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the motor selection matters... I and others are very happy with my P300 4 cyl. And the same is true for almost all who have a P400 6 cyl.
the Nature of the I6 is much more sporty (zoom zoom) and is necessary for full capacity towing
the 4 cyl is shockingly capable with a flat torque curve and what is described to have an unexpected smoothness and is integrated with the transmission logic in all situations.
the V8 is a limited run and the effective use of it is TBD. The acceleration and towing ease are likely to be off the charts.
to tow a horse trailer 7500 lbs is the market standard. So, all three Land rover larger chassis (defender, RR and discovery 5) achieve that ratings.
I tow horses with an LR4 with a 5 liter V8 and it does fine. The most I will tow with the P300 is 5000 lbs. The consensus is that P400 is necessary to happily tow to the limit.
the accessories are coming... slowly. There is a metal bumper for an external winch coming from Lucky 8 and other armor and accessories coming from a few other suppliers. The hidden winch from JLR is like the rest of the vehicle - comparatively complicated and stylish.
because of the complex design of the vehicle, there is not an expectation by defender owners that the vehicle will enable the level of owner customization of a jeep, bronco or pick up truck. Nor do the suppliers likely see an accessory demand potential similar to a Toyota or Jeep product.
even so, for the obvious items like roof racks, solid accessories are available.
everything with a JLR product is expensive compared to a Jeep or Bronco — be it service or accessories. The suitable comparisons are MB and BMW. Just the nature of the marketplace
One more point, the 4WD logic of the Defender is very advanced and much more capable than vehicles which may accommodate a manual transmission.
the logic inherent in the software and technical hardware of the new defender (and new SUV jeeps) cannot be made to tolerate the inconsistency of a manual transmission.
it’s kind of the same story as new F1 cars and their “ for sale to the public” inspired vehicles which use the same approach — the driver operating the clutch is obsolete.
Hard to accept I know —- there is an irreplaceable joy in manually clutching your way around the track and the beach
Thanks for the insight.
Knowing damn well that at the end of the day it's still a four-banger, I was never really going to push it much past 5000 LBS anyway. We were looking at a 3500-ish LB toy hauler. By the time you stock it up and throw a pair of sport bikes in it it would've been around 5k LBS.
The technology packed into the Defender is a big driving reason as to why I'm considering it, and that the auto is the ZF 8-speed that has a pretty good track record in other vehicles. LR made an exceptional car, and I love the thing. I'm just trying to decide if it or the Bronco are what fits me and my needs the most.
If I could walk into a dealership right now and have my pick of Bronco floor models, or order one and get it in 8-12 weeks, I would definitely consider it. I’ve never owned a JLR product, and dropping 80-large on a new one first time around wouldn’t ordinarily be my way of testing the waters. And honestly, if a 4 -door Bronc with all the off-road packages and 35” tires could be test driven on the road, and I liked that, I would probably get the Ford instead.
But it’s all still a mystery right now, and if the Bronco 4-door is equivalent on-road to a JL Unlimited, that’s not what I’m looking for.
Thanks for the input. The SO would really like to take this next vehicle on trips, so the nicer interior and larger capacity are the two big draws for that.
Beach driving is probably going to take up the bulk of the off-road driving, but we also want to take it places in the mountains to go camping and whatnot. If I have the capability, I will put it to use.
As far as the P400 goes, spec'd out the way I want it a P400 takes this car from the "I can afford it" area to the dangerous "I think I can swing it" area and I'm just not comfortable paying an extra $12k for it.
I don't use the interior rear-view camera (CDL holder), so ClearSight really doesn't matter to me.
And back to auto vs. manual. Driving a manual is ingrained into my DNA at this point. I have never owned an automatic car and I'm worried about my long-term happiness with the vehicle when I don't have that direct connection or control over what it's doing. I put 30k miles a year on my auto work truck, so the last thing I want to look at is a PRNDL when I get home. I've driven sticks and autos in just about every situation on- and off-road except for rock-crawling and while I know for a fact that an auto is easier to manage, I always had more fun in the manual. Partly because of the challenge, but mainly because I was acting dumb lol.
I'll never fault a man for his likes/dislikes (though I might make fun of him a bit lol). So you gotta follow your heart.
That said, I've heard good things about the 4-cyl, so drive one and see if you like it. The fact that you mentioned the STI made me think that, like me, you'd really be taken by the P400, but I hear ya on the finances. We saved a very large down payment over the course of the last 3-4 years to make ours "reasonable".
No sure what you mean about the ClearSight rearview mirror. Are you saying you never use a rear view mirror or that you've tried the ClearSight mirror and didn't like it?!? Just in case you haven't use it yet, I'm not talking about a reverse camera in the NAV/media center. the ClearSight mirror can be used as either an actual mirror (then you don't see crap because of the back seats, headrests, spare tire, and tiny window) or it can be used as a monitor for a dedicated rear view mirror camera. When use in the latter configuration you DON'T see the kids in the back seat (which is funny at first) but you DO clearly see EVERYTHING BEHIND YOU regardless of how much crap you've packed in the back of the Defender. It's such a simple feature, but quickly became one of my favorites.
Manuals vs. autos - Like I said half of what we've owned have been manuals - trucks with 3-speeds and a granny gear sticking out of the floor, 5 and 6-speeds in sports cars and wagons, hell I've got a couple hundred thousand miles on motorcycles, all manuals. I get it. I like it too. I'm telling you on the Wrangler I read plenty saying it was a CRAPPY transmission and THEY WERE RIGHT. I'm mostly still glad I got it, but if I had to do it again I might actually get the auto on the Wrangler too. Why?
Well, my aforementioned reasons.
1. Towing (I did some work with a utility trailer a few weeks back and what a ROYAL PIA backing it up into tight spots on loose sand it was with a clutch, feathering and trying not to burn. I also used to tow a boat with a manual 6-speed and had to back it UP HILL into a gravel storage area after each use (not to mention the whole ramp thing) and again, would have been a LOT easier with an Auto.
2. BEACH DRIVING - YUP, after decades of manuals I get it, I've never burned out a clutch NEVER. But the manual makes it twice as difficult (at least). Where the auto is smoothly finding it's way back and forth between deep loose sugar sand and hard pack from the tide, or back and forth across deep ruts into packed trails, the manual (on my Wrangler) is a constant back and forth between two gears. Too low for the hard pack, too high for the deep stuff. Then try going across some dunes and you're loosing momentum so you need a lightning speed shift to a lower gear before you scrub too much speed and risk digging in.
On that beach thing my Wrangler is built with a Track-Lok rear, deeper 3.73 gearing, mud/all terrain tires and is equipped with the standard BLD (brake lock differential) logic to prevent further spin as needed. It's well equipped and does a good job in the sand. But the Defender on sporting street tires walked ALL OVER IT on our last trip. I was shocked, I really was expecting the D to have to work harder than the Wrangler but it didn't. I know part of the difference is the auto vs the manual, and the rest are the other electronics for off-road.
No matter, whatever you decide hope you have a blast.
The Defender 110 P400 HSE is far more versatile than the Bronco. IMHO it will age better too. As for driving a manual, you can throw the gear selector to the Left for manual mode, select Sport, and upshift and downshift with the gear selector.
Last edited by PatriotDefender; May 11, 2021 at 09:34 AM.
In fact, I made the worst "car" mistake of my life around this idea. I ordered a 911 in 2015, when the GTS model had just come out at the top of the Carrera line. I got the $3000 premium color outside, the full leather red/black interior, every option I wanted and none I didn't want. It was glorious. Except I also decided it was time to join the 21st century so I ordered it with PDK, the Porsche dual-clutch auto/manual. This thing is so much better than the best paddle-shifted autos it's not even close. It was sublime; it did everything better and faster than I could with a 3rd pedal and an H-shifter. I used it almost exclusively in manual mode, choosing my own gears, except at the track, where in Sport+ and Auto it will not shift until redline, and it snaps off hundred-millisecond shifts within 50rpm of redline time after time after time.
So all is great, right? Sadly, nope. I literally woke up in the middle of the night about 2 weeks after taking delivery, and the first thought in my head was, "God in Heaven, what have I done???" I gave it almost two years and it was a fantastic car, but in the end I couldn't take it any more and traded on a much cheaper 981 GT4 with proper 6M. Still have that car and suspect it may be my last of many Porsches, it's so good.
In fact, I made the worst "car" mistake of my life around this idea. I ordered a 911 in 2015, when the GTS model had just come out at the top of the Carrera line. I got the $3000 premium color outside, the full leather red/black interior, every option I wanted and none I didn't want. It was glorious. Except I also decided it was time to join the 21st century so I ordered it with PDK, the Porsche dual-clutch auto/manual. This thing is so much better than the best paddle-shifted autos it's not even close. It was sublime; it did everything better and faster than I could with a 3rd pedal and an H-shifter. I used it almost exclusively in manual mode, choosing my own gears, except at the track, where in Sport+ and Auto it will not shift until redline, and it snaps off hundred-millisecond shifts within 50rpm of redline time after time after time.
So all is great, right? Sadly, nope. I literally woke up in the middle of the night about 2 weeks after taking delivery, and the first thought in my head was, "God in Heaven, what have I done???" I gave it almost two years and it was a fantastic car, but in the end I couldn't take it any more and traded on a much cheaper 981 GT4 with proper 6M. Still have that car and suspect it may be my last of many Porsches, it's so good.
I completely hear you on that, but again that's not a truck.
Though what can I say, you're nuts like me and have a 6-spd Wrangler so our opinions are suspect.
I completely hear you on that, but again that's not a truck.
Though what can I say, you're nuts like me and have a 6-spd Wrangler so our opinions are suspect.
true enough. I do have an automatic pickup, a Frontier, and I guess I've never thought about missing a manual in that. I just get in it and go; it's something that exists to haul; driving is so secondary to its mission that I hardly ever even remember the drive when I step out of it at the end.
NoGaBiker - love the GTS and GT4.. i've got a 911 50th myself.
Thed - I think understanding my own uses helped me decide on the defender
- Overlanding (1-3 day trips mostly, nothing crazy)
- Maybe hauling a rented overlanding trailer or airstream
- long road trip cruiser must have some sort of autocruise control
- occasional large family seater 6-7 passenger
- DD ( WFH so this really isn't many miles, but wasn't interested in something that wasn't semi fuel efficient )
Before I ordered my Defender I went and test drove the following in my purchase preference order:
Bronco, 2020 Raptor, Tacoma TRD Pro, LandCruiser Heritage, Jeep Wrangler Rubicon, 4Runner Trd Pro, Tundra TRD Pro
Obviously since there was no Bronco i couldn't drive one, but the way i made my assumptions as such.
Bronco would be the most capable off road, have a ton of aftermarket accessories and be a super fun toy.
I called around to a few dealers and even found one that would sell me an ordered one at MSRP (~60k).
However where the Bronco and really the Jeep fell flat was road manners. I noticed this in the Raptor and Tundra as well but after driving performance cars for many years and my previous SUV being a Cayenne, corning at speed did not impress me.
At the end of the day i decided that the defender was more than capable off roader for what i was willing to do and wanted to.
I took it for an extended test drive on the highway and i'll say it is quieter and more comfortable than all of the cars i tested aside from the LandCruiser.
Power was more than enough for a car based on handling capabilities. i test drove both the P300 and P400, and the 4cyl was surprisingly good, although i still ended up with the 6.
If i was more budget conscious i'd still take the 4cyl Defender over the Bronco and i'd also end up with those sweet steel rims!
i'm hoping the aftermarket accessory list for the defender will expand as the car ages, but if you like heavily modding your car i'd actually choose the Bronco over the defender.
NoGaBiker - love the GTS and GT4.. i've got a 911 50th myself.
Great for you! The GTS was a consolation when I waited too long to order a 911/50; I was set on Geyser Grey/ Agate Pepita and couldn't find one. Decided to wait and go with GTS so I could order exactly as I wanted and get Garnet Red interior. But I always regretted missing out on a 911/50 in Geyser, or even Graphite.
I just suffered through a six hour ride in a rented rubicon on a moderate trail in Moab and would have given anything to have been in my Defender instead. Sure, with the 2 inch lift and 35 inch tires, the Jeep could probably go some places a stock Defender couldn’t, but I’m not interested in that stuff anyway. Riding in a new Rubicon felt like riding in a tin can put together by a high school mechanics team, freshman team. Squeaks, rattles, terrible ride comfort, horrible on washboard, joke of an interior, all around piece of crap. I appreciate what Jeeps are, and own an old TJ, but after driving a Defender, it’s clear these are just completely different vehicles and just not comparable in any way.
true enough. I do have an automatic pickup, a Frontier, and I guess I've never thought about missing a manual in that. I just get in it and go; it's something that exists to haul; driving is so secondary to its mission that I hardly ever even remember the drive when I step out of it at the end.
