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New defender

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Dangermouse:
Transit engines have so much get up and gone now speed limiters are on the option's list for tranny van's so i don't think the engine will let it down

Eeyore:
Trust me, the Puma engine pulls, and with the electric turbo - there's no noticable lag (which lets the 300 down badly, and as for the 200.....).

Fitting it reduces the cost of vehilce build, and gives us an engine with a far cheaper range of spares than the TD5. The clutch is Land Rover so should have plenty of miles and the gearbox is far better than the version in the D3 (man them gates have tough springing). I would have suspected that the later R380 boxes would have been man enough for the job but were again cost-prohibitve to keep building.

Biggest issue is that the new gearbox tunnel has forced the seat further outboard. Hell, I'm used to Defenders and I felt close to the doors. The dash feels mightly close to your knees too.

The rear tub is heavily reinforced to accomodate the extra seating. Most changes were necessary to meet new vehicle build standards (the old Defender was outlawed for production in December, basically).

Driving it? Well, it's a Defender, so the steering has lots of feel and weight, the peddles have lots of feel and weight and the ride is typical. Springing wasn't hard enough for my liking, but thats a personal thing. Pulling away from roundabouts I wasn't stirring the stick as I expected with a 6-speed (and like I had to do with the D3) - any one of 3 gears kinda did the job and power delivery was consistant and sustained (no waiting for the dang turbo to sing up). IMV the engine showed greater tractability than the 6 pot in the D3, although overall the power was a fair chunck less. It was, IMV a nicer drive from that respect. I think this a down to a factor of a better engine management strategy, and better engine for the job and about 3 quaters of a ton less mass to move!  :lol:

Only my view and only from an on-road perspective. I would like the oppotunity to drive one off-road, but that has yet to happen. Maybe some time..........

HTH

Cheers
 8)
Eeyore

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