Land Rover Discovery II Reliability?

[mnewport]

Anyone here own one of these? What's reliability like? I hear lots of bad stories but I wonder how bad they really are (I had an E38 BMW that was awesome in spite of the bad reviews). My wife and I are considering selling her X3 and paying cash for a Disco...wise idea or run away?

[sammyg2]

run away.

YMMV

[gecc]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

run away.

Ymmv

fast!!!!!!

[mnewport]

OK, never mind then. Best looking SUV on the road but huge crappy nightmare is what several people are telling me (including the two previous posters).

[MBAtarga]

Each thread below offers additional insight:

Land Rover Discovery anyone???

Land Rover Dilemma

Rover Disco ate it...

[crustychief]

I like mine, it has been very reliable. 12 MPG sucks but it is very safe in a collision and it looks nice and is very comfortable.

[Mrmerlin]

I got one of these a 2005 RR HSE ,Last of the BMW engines trucks and with the touchscreen nav
IMHO way better than the Disco, and Ihad one of those as well a 2004 DII

[edgemar]

Where can you find out more info on the Range Rovers? Are the BMW era ones better than the rest?

Originally Posted by Mrmerlin

I got one of these a 2005 RR HSE ,Last of the BMW engines trucks and with the touchscreen nav
IMHO way better than the Disco, and Ihad one of those as well a 2004 DII

[LakeCleElum]

SUV= A car has positive and negative traits....A pickup has positive and negative traits.........Add the negative column of the car and pickup and you have a SUV...Doesn't really matter who makes it.......Heavy, poor handling, bad fuel mileage, etc.......

[Mrmerlin]

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[Mrmerlin]

Bob have you had the opportunity to drive a 2003 to 2010 Range Rover HSE on the road and and off road?

I think the 05 is the best of the BMW trucks and it seems to have better quality parts, ..
NOTE not all of the parts are the best though .

The other thing about the BMW engined trucks is that there are a lot of BMW dealers and many driveline parts can be had for less at the BMW dealer. and there are many BMW X 5s that can also be used for parts,
The 06 onwards jag engined trucks not so much

[LakeCleElum]

Originally Posted by Mrmerlin

Bob have you had the opportunity to drive a 2003 to 2010 Range Rover HSE on the road and and off road?

I think the 05 is the best of the BMW trucks and it seems to have better quality parts, ..
NOTE not all of the parts are the best though .

The other thing about the BMW engined trucks is that there are a lot of BMW dealers and many driveline parts can be had for less at the BMW dealer. and there are many BMW X 5s that can also be used for parts,
The 06 onwards jag engined trucks not so much

No, just a general statement of my opinions of SUV's in general. I have not problem with "Trucks"; always had one since 1974. No problem with BMW's either, love them.....I just don't see why people buy something big, with poor handling and fuel mileage that can't haul a payload...That's all........

[Mrmerlin]

Bob if you have a few minutes cruise over to the Rover dealer and take a drive in an HSE,
make sure to go over the demo track they have,
dont worry when you get to the tilt portion the truck wont roll,
though it might seem like you should have some velcro to hold you in the seat

[mnewport]

Reading on the LR forums it seems the GMC (Buick) engined Discovery II's aren't bad as long as you know what to look for. Oil pump issues in some '03's and certain '04's, three amigos, drivetrain joints, suspension. The big things. Now that I know the issues I feel a little better about it but the gas mileage has me on the fence. It's worse than my V10 Audi S8!

[jwhcars]

We had a Disco II and had no problems other than a self inflicted hole in the tranny pan (wife did it at an off road event)
We upgraded to a LR3 and it had a lot better ride,more room and easier to get in and out of. We towd a Porsche from CO to PA with no problems.
Both had a heated front windshield and I had to put after market winter wiper blades on it to drive it in the snow. They will go anywhere but if you can not see.....it sucks.

[tcar]

FWIW, I had a 94 Disco (Disco I?), first year it was imported to the US... zero problems (except had to replace the alternator).

Had almost 160k miles on it when I sold it.

Had the aluminum V8.

[techweenie]

Third hand reports say Discos are all or nothing. They're great and trouble-free like Tcar's or they are a nightmare on wheels. Seems like nothing in between. All the LR specialists in my neck of the woods seem to have all the work they can handle.

[craigster59]

Last car I bought (Subaru) the finance gal had worked previously at Land Rover of Encino. I was trading in my Audi and told her how I hadn't had any problems with it and thought Audi was getting some undeserved bad reputation. I told her LR's were rumored to be crappy and was it true.
She told me she would constantly see cars brought back with issues after weeks, sometimes days with the new owners. She also told me there was only one company that would write/sell extended warranties on Rovers. Nobody else would touch them.

[EarlyPorsche]

A close friends sister had a camshaft breakage!!! As in the cam broke in half. Something we had never seen or heard of.

[Brian in VA]

I think Techweeine is spot on. A well cared for LR3 should be pretty reasonable now. Really bad mpg's, but drives thru anything, tows, seats fold in a million ways, handles better than you'd expect for the size. I'm really enjoying mine. The lr4 commercials (though maybe a bit pretentious) describe them well - good for hauling junk to the dump and taking your wife out on sat night.
Check out disco3.co.uk