It answered my curiosity about the cross linked air suspension.

https://www.drive.com.au/reviews/202...cs-and-review/

 

That’s an excellent review. I learned some new information from this one. Thanks for sharing.

 

Very cool. It’s good to hear all of the extra reinforcement that went into the vehicle. It is probably overkill for the mild off road driving I do, but I’m not going to complain about it being over-built.

One question I haven’t figured out (or taken the time to crawl under and figure out) - does the Defender come stock with any underbody protection? I know skid plates can be added, but wasn’t sure if there is any protection built in (I have a base model for reference).

 

BRW110:

The built in protection includes a double layer of aluminum plating beneath the engine, transmission, center differential and transfer case. It is suitable for most off-roading activities.

The three, most risky exposed remaining items are the: a) door sills (critical to the strength & repair cost of the monocoque body structure), b) the area forward of the engine, and c) the fuel tanks.

The door sills require the addition of rock sliders (several threads exist on this blog to describe the options and installations).

The front requires a front skid plate to replace the plastic one which comes with the vehicle. The JLR available aluminum plate is adequate. Another advantage is the front aluminum skid plate exposes the recovery eye (which is something many have commented is a real pain to accomplish with the plastic cover). More than one person has commented that the front skid plate should come standard on all Defenders.

There is yet no available armor for the fuel tanks. This should come onto the market at some point.

Enjoy !

 

Good synopsis. I have the factory aluminum front skid, and I covet the rock sliders. I just can't get past what a PIA they are, and how expensive. Why, oh why did LR not envision the need and leave mounting points exposed for which they or the aftermarket could design perfectly fitting sliders?

I am slowly overcoming my initial resistance to the 663, based on how "automatic" it is in all its traction management wizardry, when I spent years in the ditches learning old school driving methods to avoid getting stuck, or to navigate over tricky rocks out west. I've come to be more and more amazed with each excursion off road.

But my dissatisfaction with the difficulty of adding any sort of aftermarket gear, the intense complexity of jobs that were trivial and very low cost on my Jeep, is not going away. I hung three sets of LED lights, one at the bottom of A-pillars, sitting atop the front bumper, and screwed into the face of the rear bumper, off my Jeep at a cost of under $500 and taking maybe 4 hours all-in, and I'm terrible with electrical. The best rock sliders were $450 delivered and took me maybe an hour counting assembling and putting away my tools.

This is the reason my pre-order for a Grenadier stays active and will be converted to an actual order when that's allowed; the brilliance with which they've thought it all through. It's like an experienced off-roader designed or oversaw the design of everything, thinking through all the mods we all make or wish we could make, and allowing for ease of retrofit. The multiple switchgear wired into the headliner for lights and winches -- bloody brilliant.

Anyway, time will tell. I do love the Defender's on-road prowess so very much and wouldn't want to diminish that by more than a few percent.

 

It's kind of academic because if you live in Australia you can't buy one.

Ordered in June 2021 - Still no build or delivery date. Driving me mad

 

Surprising. I ordered June and took receipt in late Jan. What did you order?

 

The lucky8 sliders are expensive for sure. The only tricky/annoying part of their installation was the metal trim piece (could be just because i had never installed rivnuts and was not thrilled to have to drill holes wider in my new $75k truck). The sliders themselves bolt in nice and easy, using factory holes and bolts.

OEM aluminum slider accessories (and other under protection for like gas tanks) would be fantastic though. Knowing JLR they’d be pricey af but at least they’d set something of a ceiling on the aftermarket slider options.

 

Why do you need rivnuts? Doesn't it come with holes to bolt on?

 

the sliders themselves reuse the big bolts that go right back into the holes they came out of (18 in total iirc). It’s the black metal trim piece that goes under the doors and replaces the plastic you take off that needs rivnuts. There are existing holes but they need to be slightly widened for the m6 rivnuts and since you can’t get behind the hole you cant just use a nut.