First Impressions: 2005 LR3

[troverman]

We are very excited to have taken delivery of our (new to us) 2005 LR3. It is striking in silver with black leather, and is an SE V8 model. This is our fourth Land Rover. After several years and many miles of owning a 2000 Disco II SD, I decided to write up a first impression vs the Disco.

First off, the styling will grow on you very quickly. The thing rides amazingly well, better than our previous second-generation Range Rover. The Jaguar V8 is such a huge improvement over the old Buick V8. It growls under acceleration, is exceptionally smooth, has quite nice power, and will last longer than 200k miles!

The old Discovery seems chintzy and not fancy at all compared to the LR3. Partially our own fault, we went with an SD with no sunroofs, no heated seats, and 'duragrain' seats. After all the things that went wrong with the P38, which was fancy, we wanted a 'basic' Land Rover. Our Discovery has run very well the whole time, and now has near 140k miles. The transmission has been flawless. The biggest mechanical complaint has been the brakes. The DII's brakes are very good when they are right. We have changed pads and rotors 3x in 50k miles. We had to replace the brakelines! They rotted on a car that was only 6 years old at the time. The 'trio' has been on way too many times. Sometimes it is for intermittent faults; sometimes it was more expensive like a sensor / hub module. The DII, despite permanent 4x4, relies entirely on the traction control system to regulate slippage. Anytime there is a fault in the ABS system, your traction control is knocked out. This means the DII cannot make it up a snowy hill!

Still, we generally liked the Disco. The stereo was merely decent, and had no CD player.

The LR3 has all the amenities: Bi-Xenons that 'look' around corners, an all-glass roof, 3rd seats, reversing sensors, heated front and rear leather seats, and an h/k stereo with in-dash 6-CD player; rear aux climate controls. So far we love it, but already a couple of disappointments: There is ONLY auto-down on the driver's window; the sunroof is also one touch. Even the old Disco had auto down on both front windows! The old P38 Range Rover had auto down on everything, and auto close on the sunroof and front windows. Heck, even our Volkswagen has auto up/down windows.

Also, the radio does not appear to have weatherband. All our other Rovers have had this, even our '92 Classic has this. (The Classic actually has an amazing factory a/d/s stereo w/ 6CD changer).

Our truck does not have NAV. Apparently w/o nav, there is no compass! Again, our old DII had a compass.

Given the equipment levels, we will gladly live with these 'letdowns,' and the Discovery is going up for sale today. We will keep the old Range Rover Classic still.

One other thing: this LR3 has the factory brush bar, with factory off-road lamps hanging there, and a factory-installed WARN Winch! How nice. The previous owner is a big Rover buff, he has another LR3 and an immaculate Defender 90. He is only giving up this vehicle because he now commutes and is getting a new Volkswagen. Still, we got 18mpg last night on our trip home.

So, we love it so far. Hopefully this extremely advanced and complex vehicle will be very reliable.