2003 Land Rover Discovery SE Test Drive
Casey's List: The Good
The Bad
Chris' List The Good
The Bad
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Land Rover LusterThis was the absolute coolest test drive I have ever been on. I thought it was a little weird at first that the sales guy not only went with us but drove the car, but he soon showed us why. We drove around the back of the lot, up a curb, down a curb, up a curb (we were starting to think he was crazy) and then we headed towards the rock-track display. All of the Land Rover dealers have these — big rocky displays that they place their cars on to show what sort of terrain they can handle. This one, however, didn't have a vehicle on it. So we drove up it.
We got to the top, started to nose over, and he applied the hand brake and took his foot off the brake. It actually held...I'm not sure what the grade of this hill was, but I was sitting in the front passenger seat and could see the ground at the bottom of the hill. I was impressed with the seat belt; at the angle we were at I should have been leaning on the dashboard, but the seatbelt locked and held me in the seat. He took the handbrake and let the car take itself down the hill. It felt WAY too fast for me, but I suppose we were going only 5 miles an hour or so. Then he backed up the hill. And down again. Ugh. I hate roller coasters, even slow Land Rover ones.
After the decline, The track levels out, and then there's a small hill. He instructed us to look in the window of the Show room and he drove over the small hill. It was uneven and caused the front tire to spin. It spun for a second, then stopped and the car moved on. The last part of the track was a 37 degree slant, which looked like it was going to topple us right over. He went right up it and stopped and let us hang out there. He then thought he'd be funny and shook the car back and forth ("See? We could go to 40 degrees!"). Not funny!
When we were done playing on the track, he drove to a parking lot behind a shopping center and cruised on up to 50 mph and slammed on the brakes. The car stopped in a straight line and was very smooth. Seemed to stop quickly too, although I don't normally test cars like that I can't really compare it to anything (I have tested a bus like that — the Land Rover stopped better than a bus). He then turned around and drove through the parking lot with the passenger side tires up against the curb. The steering wheel didn't jerk or fight him at all and the rims didn't rub. Got to be horrible on the tires, though.
After that it was my turn to drive. I headed out of the parking lot and turned right and he yelled "correct the wheel!" I didn't know what he meant until I realized the car was oversteering and I was headed around towards the curb. I've never driven a car that doesn't correct itself (including a Mustang with no power steering and school busses). What I mean is that when you turn, you have to straighten the wheel back out manually, as opposed to all of the other cars I've driven that I just let go of the steering wheel and the wheel unturns itself and they head straight again. Weird. It only bothered me through that one turn, though--after that I was fine (maybe because he didn't yell random things at the rest of the turns). I headed down a two lane road with a grass shoulder, and he reached over and jerked the wheel and two wheels went into the shoulder and I corrected and pulled them right back up on the road. You couldn't even tell we had left pavement. I headed back to the dealer and Chris switched with me.
Chris immediately tried to slalom through some cones in the parking lot. "It's not meant to slalom!" the sales guy informed us. He wasn't kidding! Chris drove the same route I did and once went totally off the pavement down into a little ditch and back up (on purpose, of course). The car handled it exceptionally well even though it wasn't in low gears (I was confused about the 4 wheel drive--I thought the sales guy said it was full time, but we had to shift to get into it so I think I misunderstood him). After we got back to the dealership we spent some time checking out the interior. The driver's seat had lumbar, and moved a whole bunch of directions including up--nice for us short folks! This model had alpaca beige leather seats with black piping. Very classy. The sun roofs were cool; they opened all the way, but also had screens that could be opened or closed. The screens let in the air but blocked the sun very effectively. All in all I was really impressed with this car.
Land Rover Discovery (Chris' Ramblings)
Casey and I went down to Houston to test drive a Land Rover Discovery
a couple of weeks ago. Land Rover had sent me an offer for a $75
Visa gift card if we drove the Discovery. After putting it off for
a couple of months, we finally made it to a dealership. The test
drive was the coolest test drive I have ever been on.
The salesman started by taking us over their rock driving course. If you have even driven past a Land Rover dealership, you have probably seen their cars parked up on giant rock expanses. Well, this dealer had one set up for a test drive.
We started by heading up a 30 degree incline. It handled it with ease. The salesman showed off the hill descent feature that allows you to tackle a decline without applying the brake. It is supposed to keep you moving at a constant 7 mph. It was pretty impressive.
Next he demonstrated how to pop one wheel off the ground on uneven ground. We could see the wheel up in the air in the showroom window that was across from the "test track." Nothing fazed the Discovery, it kept going.
After that we headed to the angled hill. This rock hill had us driving at a 37 degree horizontal angle - to show off the stability of the Discovery. This was impressive because we had assumed the Discovery was a top-heavy vehicle that could be prone to tipping. No such thing. It was stable, even at that severe angle.
After that "warm up" Casey got to drive. The ride was much like you would expect from an SUV, except for the smoothness. I assume it doesn't compare to some of the luxury SUV's, but it was pretty smooth. The salesman got to pull Casey off the road while she was driving to show her that if a mistake was made the vehicle wouldn't be unstable when reentering the road. Now, there was no curb here, just a fairly level runoff area with only a couple inch lip back onto the road.
After that, we switched and I got to take it around the block. I took it up to speed on the highway to check for wind noise. It was fairly quiet for having the general aerodynamic shape of a brick. Less wind noise than the Vette or the Miata. I was comfortable driving, even after just a few minutes.
Acceleration was fairly good. The 2003 models, which we drove, benefit from increased horsepower (up to a whopping 217) - but is still supposed to be down on power compared to the other vehicles in its class. Having not driven any other comparable vehicles, it was fine. Plenty of power to execute a passing maneuver on a two lane road. The steering was a little loose for my taste (Casey's too). A little more play in the wheel than expected. However, it wasn't a problem.
The interior was nice. The tan leather seats had a nice black piping to them. I don't remember the buttons being too small or hard to find. In fact, I remember changing the air while driving. Must have been fairly easy. Two complaints though are the funny looking cupholders up front and the very narrow rear door. The cupholders look like they should be removable, but they aren't (Casey tried). I think it could be easy to get used to them, but they still look a little out of place in an otherwise wonderful interior. The door could cause a problem if you were constantly putting people into the back seat. That is not what we are expecting to do, so that won't be a big deal for us.
Overall Impression
Unbelievable off road ability and well-mannered on-road driving habits.