I notice nobody admits to anything along the lines of "Yes I bought one and it looked like gold but turned out to be total dog ****".
My 90, D-Reg (87), has a Disco 200tdi engine in it, uprated brakes (discs all round), a 2" lift kit, steering guard, diff guards, rear bench seats and is a soft-top front and back.
It was £2,700 as it came and I bought it from a farm who'd obviously rung the local MOT place and told them to sign off an MOT for them to collect the next time they were passing - either that or the MOT bloke was blind and had no arms (possible I suppose - it was Pocklington).
My test drive felt ok and I stupidly fell in love with it there and then. This was stupid as on the way home it developed a bad earth problem where any electrical current for anything other than the engine basically switched the engine off - so think radio, wipers, headlights and laughably brake lights.
I drove from Pocklington to Leeds cursing the day that Land ever met Rover. Finally on the ring road swooping passed Sainsburys the gear lever came off in my hand leaving me the odious task of trying to keep it at just the right speed to hit all the green lights between Moor Allerton and Horsforth. Naturally I failed.
After replacing all the brakes all round, including discovering it's got Discovery calipers that don't quite fit on the front, new hubs, new bearings (again all round), new down pipe on the exhaust (which obviously isn't a standard part because it wasn't the original engine and therefore cost a fortune), new wheels because they were so rusty they were like brown doilies holding on cracked rubber things pretending to be tyres, so new tyres, new swivel housings (expensive), new ball joint things (shiny) and finally to add insult to injury a new fuel tank because that smell of gas just waiting for someone to set it on fire isn't supposed to be there.
In short I've blown at least as much as I paid for it first time around and am only now starting to think of it as loveable.
It is a testament to Defenders that it can put me through that much pain and suffering and for me to still love it with everything I've got.
...now if I can just get it to drive uphill for any length of time without overheating I'll be a happy man.
So anyway - yes, buy a Defender at once. Best by an older one that is easier to take to pieces and less of a hole in the wallet. And start saving and cancelling your social life now. It'll be easier in the end.
