs. I have had mine since 11k miles, it has now done 61k and it has cost, as yours did, a bloody fortune! I have a folder with an inch of parts receipts, all from LR. Whenever it has needed something it has had it regardless.....

That list covers almost every aspect of the car alathough having said that the gearbox and TC has been faultless!

I do however use it immensley hard off road, so I cant really complain! It has probably done over 10k miles off road now. It did 5k miles in 3 weeks back in June on some really attrocious tracks

Must admit I really dislike those earlier l200's. The ones I have used haven't really endeared themselves to me!!

The trooper looks good though, although I do think you are being overly optimistic with its off road prowess!!

Stupid thing is I am not sure I can bring myself to buy the new one.... The new dash really puts me off!!

Rgds
Pete.

Edited by Psimpson7 on Saturday 13th December 13:04

Edited by Psimpson7 on Saturday 13th December 13:08

The trooper is every bit as good as the landy off road. its wheelbase is actually shorter than the landy! I live on the 440M contour line in Northumberland and my spring water supply is one mile away up a 30 degree hill which is soft and spart grass infested. Both The L200 and the Trooper have needed to get me up there in the winter when my water supply has went faulty. both times I wish I had taken a photo. the L200 actually righted an upturned mini digger.

The L200 is a good workhorse but didn't prove very reliable and I got rid when the warranty ended since the parts costs were frightening. I bought a trooper because my brother has one and has done for years. The bits from Milner off road are also very cheap, £10 for a full filter kit, oil, air, 2 x fuel, I kid ye not.

Landies have a cult following and if a brand new one was marketed for the £19k it is worth then a lot more would sell. The dealers though market it towards the cult following and less so these days to the farmers who always traditionally bought them.

The 300 TDi around late 97/98 is the model to go for but a good one will still fetch £6-7k. a trooper is half that and half the age. I still also maintain more reliable, warmer, more powerful, faster, better for towing. The only downside is it doesn't feel as indestructable as the landy

Horses for courses but a landy wears very thin when you're scraping the ice of the inside of the windscreen up in the northumberland hills.

I now have a custom fabricated roof rack on the trooper so I can carry, tow and do everything without the breakdowns



This is what we up here term winter driving:



Even troopers and landies are no good when the snow drifts to 7ft deep. you stay in bed and wait for the snow blower

N.

[*******]

Sounds like you were unlucky. I'm on my third defender and haven't had any of the problems you describe. My current 90 is on about 55k miles and has needed a new intercooler hose and manifold studs replacing (common on Td5s with any sort of power upgrade) and that's it. Previous 110 had nothing at all go wrong with it, though I only had that for 3 years, from new.

As for Troopers, they're the vehicles with the grenade engines that can basically eat themselves at any time, leaving you with a worthless heap of metal. Hmmm.

[heightswitch]

******* said:

Sounds like you were unlucky. I'm on my third defender and haven't had any of the problems you describe. My current 90 is on about 55k miles and has needed a new intercooler hose and manifold studs replacing (common on Td5s with any sort of power upgrade) and that's it. Previous 110 had nothing at all go wrong with it, though I only had that for 3 years, from new.

As for Troopers, they're the vehicles with the grenade engines that can basically eat themselves at any time, leaving you with a worthless heap of metal. Hmmm.

The problem with forums is reading too much into comments. I think it is the main reason we have a credit crunch now.

The grenade engine is the 3.0 twin cam (my model) The problem was traced to a bad batch of injector seals which were prone to failure allowing oil and diesel to swap places in the engine which caused a hydraulic siezure and breaking of the engine.
The difference with Izuzu however is that when I bought mine in April this year on a 51 plate I rang the Izuzu dealer, quoted the chassis number and in it went for a free re-call and new injectors.

Other than that the cars are bomb proof. The main dealer I spoke to, because I had researched the topic told me he had replaced 8 engines in approx 8 years. don't forget they stopped making this in 2002. they are still going strong?

The previous 3.1 in the older model is also know to pop the odd head gasket but pound for pound and mile for mile their isn't any compromise. 50k is only one and a half years of motoring for me.

At 38k for a new defender you expect a bit more than you get. and the budget the OP has got you get a lot more and more reliability by buying anything but a defender.

N.

[*******]

heightswitch said:

The problem with forums is reading too much into comments. I think it is the main reason we have a credit crunch now.

The grenade engine is the 3.0 twin cam (my model) ...

Other than that the cars are bomb proof. The main dealer I spoke to, because I had researched the topic told me he had replaced 8 engines in approx 8 years. don't forget they stopped making this in 2002. they are still going strong?

The previous 3.1 in the older model is also know to pop the odd head gasket but pound for pound and mile for mile their isn't any compromise. 50k is only one and a half years of motoring for me.

At 38k for a new defender you expect a bit more than you get. and the budget the OP has got you get a lot more and more reliability by buying anything but a defender.

N.

Not sure what you mean in the first para, particularly the credit crunch reference.

As to the rest, not much of a defence for Troopers really. Think about it- a main dealer has admitted to replacing 8 destroyed engines in 8 years. I wonder how many he sold in that time, not hundreds of the things I'll bet. Add to that the fact that any vehicle that's blown up out of warranty is unlikely to be taken to a main dealer for an engine replacement that'd cost more than the vehicle was worth... not looking too good.

Also, £38k for a new Defender?

[heightswitch]

******* said:

heightswitch said:

The problem with forums is reading too much into comments. I think it is the main reason we have a credit crunch now.

The grenade engine is the 3.0 twin cam (my model) ...

Other than that the cars are bomb proof. The main dealer I spoke to, because I had researched the topic told me he had replaced 8 engines in approx 8 years. don't forget they stopped making this in 2002. they are still going strong?

The previous 3.1 in the older model is also know to pop the odd head gasket but pound for pound and mile for mile their isn't any compromise. 50k is only one and a half years of motoring for me.

At 38k for a new defender you expect a bit more than you get. and the budget the OP has got you get a lot more and more reliability by buying anything but a defender.

N.

you mean

Troopers really looking too good.

When you quote people you should quote what they have said in context, not delete the bits of the post you don't agree with ??

answering your post.

Sorry 35k for a new defender.

The point I am making is that engines that have blown up have blown up because they have not had the oil level checked regularly and the problem was not noticed by the owners until it was too late.

my other point is that the failure was a simple rubber seal on an injector

my other point was that the failures to engines have been minor in number when compared to the world market troopers are sold into and the number of units / failures in existance.

As an afflicted land rover owner I know I will never change your opinion I shall enjoy my warm 174hp trooper with comfy seats, electric heated mirrors as standard and just as good towing / off road performance.

The original point was that for the OP's £3.5k There are other much better value buys than a defender which would be 5 years older then an equivalent trooper.

The OP could also buy a 3.1TD which is an older less powerful model if he didn't want to check his oil once per week.

N.

Edited by heightswitch on Sunday 21st December 09:40

[Psimpson7]

A derender isnt 35k!! they start at 18.5k

[heightswitch]

Psimpson7 said:

A derender isnt 35k!! they start at 18.5k

agreed Peter but when you add some basics like wheels etc the price is 25k and the top of the range with trim and finish equivalent to the better finished jap 4x4's is £35k

I think if they marketed landrovers properly for real world money then Tata in the long run would do themselves a lot of good. The new landy with the TDCi engine will undoubtedly be the most reliable made but they are £10k more than they need to be because of the cult status.

I bought a brand new warrior for £19k with full leather air con and electric everything. if land rover sold to the same market then more people would buy. I just don't like to feel ripped off.

Bit off topic though to the original post.

N.

[Ramthorne]

A 110 XS is £23,500 plus VAT, and you could probably haggle some on that. Also because it has over a tonne payload the VAT is reclaimable, so quite a cost effective way to get a 7 seater if you are self employed. And you get a heated front window and seats. The low depreciation also means that the cost of ownership is quite low, and no one assumes you are a second hand car dealer or scrap dealer