Advice on buying a Discovery

Hello I am thinking of getting a Landrover Discovery. Test drove a few and love the way they handle. Need something to pull my boat and haul gear. Any advice on which years are preferred. It would not be used as a daily driver. I have been checking out models from 95 to 99. Many have advised me against this type of car becuase of high repair costs and dependability. Personally I think a Discovery would be a nice compliment to my /69mgb. Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Sincerely David

Reply to
David Johanns
Loading thread data ...

Well, you're certainly in the same reliability territory as the Mangy Bee.

I think the advice would be to go for a late 300 type Disco and avoid the TD5/Series 2 ones at that sort of age like the plague.

The 300's quite cheap to fix compared to the Series2s and has less to break.

Other than that I don't think you'll be disappointed by it as a tow car and to be honest the 300s aren't that unreliable all things considered. The TD5s at that age are a bag of shit, and I say that as somebody who ran one and caused most of the service recalls in the early days of the model life.

Diesel rather than petrol too. Less to go wrong, less that's probably already gone wrong.

P.

Reply to
Paul S. Brown

On or around Fri, 28 Jan 2005 11:26:50 -0500, David Johanns enlightened us thusly:

95-99 discos are not high repair cost and are, if you get a tidy one, very dependable.

go for it. Check for corrosion on the rear floor, excessively clonky driveline when taking up drive, or going from over-run to power on, or changing gear.

300TDi engines should fire pretty much instantly from cold, and should pull well from about 1500-2000 rpm up to about 4000 or so.
Reply to
Austin Shackles

Hello, David!

We've had our 300tdi (1998) for a year now and would heartily recommend it. Before buying we looked at the early Td5's as well but were told to watch out. The only problem was finding a tidy one at the right price.

Reliability has been very good, repairs and costs minimal.

As far as towing is concerned we use it for dragging the horsebox to shows with two equine occupants and I feel it drives better with a load. Certainly we've never got stuck, and I do feel smug when helping to pull someone out of the mire.

Good Luck on your quest

With best regards, Not so Clever Trevor.

Reply to
Not so Clever Trevor

Petrol megabucks expensive to run unless you convert to LPG.

Reply to
hugh

MotorsForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.