Defender for daily drive?

Defender for daily drive?

Author
Discussion

Graham

16,368 posts

283 months

Thursday 17th January 2013
quotequote all
Crossflow Kid said:
Where do you get your info from?
A Defender has a Series 1 bulkhead? Really? Really really?
rolleyes
well they are both made if steel i suppose rolleyes

all the different defenders dont even share the same bulkhead !!


vcm

72 posts

141 months

Friday 18th January 2013
quotequote all
umm... crash testing and safety,. now i don't actually know a lot about these test ratings, and i'm not really too bothered. the defender, as has been said by others is a big, strong beast of a vehicle. this side impact protection concern, take off the sills, fit nice looking powder coated rock/tree sliders - sorted. head/side on crashes. over the last few years i've experienced the result of at least half a dozen. my vehicles, generally not me driving by the way. no injuries to driver. generally 1-1.5k to put the offending front corner straight. these seem to be 30mph-ish impacts. roll-over (or should that be fall over). a few years ago, in my 2 year old td5 90, i had the mis-fortune to be the passenger on the m5 south of bristol. dark + very wet weather. the drivers daily was a golf gti, so slightly different handling characteristics.. driving at the top end of possible speed, evasive action was taken to avoid sideswipeing a vehicle in the middle lane. then came the first over correction,then... we know the sequence. so after hitting the armco, it fell over at near the legal limit. slid down the road on its side for a few hundred yards, and stopped. the only injury was to my partner. caused by me putting my arm across her chest, to minimize her impact as we were aiming for the armco. anyway, my side of the vehicle was on the floor, it ground away the door handles, mirror,started on the front windscreen etc.most panels had been got. the side was flat and smooth. NOT squashed by 18 inches as a poster suggested would happen. now then.would these jeeps etc, whilst not knocking them, have come off as well. i'll never know. could you then have got a lorry to pull your vehicle upright, get back in it, start it up, then drive it onto the hard shoulder? unlikely. do i still drive a defender. of course. all the safety features in the world wont save you if luck isn't with you, just drive sensibly, within the vehicles limits, and enjoy it... (it ain't a GTI !)