Well, my car has gone in again today for another bonnet badge and for once I have not been given a rubbish Freelander but the Dealer Principal's Discovery 3 TDV6 HSE. It's Adriatic with privacy glass, chrome side tubes and wind deflectors. looks nice.

It's the first time I have driven the D3 and the first time I have driven the TDV6 engine.

I have to say that even though so far I have only covered about 30 miles in it, none of it on the motorway, I am very impressed with the way it drives.

The engines is smooth and pretty quiet, eons away from my dad's P38 2.5 DT, it pulls well, however does suffer from the lack of puff when you need to overtake in a hurry, something the SC does not get of course!

I can now understand why so many of us have gone for the Diesel RRS, as I'm sure it feels a lot more 'together' in the sport.

The D3 I am driving does not have the Dynamic Response pack and this shows, you can feel it in the firmness of the ride (The D3 seems a bit bouncy and rolly polly) and also very noticable in the brakes, the Brembo's on the SC are superb, the ones in the D3 lack 'clarity' and just feel a bit spongey.

Clearly the interior is much alike to the Sport as they all come from the same parts bin with a few exceptions, however the D3 DOES seem cheaper somehow, despite this car being for sale at £40K at the moment, I'd say the Sport feels better constructed, and more solid.

Interestingly this car has almost the exact same mileage as my car and is almost the same age, at 5500 miles, and it has the Alpaca Leather interior and already places like the armrests and edges of the drivers seat are dirty and look a bit poor. That just confirmed my original opinion that the light colour leather is higher maintenance than the Ebony I chose. Thanks god I did not go for Ivory!

Overall I'd say that if the new V8 D is much better than this engine then it will be a very good car indeed. I am actually considering the swap to a normal Range Rover for that engine, just have to see if they also tweak the Sport, make any facelift changes and how the residuals are going.

I'll update this later today when I have driven it some more. Here's some pics , oh, and while it sat on my drive it developed a suspension fault!





 L319 D4 HSE

1998 110 TUM HS FFR Hard Top XD WOLF

1982 Series 3 SWB

Last edited by RRUK on Wed Dec 21 2005 9:14pm. Edited 1 time in total

RRUK I have the Alpaca leather and I agree it does not wear well. The drivers seat has taken a blueish look which I can only asume come from the various blue trousers that I wear - thank god my wife doesn't drive it much as the seats would be looking pinkish by now!  2005 Zambezi TDV6 - Gone but not forgotten
2009 Alaska TDV8 - Gone and much missed.



WINNER - 2009 �Idler Of The Year� Award
Runner Up - 2009 �Just Doing What It�s Designed To Do� Award


DO NOT CLICK HERE!

Yes, our drivers seat edge keeps getting blue from our jeans. It doesn't take much to clean the leather with some leather wipes. If you had black leather, you'd never see the dirt and therefore never clean it so much. I'm not sure if that is an advantage. Surely dirty leather will wear faster. Matt
-------------------------------------------
RRS ownership for 1 yr, then D3 for 2 yrs. Then cut back to old bangers and working my way back up through two Peugeots in 6 months. Now got Saab 9-5 2.3t and enjoying the performance!

Shock news, RRUK thinks the TDV6 is not to bad. Now there is a turn up for the books coming from a petrol head.  Its out there somewhere. Second V10 Treg on the drive at the moment.

haha..
yeah at the next meet, i'll let you have a go in mine RRUK if you want? see how it compares to the Disco3..
obviously will need the favour back in your SC?

Haha chaps.....all is not lost for the eternal petrol devil.

So, I've just handed back the D3 and my thoughts as against my car are as follows:

Clearly slower but very smooth for a Deezul.
A bit wallowy handling, the DR pack on the RRS should sort that
Lacks puff after 4000rpm
Interior felt cheaper - gear knob is VERY cheap compared to the RRS
Leather did not feel good quality
Seats were more spongey and not as shaped as the RRS ones
Feels much bigger and therefore less sporty

I'll probably keep my TDV6 for now until the warranty is up and at the present time the only next car I can think of is a V8 diesel Sport with a Turbo Chip upgrade instead of a SC... I should be able to get another Lotus Elise with the change

My wife recently cancelled a Disco3 although she loved the 7 seats. Must admit the interior felt very cheap compared to the Sport and also agree that you're not made that involved in the car, not special. It didn't really appeal to me enough for £32,000 when mine was only £10,000 more, I think for £3k more I'd definately prefer a TDV6 S RRSport at £35,000. But it's probably a very good bus and suits many people.

Mr Bean wrote:

I'll probably keep my TDV6 for now until the warranty is up and at the present time the only next car I can think of is a V8 diesel Sport with a Turbo Chip upgrade instead of a SC... I should be able to get another Lotus Elise with the change

My wife recently cancelled a Disco3 although she loved the 7 seats. Must admit the interior felt very cheap compared to the Sport and also agree that you're not made that involved in the car, not special. It didn't really appeal to me enough for £32,000 when mine was only £10,000 more, I think for £3k more I'd definately prefer a TDV6 S RRSport at £35,000. But it's probably a very good bus and suits many people.