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Originally Posted by walter4x4
Emissions I can understand, but safety? It's been proven that in a collision the current crop of Defenders is at least 2x safer than the safest Volvos currently on the streets.
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Only the newest Ford deritive diesel would pass Current EPA diesel opacity and NiOx specs. The 300 Tdi wouldn't pass any country's limits, and the TD5 won't pass EU, New UK standard, and Californis's standards.
Apart from the emissons issue I would like to know where you got the info that the Defender is safer than, well, anything. There are no side impact structures, no SRS of any sort, no crumple front bumper, the most primitive colapsable steering column, two piece A pillar, and the list goes on. I'm not trying to take anything away from the simple love of the truck, I've been driving one for years, but to call it a truck designed for safety, let alone compare it to one of the safest cars on the road is utterly rediculous. Unless things have changed radically, we're still the only country with not one, but two crash testing bodies (NHTSA & NIIHS)
The last Defender to undergo a crash test (1 vehicle, frontal crash only) was a '97 D90 soft top, in 1997. Leonard Torres bought it after the test, and if what I saw meets your idea of safe, we have very different standards. There haven't been any structural body design changes to date so even the pretty new dash and Transiit engine won't make it any safer.
