Disco 3 or something reliable?

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Dicky

New Member
Posts
31
Need some advice please.
Have been wanting to get a Discovery for some time and am now in a position to do it. Looking at a disco 3, either new or nearly new. This is obviously a major purchase, and will be our main family car used, more often than not, by my wife for commuting to work, and by me for towing at weekends.
However, there is one major problem in my mind. Whilst I have always liked Discoveries and am genuinly very keen to get one, it needs to be reliable and I'm just not convinced that the disco 3 is, or will be in the future. I know there are some serious electrical issues with the new ones which, whilst I appreciate will be covered by warranty, are not ideal if you are spending a significant amount of your hard earned on a motor that continuously breaks down and spend more time off the road (and I don't mean in the mud), than on it. At that price, it must be reliable and trustworthy.
Does anyone have any useful views or experience on this. In particular, I'm wondering why we should take a risk with a disco, when say a Shogun (sorry, I appreciate that is probably a swear word here!) could virtually be guaranteed to be reliable and is a well proven tow car and off roader.
Don't get me wrong, the disco would be my first choice every time except for the reasons above. Looking at it purely on paper though, you'd have to agree that the disco is maybe not the most sensible choice.
Help!
 
id be very nervous of spending 25 grand on a new disco. there are some terrible write ups on the net from unhappy customers.

what about spending say 10 grand on a used disco and the balance on a reliable commuter car such as a focus tdi? (60mpg!)
just my 2 cents.
 
Hmmmm.... I really want a Disco 3 but there may be reliability issues. can a bunch of you tell me to buy one (because that is what i want) so that when it all goes tits up I can tell the wife its not my fault, the big boys made me do it.
 
Actually Sheddy, the wife wants one more than I do. I'm just trying to make a sensible choice given the £ envolved. I find myself persuading her more and more that we should get a Shogun, but it's harder to persuade myself.
Thanks for the helpful comments anyway.
 
the disco3 has won alot of awards, sure alot of people have come on the various LR forums and given some horror stories, but the only people that write blogs are the ones with problems. its a very small percentage of disco3 customers. you dont get the other 95% of disco3 owners coming on here saying how wonderful it is, no, you only get the negatives. if i had the cash spare i would buy one, the only thing that puts me off is how ugly they are!!!

thats my 2 pence worth.
 
Just a thought...

If it is a Discovery that you after, why not buy a really nice late registration Series 2? All of the gripes that afflicted the earlier models were sorted by the time that the 2001 + models were built. Benefits.

1) The depreciation on a 3 year old model would have hit the pocket of the previous owner, not you.
2) The Series 2 still has bags of image and a really nice low mileage and high spec example can be found if you look hard for half of the cost of a new Disco 3.
3) Hugely practical and big enough for your wife to feel secure in, yet at the same time it will tow anything you want it to at the weekends.
4) If you look after it, it is essentially bullett proof and will still be worth some decent cash when you trade it in on a new Disco 3 3 years from now.

Ok, so the new Disco 3 is obviously a major leap forward over the Series 2 and is a better car in most respects. However, the lads at the LR specialist where I take my Series 2 reckon that it would be best to wait 2 years before buying a new Disco 3 because of all of the faults that are occuring with them. Granted, appreciate that the majority of posts about D3's are related to problems with them. However, based on the number of Disco 3's that were parked up for repairs when I took mine in for service this morning, coupled with the number that the specialist say they have had in, you could potentially be using that warranty more than expected.

Might be worth considering. (A Disco 2 is also way better than a Mitsubishi)
 
Anything would be better than a Misubishi...

Seriously though, Benjoli makes a good point. If I was in the market to replace my (98000 trouble free miles, '99 model) Disco 2 within the next few months it would most certainly be with a late model (face lifted) ES Auto. If the change was in a couple of years then I would be looking at Disco 3s but also RR3s.

Tony
 
Thanks for the advise guys. I agree that a late model disco 2 is looking like a good idea.
Regarding the Shogun. I appreciate it's not a Landrover and is therefore not popular on her, but seriously, what is actually so wrong with it? It seems to be well made, relatively economical, has a good towing capacity, is good off road, seems to be a pretty reasonable price relative to others and is very reliable. It would be useful to know specifically what is so bad about it, rather then just a general slagging. Is this just brand loyalty, or is there actually something I should know?
Thanks all.
 
Shoguns well what can I say test drove 2 of them and felt like i was driving a truck :( , test drove our disco 1 fell in love with it had it 5 years, now drive a disco 3 TDV6 S :)
 
Hi there Dicky and Sheddy, just to let you all know i have a lr d3 tds v6, i took delivery of it 8/12/05 because i did a fantastic deal on my 'v' plated 1999 td5, me and my wife loved that car, we were both very sad to see it go but life goes on, so do disco's. We have had a few problem's with our's yes BUT we both love the new one even more, we love even more once we found out what it could do off road, at the experience. We also had a shogun a few year's ago, and it cost us a fortune in repair's, we had more time off road than on it, i would not wee on a shogun if it were on fire iam sorry to say, once you have had a disco 3, in my mind i have got thee best 4x4 by far, plus you look at the price of part's for a shogun, and then look at price of part's for a disco. Hope to be in touch soon all the best and thank's for looking bigcol:D
 
Thanks bigcol. The d3 sounds great; I just hope it turns out to be reliable for you. Fingers crossed. Let us know how you get on with it.
What sort of things went wrong with your Shogun? Like em or loathe em, they've generally got a reputation for good reliability.
 
Hi dicky, the worse thing that happened was the head warped, if you ask anyone who has had a shogun they are well known for it. The head on the shogun is made from aluminnium. That and the fact the one we had was a ringer, since then we have always bought from a main dealer, at least you have someone to help. I read with intrest about all the bad stuff on d3, i think there is only me and my wife that like them, anyway dicky like i said before, there are some really good deal's about, at the moment, so take a good test drive and let me know what you think, don't forget take the boss with you. Good luck all the best Bigcol
 
We have a discovery 3 and 2 and i would say get your self a 2 unless you want to wait untill lr sort out all the faults. Dont get me wrong i love or d3, but we still get random warning message come up and the problem with the brake locking up has really nocked our confedance in the car. You could get a really good top of the range s2 with about 8k on the clock for like £21k. With the money you would save you could get the v8 if you dont want the sluggish td5, which is also cheaper than the td5 due to getting about 12mpg.
 
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