Discovery - let the flames commence!

Luke

Luke

Luke

Soldato
Joined
19 Jul 2005
Posts
7,069
Location
S. Yorkshire
Let's get this off to a flying start, I don't need a Discovery - I want one.

There are areas that I will make use of:
Large load area
7 seats (I want to be able carry 5 adults and 2 kids)
Off road capability - I'd like to start green laning

There are areas that are no so great:
Reliability
Size
Fuel economy

I have a motorbike and am finding myself doing a lot of mileage on that instead of the car. I can only accomodate 1 car so having a daily driver and a toy is not an option.

It's not an 'I need', it's an 'I want'. I had a Defender before but it was just a little to agricultural. A Disco to me seems a (slightly) more civilised option.

Aside from poor reliability, are there any other reasons not to get one, or are there any better alternatives in the £7k-£8k price range?

I'm fully expecting to get flamed for this post.
 
Possibly. It's an 'I want a Discovery but am willing to entertain other ideas if any are forthcoming' thread!
 
Discoverys are cool. No flame suit needed.

I'm assuming at that price it would be a disco 2? I'm guessing the better Disco 3 is a bit more than 7-8k.
 
Yep, Disco 2 at that budget.
What I'm not sure about is whether to go for a late Disco 1 on a 300tdi or early Disco 2 with a TD5 engine. Disco 3 starts at £10k really.
 
I had a disco series one till it died from chronic rust. But for that one you'll be looking at a Disco 2 or a mint Disco 1. My dad got a Disco 2 and is a great car. Yes they can be unreliable but there a huge parts industry.

Disco 1 are better for off roading and the very easy to mod. 2" inch lift kits can be had for pretty cheap and a set off mud terrains and it'll conquer any green lane you throw at it. Eventhough reliabilty is a problem, parts are pretty cheap as long as you dont buy land rover parts and if your got some mechinical experiance there not much you cant do. But on the road the Disco 2 are nicer to drive.

Loved my disco 1, yes there are properly better/ more reliable 4x4 but i would go for another landy in a heart beat. Be warned it is a labour of love. If you want more advice, try www.difflock.com, great community again and can get some good advice. The main thing to look for is rust on them, the 300tdi engine as long as it looked after will go on long after the rest of the car has rusted away. Bring a screw driver and dont be afraid to poke at everything, areas to look at for at the boot pan (can be expensive to fix) wheel arches, seals, actually just poke everything. For that money you should get a good one. Enjoy it!
 
The Disco 2 with a TD5 would be my choice with that budget - too much for a 1 and not enough for a good 3.

They're not as easy to mod as a 1, and all the better for it, I don't recall EVER seeing one heavily modified for offroading (Expedition yes, but offroading no) and that means you shouldn't have to deal with all the abused dogs you'll find when looking at Disco 1's or Defenders.

Another thing to watch - The air suspension. Its nice and all but get coils for reliability :p It's prone to leaks and everything, and is quite expensive to replace.

If you do buy one watch the wadding depth - TD5's aren't as good in the water as the 200/300 TDi's (supposedly at any rate) and you defiantly don't want to drench the ECU :eek:

The Disco 2 is the only Land Rover I'd consider in that budget, but if you're feeling very brave, and are prepared to hunt for a mint one, a P38a might be worth a look, but it will bankrupt you unless you're handy with a spanner :p You have been warned :)
 
chumpit said:
so when is fox going to pop in ask for a in-depth credit report, annual earnings and monthly outgoings?
Click to expand...

About the same time he posts 'I am worried about the tax being £245 a year' or 'I'm looking to leverage synergies for a capital downgrade from my 59 plate Fiesta' or 'I do 4k a year so I need 50mpg' or 'I am really rich and can totally afford my car but I'd like to buy an old Fiat Uno so I can afford to go to the cinema every so often' or whatever other utterly inane and nonsensical requirements people put into spec me threads that make me and others think 'hang on, you dont have a clue what you are doing'.

But he hasn't posted anything like this, it just seems like a normal spec me thread, which I'll now leave to those better educated on the cars he's after than myself.

Thanks for thinking of me, though, I love you too.
 
Like griffo_001 one said, on a disco 2 watch out for the air suspenion. You cant get kits to replace the air suspension to standard springs. And as he said hunt for one, there are plenty around. Another thing to watch out for on the 2's is the knocking on the steering at full lock, its usually the UJ being knackered. A cheap fix though. You'll be surprise how well the handle the road. It will never be as good as a standard saloon, but for something that weighs over 2 tonnes, it can stick well to the road. Trust me on that, sharp bends on a country road, it scared the hell out of me but it got me through them alright.

As 'whitecrook' said, have a look at range rover, the older ones have the same chassis as the disco 1's. But even the newer ones can be had for that price. But for some reason there seams to be a higher cost associate to them. As you said in your op, a disco is a more civilised option. For that money you can get a fully kiited out disco 2, with full leather and all that lark. They then make defender look like sheds. But as i stated in my earlier post, its a labour of love. Having some mechincal skill deffenlty helps!

PS Fox, ive been a long time lurker and read allot of your posts, you strike me as the type of person who on this forums is like Marmite. But for your sins you always give out sound advice that can't faulted and your not afraid to admit when your wrong and give over to people who know more about the subject then yourself.
 
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Had a 1996 series 1 V8 ES with LPG conversion for a number of years. It helped that I had a friend who was a LR mechanic in terms of keeping cost down.

Couple of things I would point out from your list:
Load area - isnt that huge. Its tall, but not deep, unless you are folding the rears down.
7 seats - series 1 load area seats fold out and face each other. They are very much "occasional" seats and I would not recommend them for long journeys or adults at any time. I believe series 2 load area seats face forward, but don't know the impact on the carrying capacity - the series 1 seats are very neat in how they fold away.

My V8 was bullet proof on the engine side, but being an ES there was a lot of stuff that could go wrong - electric seats, twin electric sunroofs and so on.
Leather was a must have as far as I was concerned, and was good quality and took everything I threw at it in about 8 years of ownership.
My understanding from my pet mechanic is that the D2 is far more reliable in the electrics/gadgets than the D1, bar the air suspension issue already commented on. Driving position was good, and interior felt "right". "Wallow-ey" at speed/in corners, but its a tall 4*4, so what do you expect? (Also understand that road feel is much improved in the D2)
Agree that any you go and see you should poke everywhere, and a reasonable seller would not mind this. Rear door on mine was a water trap - not sure if this was addressed in the D2.
Other thing on mine was the dashboard warping - common issue, might not be relevent on the age you are looking at but be aware.
 
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