Folks,

While the rear diff was being replaced on my 2020 P300, my dealer graciously let me use a 2023 P400 model that was different from mine in a few areas. I just wanted to share my thoughts over a couple of weeks and hundreds of miles (highway and city):

** P300 vs. P400: I have a P300, and very much like it. The P400 is a bit smoother and refined, and has a nice even acceleration on the highway. That said, for me the upcharge wouldn't make sense as I like them both. MPG was about the same overall. If money is no object, the P400 is very nice but I'm thrilled with my P300.

** Interior materials: After ~3.5 years and 36,000 miles the Windsor leather in my car looks great. After 1 year and 10,000 miles, the black resist materials in the loaner looked tired and worn in places. I know that people don't care for loaners as they do their cars, but in a $90,000+ MSRP vehicle, the Resist fabric was shockingly tired in my opinion. I also don't love the neoprene feel in places. I'm sure there are benefits I'm missing that appeal to some folks, but I'd go for the upgraded interior over the engine without pause if money is an issue.

** Bigger LCD vs. Smaller: I prefer the smaller LCD in my car, which blends nicely, although the larger screen is nice.

** Small things: The 2020 model has some things that I believe were phased out due to supply chain issues (?), including the sunglass holder in the upper controls vs. a blank piece of plastic, the soft close rear tailgate, the front seat pockets accessible in the rear seats (nicer in mine, mesh in 2023), the leather manual holder in mine vs. the cardboard one in the loaner. Not huge deals at all, but feels cheaper in comparison. That said, I'm sure some refinements in the later models were good.

Don't get me wrong -- the newer one was great, but knowing people are out there looking for random thoughts and opinions, I wanted to provide some, thanks.

 

Good points. I never cared for the resist materials LR uses.

 

I have Windsor and Extended Leather Package on X-Dynamic SE. The outer edges of the seats are a different material than the seat inserts though. Is this the Resist material you're referring too?

 

No, the loaner I had was 100% Resist throughout the car, no leather at all.

 

Lesson learned for me with my 2022 was don't skimp on seats. I'd never consider another LR product that doesn't have fully electric seats and the extended leather upgrade was also in my plans when I had spec'd out a second defender to potentially trade up for. Ultimately decided against staying in a Defender because the problems kept mounting up but just sharing random thoughts of what once was. My loaner was the F-Pace, I liked it much more than my Defender tbh.

Sadly they'll go fully electric soon with the jags and the F-Pace will no longer interest me much. Might lease a disco sport someday, who knows.

Would like to see them re-release the LR4 as a hybrid. Still even now it's among the best looking vehicles on the road to this day IMO. Contemplated even jumping into the last model year but I couldn't find a single extended warranty that will cover one, at any price. lol

 

I had a loaner about 2 weeks ago. It was a brand new defender 110 with almost 2k miles.

After a few miles of driving I kept hearing a chime but didnt understand why it was doing it. It persisted about every 10-15 seconds. Then I realized it was only while driving, and the speed limit sign on the dash would flash with red around exterior. I'm not positive, but I think this constant chime was because I was going above the speed limit. We're talking only 1-5 mph over the speed limit. When I drove at or below the speed limit, no chime.

I only had the loaner for a day and didnt bother to get out the manual or try to figure it out for sure ....but if that's what it was and you can't shut it off, I would never but a new one. VERY annoying!

 

You can easily shut this off. You can have the speed limit warning audible/visual, just visual, or off completely.

 

This is helpful, I have a p300 110 ordered. A tad bit worried about the engine size vis a vis the weight but didn’t want to spend another 8-10k. From the build sheet it looks like seats are by default fully automatic in the MY25, along with the 11.4” screen.

 

You can, at least today, and at least in US (they recently passed a mandatory speed limiter law in EU, wonder how that will fly with the population). No manual handy, but I think it's called "driver assist", and there's a shortcut on the left side of the steering wheel to get right into assist settings.