About 10 days ago driving back from Norfolk via A14 I felt some vibrations when driving, seconds later a bang and then complete loss of power. I managed to coast safely to the side of the road but it was going no further.

Having lurked around this forum for some time I knew what the problem was as soon as it happened.

My vehicle is covered by extended warranty so it was a quick call to LR assist, no messing about they arranged for straight recovery, not even bothering with the investigation stage. Took 6 hours to get home, after a short break at South Mimms to switch relay service. Trip is normally 2.5 hours so not bad considering, I was kept informed of what to expect by LR Assist regularly.

Sport was recovered to my local dealer next day and was looked at couple of days later, in the meantime I was been provided with an f-pace via Enterprise.

Next day dealer confirmed it was a seized crank, and it was definitely not covered by the extended warranty. Dealer said they would contact Land Rover for goodwill payment, and advised they expected 100% goodwill, they also checked what car I had been provided with and later contacted Enterprise who then found me a MY19 sport instead of the F-pace.

My Sport was purchased from this dealer, it has been serviced there, and I purchased the extended warranty in Feb this year, it’s an MY15 SDV6 AB with 73Kmiles

Few days later dealer has confirmed all costs for engine replacement will be covered by goodwill, and the new engine has been ordered, should be back with me next week.

I understand things break, what’s important to me is how the suppliers respond. In my case I cannot fault LR Assist, the dealer, or Land Rover. I wanted to share my story to show there are good dealers out there, and Land Rover are not abandoning all customers who experience this issue, it's a shame Land Rover do not confirm they will cover all affected vehicles, instead of treated each case on its merits, I did have a couple of nervous days waiting for confirmation, but it does not appear to be a lost cause.


Good chance I will now replace mine with a new P400 HST early next year

Mark ------------------------------------------------------------------
2020 Range Rover Sport SVR - Eiger Grey
2015 Range Rover Sport AB SDV6 - Aruba/Grey - Gone

It’s good to hear some good news about the crankshaft failure getting fixed for a change,When I purchased my15 AB in March I got it in writing from the supplying dealer that they will cover the crankshaft in case of failure. Andy.
21 Ford Ranger
Gone but not forgotten
Focus RS Red Edition
2015 RRS AB Fuji.
2014 RRS SC Santorini
2016 VW Amarok
2014 RRS AB Fuji
2012 RRS Red Edition Fuji
2015 Nissan Navara
2012 RRS SE Santorini
2008 RRS White
2007 RRS Santorino

First one of these I've heard of being solved so quickly!

I guess there are others but we just don't hear about all the successful ones.

I wonder what internal checklist they have to go through before they say yes we'll cover 100%. Non JLR Vehicle

The failure of the warranty company to cover such a thing is probably why LR are reducing the extended warranty cover to one year. Why pay a company to provide a warranty if you then end up footing the bill yourself to fix it?

Glad to hear it will all be fixed for free (to you).  2012 SDV6 - it's missing a couple of cylinders
2008 TDV8 - it was a labour of love and is much missed

^^^ completely agree with RRSTDV8, I think he is spot on.

Also happy for you that you are getting this sorted at no cost to yourself Many others are not so lucky  Kev

MY2014 L405 RR Vogue SE 4.4 SDV8 in Corris Grey
MY2010 L320 RRS HSE 3.0 TDV6 in Stornoway Grey

It could be that the warranty company has had to pay out on so many claims that they have refused to pay for any more repairs, they will have a business model for claims for various marques and now JLR has had to focus on just how claims there are. The message that long standing buyers of SDv6 engined vehicles are abandoning the brand because of the remote risk that they will a crank seizure/ snap may also have focused a few minds in the company. I know my local dealership struggles to shift on any SDv6 engined Land/Range Rover without now offering reassurance that the engine will be replaced FOC to the owner. They are also trying to launch an extremely important to the brand new model and need some good PR as Dieselgate, oil dilution and DPF issues are having a major impact on Land Rover sales. 12 years ago the dealership I used to use would not even order me a petrol RRS all they sold were diesels and now they are loosing sales because they cannot get enough allocation of PHEV’s or V8’s or even Si4 engined cars as JLR want to clear backlogs of unsold SDv6’s.. in May when I was checking on my New Defender situation I said I wanted a PHEV............. 1st it isn’t being launched with the first models, 2nd the manager showed me his reservations list............. 90% were 6cylinder petrol engined version’s and PHEV’s I struggled to find a diesel powered car on the list. Ingenium isn’t popular too as initial RRE and DS suffered terrible problems with oil dilution, DPF clogging and noisy engines. 2020 Pangea Green 1st Edition D240 New Defender 110 is here and loving it
2018 Melting Silver Mini Countryman PHEV - soon to be replaced
2015MY Corris Grey SDv6 HSE Dynamic, the best car I have ever owned, totally reliable only a cou0le of rattles in 3 years, now no longer in my care
Also in my garage is a 1996 TDi300 Defender 90 County HT made into a fake CSW

The 12 month warranty must be the one they call Assured warranty,when I was at Hatfields last week I noticed some used had Approved on the front on the car & some had Assured.When I enquired about a new DS sport the salesman did ask me how many miles I did a year & as I only do about 5-6000 he said a diesel wouldn’t be good for me & recommended a petrol,as Tim says they are probably pushing petrol cars now with all the problems they are having with diesels. Andy.
21 Ford Ranger
Gone but not forgotten
Focus RS Red Edition
2015 RRS AB Fuji.
2014 RRS SC Santorini
2016 VW Amarok
2014 RRS AB Fuji
2012 RRS Red Edition Fuji
2015 Nissan Navara
2012 RRS SE Santorini
2008 RRS White
2007 RRS Santorino

Mark314 wrote:

My Sport was purchased from this dealer, it has been serviced there, and I purchased the extended warranty in Feb this year, it’s an MY15 SDV6 AB with 73Kmiles

It's good hearing of a smooth positive result for the dreaded SDV6 crankshaft issue.

Earlier this month I renewed my LR warranty. I had been planning going with Warranty Direct so checked prices with everything added, uncapped labour, 0% contribution and excess of £0 as this makes a fair comparison with the LR one. I was getting a price of around £900 which was £300 better than LR but after a couple of days when I went to buy it the price had shot up to £1600. Changing the excess to £50 drops £300 so a sensible option but it's still more expensive than LR. So is this Warranty Direct realising a RRS risk is too high so putting prices up?

What bothers me is if the LR warranty isn't covering the crank issue as it's a known fault, how come LR aren't being forced to fix things? It would be interesting for this to be checked in a legal way but I guess the costs would be too high for the majority of us.

As it is I'm unsure if I've insured against the very thing I am trying to protect myself against, the SDV6 engine. I always pay for stuff in full but for this warranty I chose to pay monthly with a view to cancelling payment once I can figure what's best to do. 13MY Range Rover Sport Autobiography SDV6 - mine
14MY Range Rover Evoque Dynamic SD4 Black Pack - wife's
99MY Defender 90 TD5, Soft Top Conversion - my toy, and bairns favourite

@insiorc

Mine is coming out at £982.02 for a year. Uncapped, 0 Excess, 0 Contribution with everything covered. Mine is a 2012 but MY13 model. I wouldn't have expected that much of a difference unless you have high mileage?

Mine is also late 2012 MY13, and 51k miles. I've just done another price check and still £1600 for a year. That £900 odd price you paid was what I originally got quoted, until I returned to buy. 13MY Range Rover Sport Autobiography SDV6 - mine
14MY Range Rover Evoque Dynamic SD4 Black Pack - wife's
99MY Defender 90 TD5, Soft Top Conversion - my toy, and bairns favourite

Thats a bit sneaky of Warranty Direct!

Tim take what I say from the amateur place it is being said; for the RRS beyond the two 2ltr engines SI4 and SD4 the SDV6 is still the least depreciating RRS in the range in various trim guises.

Performs a small margin better than the PHEV and then better than the SVR and then lots better than the SCV8 & SDV8, why? I don't know, but I checked HPI CAP across all the models in the range and as of yesterday that's where the market was on their cars.

I wonder if there were any silent changes to the engine at all, or is it right up to present day that the SDV6 engines can do this?

Personally I think its a cracking engine when it works but that isn't saying much! I had an SDV8 RRS loaner for a long time and then I had my own one and I'm surprised how little difference there is between the two engines.

People are right that there's no top end grunt in the SDV6 like there is in the SDV8, however its a smoother engine and there's less weight over the front end, so I'd say it comes neck and neck in a compromise and that's before we've looked at the price difference!

Just wish it wouldn't blow its crank at random! Lol Non JLR Vehicle

I think everyone here would share that view that it is a cracking (excuse the pun in relation to crank shafts!) Engine, smooth quiet and plenty of power and torque. It suits the car to a T. The TDv8 was probably the best engine for the RRS and FFRR but it got strangled by emissions problems. I will say this too - the 2.7 was actually a much better engine than the very agricultural BMW straight 6 LR used in the early L322 FFRR, it was a rattly wheezy old thing the sure didn’t like being huddled along, progressive acceleration was its forte not, BMW used the same engine in their own saloons and early X5’s but it was much smoother and quieter with a different ECU map to what they gave LR
I believe in 2015 or 2016 there was a redesign of the bearing mount that was supposed to have either stopped or reduced the problem but finding out which engine serial numbers / production dates that that mod applies from is like trying to get blood out of a stone. The DPF issue and the oil dilution issues are more to do with the exhaust design than the engine. The change of design doesn’t account for why more recent engines have suffered crank/seizing issues, it could be an unrelated cause. In 2006 there were a lot of angry owners of 2.7TDv6’s who suffered seized engines too but my memory now is a bit hazy about engine problems that far back. 2020 Pangea Green 1st Edition D240 New Defender 110 is here and loving it
2018 Melting Silver Mini Countryman PHEV - soon to be replaced
2015MY Corris Grey SDv6 HSE Dynamic, the best car I have ever owned, totally reliable only a cou0le of rattles in 3 years, now no longer in my care
Also in my garage is a 1996 TDi300 Defender 90 County HT made into a fake CSW

insiorc wrote:

What bothers me is if the LR warranty isn't covering the crank issue as it's a known fault, how come LR aren't being forced to fix things? It would be interesting for this to be checked in a legal way but I guess the costs would be too high for the majority of us.

I might, albeit for my uncovered ARC suspension failure in a 2015 Dynamic.
- there is no exclusion for corrosion in the warranty documents. Pathetic. Though JLR paid 40% on a FSH bought from new car. 2022 P440e AB