A Land Rover Defender 90 XS "The county's strongest breed"

[AJordan]

What with the recent demise of the Defender, I thought it would be nice to share my experience of my own. In actual fact I've owned it since September, but what with one thing and another, I've somehow not got around to it thus far;

Most of the below is ripped straight from my thread on defender2.net, so apologies for any typos or errors (warning, pic heavy!);


I've been around Land Rovers all my life, (my mum had a 300tdi Discovery way back before 'the school run' caught the bug & my dad has worked at the local Dealership since I was two). So I can say I've seen my fair share of Defenders, from late 300tdi's through TD5's to the current model. This, and a diet of LRO back issues & Camel Trophy DVD's, fuelled my enthusiasm for the green oval from a young age.

After having smoked around in hatchbacks for my first three years of driving, I decided that given the Defender's imminent demise, it had to be now or never to get my hands on one of my own. Spurred on largely by the launch of the Heritage LE's (of which I unsurprisingly missed out on), I took some brave pills, dug deep, and placed an order for the worlds most impractical car for a 20 year old!

This was back in March 2015, and knowing I wanted it for a 1st September registration, I settled down for three months (chopping & changing the spec constantly until the cut off point!).

I'd deliberated long and hard over the final spec, the colour being the main issue. Havana Brown, Montalcino Red & Fuji white all came and went, as did Recaro seats, sunroof & briefly, a winch.

The car finally arrived off a transporter early in August; (pictures below)

2016 MY Defender 90 XS Station Wagon
Scotia Grey
Fitted with;
Carpet
Tow pack
HD Steel Wheels w/Goodyear MTR's

As can be seen from the above, less is probably more. I junked all the fripperies apart from carpets, which would probably have faced the axe as well, had it not been the only option for protecting the rear wheel boxes.













In the intervening period, you could have been forgiven for thinking the local 'honest, salt of the earth, travelling scrap metal traders' had been round;



Picking it up was the first time I'd seen it with the refinished wheels fitted, and I'm really happy with the one colour look throughout. Its exactly what I was aiming for, understated, whilst retaining that something different.

First impressions? Well chuffed with it so far, really over the moon. Yeah it's a slow, noisy, uncomfortable, awful on diesel and has the turning circle of a canal boat. But, with it it brings some sort of charm that only a Defender can.
As expected, when most of my friends and colleagues are driving Fiestas, Audi's & BM 3 Series', it certainly stands out from the crowd.
The question "how did you afford something like that?" is one I've long since given up fending off!

In the first 500 miles I clocked up, (pretty much all Motorway), rough fag packet maths showed 22mpg on a long run at a steady 75ish, dropping to around 15mpg when you push it up to 85/90. All in all pretty horrendous, but for the mileage I do, I'm more than willing to grim and bear it for the time being. Given that I've not changed from the driving style that I've always employed in hatchbacks, I cant expect too much!

Modifications have been kept to a minimum thus far, the new Kenwood unit sits well on the dash, and has much better usability than the standard Alpine unit that came out. Whilst having this fitted I wired a cable from the rear of the radio, under the steering column for my iphone, meaning that I can stay connected without having wires draped all over the dash.
Also had a second 12v socket put in behind the dash, from which a TomTom lead comes up at the windscreen, again for the same reason.

I'd read a fair bit about Mobile Storage Systems' Glovebox kits prior to buying the car, so ordered one earlier this month. Although its a bit pricey at fifty notes, I'd say its worth it in the long run. Especially as I'm toying with the idea of removing the centre box, it allows me to keep my options open.
A note for any Defender owners considering this kit, I'd highly recommend getting hold of plenty of black number plate screwcovers beforehand, as the silver screws supplied stick out rather against the black dashboard!

Longer term, plans for it may include a Britpart XD Handling & Lowering Kit, although this may sound odd, 99.9% of its use is going to be on the road, so anything that improves the handling and allows me to carry a little extra speed through corners is welcome. I also don't feel that the 1'' lowering should harm the looks too much.
Potentially a Safety Devices interior hoop may be on the cards as well, whilst intrusive, it gives that extra comfort, should the worst happen.

I've always wanted a Defender with a winch as well (remember the Best4x4xFar advert with the car going up the Dam?) but this flies in the face of the almost exclusive road use, plus £600plus is a lot of cash to drop on something that never gets used!
Ultimately I suppose, the plan is to not do anything that looks openly lairy and modified, I want it to look 100% factory standard to the untrained eye (LED Light Bars, big alloys and cliched 'One Life' stickers aren't my style).

A few pictures from when I picked it up:

















Since collection, I've racked up about 1,400 miles, and its been fairly solid. Pretty diabolical on fuel still, but all things are relative.

Why so few miles I hear you say? Well, about a month into ownership, I noticed that whenever it rains (as it often does in England) the footwells got very wet, as did I.

Unpeturbed, I took it back, for hopefully a five minute job of adjusting the window rubbers around the windscreen, and I'd be on my way. Not so, the relative complexities of taking the whole roof and top of the car apart (!) and my being in no hurry to get it back, led to me being Defender-less for nearly ten weeks.

During that time I smoked around in a three month old Discovery HSE, wringing the neck of a 3.0 TDV6 wherever I went. Which was fun.

Consequently, going back to the 90 was a fair shock to the system, nearly three months of automatic to 'bucket of spanners' manual took some getting used to.

Overall though, as can be imagined, I rate the Defender highly. Yeah its maybe not your obvious 20 year olds choice, but its a laugh (except when filling up and commuting at rush hour) and I'll look to keep it for the long haul, avoiding the pull of cashing in on the 8k its already jumped in value!

Thanks for reading (this has been a fairly mammoth post) and I'll aim to update more in the future!

Cheers,

Andrew

[HarryH321]

AJordan said:

Overall though, as can be imagined, I rate the Defender highly. Yeah its maybe not your obvious 20 year olds choice, but its a laugh (except when filling up and commuting at rush hour) and I'll look to keep it for the long haul, avoiding the pull of cashing in on the 8k its already jumped in value!

Thanks for reading (this has been a fairly mammoth post) and I'll aim to update more in the future!

Look forward to more updates! This will be a classic and it's nice to see vehicles on here that are out of the box somewhat.
Any reason for ditching the Recaros out of the spec? or just pure necessity/comfort? Still what an example and love the colour
coded wheels to boot, such a good colour choice

[trowelhead]

Absolutely love this!

Good choice keeping it subtle (I'm not so keen on all the bling and recaros and snorkels and LEDs either)

Those wheels suit it perfectly.

[hidetheelephants]

AJordan said:

Why do Beadle's have a LR sized wetroom?

[AJordan]

hidetheelephants said:

Why do Beadle's have a LR sized wetroom?

Thats a handover bay, for doing handovers out of the elements!

[AJordan]

HarryH321 said:

Look forward to more updates! This will be a classic and it's nice to see vehicles on here that are out of the box somewhat.
Any reason for ditching the Recaros out of the spec? or just pure necessity/comfort? Still what an example and love the colour
coded wheels to boot, such a good colour choice

Cost ultimately, from the factory they're something stupid like £2,500/£3,000 a set, and I couldnt really justify spending almost 10% of the invoice price on some seats. That being said, I found them far more comfortable over longer journeys that the standard seats (The first long term Demonstrator I had was fitted with them)