2009 Land Rover Discovery 3 Review & Road Test
March 30, 2009 by Karl Peskett
2009 Land Rover Discovery 3 Review & Road Test
It’s a box on wheels Jim – but not as we know it
Model Tested:
- 2009 Land Rover Discovery 3 SE TDV6 – $75,990
Options:
- Active Rear Differential $1050
- Technology Pack $6250
- Front PDC $900
- Folding Mirrors $900
- Metallic Paint $1800
Comfort, space, off-road credentials, solid build, ease of drive
Wallowy suspension, lacks grunt off the line
CarAdvice Rating: 
Words and photography by Karl Peskett
Now I know how my son feels. I’ve come to realise it’s not nice being chastised. You’d think as a grown man, I’ve got past the stage of being reproved, but no.
The day was going quite nicely, until I walked into the dealership to hand over the keys. It’s the first time I’ve ever been told off when I’ve dropped off a car.
I walked into the office where the manager worked, and sat down and handed over the keys.
“So, how did it go?” he asked.
“Yeah, it was quite good actually,” I replied. “Although it didn’t go quite as far as I had hoped off road.”
“Why is that?”
“Well, it might have been due to the tyre pressure. You know, I was looking at the sidewalls, and thinking, ‘they’re looking kind of flexy’ so I only dropped them to 20psi.”
The manager’s head fell into his hands, and he rubbed his eyes. “I can’t believe you only went down to 20,” he said. “What were you thinking?”
“Um…”
“16! It will easily go to 16!” he said, incredulously.
“Okay, but the last thing I wanted to do was roll a tyre off the ri….”
“You won’t roll it off the rim at 16! I’m from Dubai, and we go down to 12. Even eight! All we do is drive through the desert, and we never roll tyres off rims.”
So, I’m feeling about a metre tall at this stage, and the manager is just shaking his head at me. Lesson learned. Thing is, it wasn’t bad off road. Far from it. It was excellent. It’s just there was one section of dune that I was hoping to conquer, and couldn’t. Mind you, no one that was with us could.
Who knows, had we have dropped the tyres to 16psi or below, we might have made it up the seriously steep, powdery sand incline. As it was, and hampered by too much air in the tyres, the Discovery was still very capable. With its height-adjustable air suspension, low range transfer case, and user selectable terrain programs, the pretensions are there for a dedicated off road machine.
Theres supose to be a new 3L V6 twin turbo diesel out soon not sure exactly what the power figures are but I think they are around 200kw and 500nm which will be good. That Disco reads well in the review and looks nice. I like the Rangie more though that V8 Twin Turbo Diesel is an awsome motor.
An exhaustive CarAdvice review of a 4WD completed on….sand. No mention of articulation, clearances, underbody protection, nor how it would cope in real offroad situations. Not everybody plans to drive their 4WD on the sands of UAE! The conclusion talks about this being ‘one of the best family cars out there’, and yet nothing conclusive about its capability offroad (other than assumptions that can be made about the marque) are highlighted. Toorak tractor owners need only apply? Perhaps in future, the reviewers could head west, not east, whilst spending a little more time actually talking about what the vehicle is designed for.
This is a hideous looking car but besides that it does what it’s supposed to really well. I’d love to take this on a camping trip, could practically live in it.
FMD!!! $11,000 if you take all of the options and how in the hell can they justify $1800 for metallic paint
Folding mirrors 900 bucks!? Even BMW charges less for those…
I have a Honda CR-V with folding mirrors and it didn’t cost me anything. Heck, most cars have folding mirrors these days.
Yeah Jason. My current IS has them standard, Supra, and Soarer also. That’s a lot of money for something that’s essentialy a small servo, button, and few cm of wire…
I think most non-econobox Japanese cars have them as standard. Some options on euros are way overpriced imo.
Make sure you know a good and reliable tow truck driver because you and the service manager at Landrover will become like old friends. These have the worst reliability in the world ( Source JD Power)
I don’t get it, Landrover has been around since Jesus was a boy and they still can not get it right. On the plus side you feel like king of the road in one of these, they look fantastic and almost command other road users to look at me and be jealous. The V8 make a rumble that will make any man drool. Off road performance is good but the real test should have been the primary school drop off because that going to be the most travelled to destination for the Landrover during its life time. Accept for when it is in the work shop :)
Salesman I dont get it either,my dads had a couple of these and done serious 4WD work in it ,never missed a beat . Amazing where these things will go in the out-back .
I would normally would have picked a Landcruiser over one of these but with all the faults people seem to be complaining about and its latest recall you may as well have one of these .
I had a TD4 SE Freelander. If you knew how big i am you would laugh your ar3e off. I looked like a clown in a little car. My wife chose it (standard answer when my friends asked what i was thinking) we took it to the surf side of Bribe Island and it sank, all the way to the chassis. As the water lapped up against the wheels our savoir came in the form of a bloke in his 60’s with a Range Rover (that was about the same age as him), he dragged me out without a word and then took off on his merry way. Never in my life have i had so many problems with a car. On a side note i ended up selling it on E Bay to a bloke who just moved to Australia from Dubai, maybe he is the Same Manager at the place were Karl got told off.
Hi Salesman
To be fair to LR, the new models appear to fair a little better in the reliability stakes. I briefly considered the Freelander2 but couldn\’t justify spending over 50k on a softroader (the wife liked the look).
Bought a Diesel Sorento EX-L and haven\’t looked back :)
Yes this car does have it’s short comings. There’s meant to be a 5.0 V8 Diesel coming to it when the major update comes and it couldn’t come soon enough. I have a Discovery 3 but mine is HSE and I will just say that on the UK HSE models, you get basically all you could ever need in a car. It’s so very luxurious. I define luxury as things that you don’t need but are nice to have and it has plenty of those.
I can also vouch for how well it goes off road. I can’t say anything about sand but incredibly wet, muddy, terribly conditioned steep hills it takes with ease.
Mine has only once not turned on and it was on a -12 degree morning after 210,000 miles. It’s also still as tight as the day I bought it. Build quality is not a problem here.
I still stand by my saying that any new Land Rover will be reliable if you just look after them. I have my Discovery and my Range Rover serviced at the right time, every time and get no problems with them.
To The Salesman, please don’t base your experience with Land Rover on the original Freelander. That was one of the worst cars ever made for reliability and build quality and Land Rover, after a while, made no secret of that.
My mother had a couple of Freelanders and all though she’s very much into Land Rovers, she hated them as much as everybody else. They were horrible! And from the stories you here, about 90% of them must have had major problems.
I’m just saying that if you went out and bought a Freelander 2 today, I don’t think you would have problems with it and the build quality is now amongst the best for compact SUVs.
George,
You couldnt have spent more wisley. I wish we didnt not spend so much on a Freelander. I lost thousands of $$$$$ selling it.
Alex,
You are right, i dont assume all Landrovers are bad. But my experiance was. I dont think i could bring myself to buy another one. Once bitten, twice shy.
Well it’s good to see you have an open mind. Most don’t and just assume that every Land Rover is going to be a a big box of trouble, but that’s not the case. The problem is that people with reliability problems always go on and on about them but you never hear from the people who love their car and don’t have problems. I can see where you’re coming from if you don’t want another though, I think most people who owned an original Freelander will never go back to Land Rover again.
I have just purchased a 08 v6 se and 10 grand worth of options and have found it to be one of the best luxury cars i have ever driven. This car is better than any x5 or m class mercedes. The ride is superb and the leather upholstery is better quality than an x5 and m class.Well worth 80 grand plus.
20psi is about right for moderate sand driving. leaves a bit in the bag should you get stuck too.
Having said that 16psi does make a noticable diffence. It just feels like you driving a waterbed when on hard packed sand.
i have a 97 disco camel trophy that has served me well for years, living on the west coast we have done a lot of beach work, 12psi is about as low as i would go if i had to, with the diff lock engaged the thing we go almost anywhere, as for the freelander my partner had a 98 and it was the biggest piece of crap on the road, we spent 1000s on it and the previous owner spent alot more than that, stay away, and landrover you should be ashamed of yourself for putting them out to the public
My uncle just bought one of these, has some rough edges, but overall not a bad car. Of course,like majority of such drivers, he’s too chicken shit to take it off road!
I bought a discovery 3 (2006) and kept it for the full three year warranty life, and did 65 k of entirely city driving in it. My wife drove it to school and back
It was the worst built car that I have ever owned
1. the air suspension failed and needed to be replaced
2. the clock failed and needed to be replaced (with the CPU, twice)
3. The CD player failed (for f**k sake, they could not even source a cd player)
4. The steering rack failed on two separate occasions
5. The brake booster failed and needed to be replaced
6. The rear air con was checked at its end of warranty service and found to have been connected incorrectly at the factory
7. The engine management system failed
8. The coolant system sprung a leak
9. The windscreen wipers screeched and never correctly wiped the driver side windscreen
10. the car smelt of oil smoke in the cabin.
Lance Dixon (me dealer) told me (unofficially) that all LR cars were so badly made that this was not atypical.
For you clowns at “car advice blog” to continually brownnose to Land rover only undermines your already tenuous credibility .
Rather than fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, the British army would be better off giving them Land Rovers
Always have been a fan of the Discovery 3, but have never understood why they’ve never adapted the 3.8L TDV8 engine for the Discovery, considering dimensionally, the 2.7L V6 and 3.8L V8 are similar.
One thing that some people miss (at least, I think) often in the Discovery (and also its Range Rover cousins) is how much they actually -weigh-.
A fully laden 2.7L TDV6 Disco 3 comes close enough to 3 tonnes, and the car’s unladen weight isn’t great at 2.5 tonnes. Mind you, you have the monocoque-on-ladder-frame body with the additional reinforcements and what not to account for that.
But that said, I still wouldn’t say no I guess. Always loved that olive green color it comes in.
Chechen, there’s no brown nosing about it. And if you think they’re clowns then got of their website. Land Rovers are good cars, you’ve just had a bad one. Do you really expect us to believe that your dealer told you that his (expensive) product was crap? Apart from anything, if he did, he was wrong.
I purchased the Discovery 3 for my retirement and to undertake a major round Australia trip and have to say when I took delivery I thought this is the best car I had ever owned, three years and 50,000 kilometres down the track my experience includes, instrument pack faulty and replaced, air suspension faults, two new front differentials, tie rod replacement, RH front lower ball joint arm and ball joint replaced, second lower ball joint replaced, three wheel alignments, front window not working, loose wiring, indicators not working, loose wires, water leaking from sunroof, (twice), radio not switching off, radio complete fail (twice), an intermittent fault with another window not working and countless stop light globe replacements. The vehicle has never been off road, always garaged. In the case of my previous (and much less expensive) vehicles, a Nissan Pathfinder, a Mitsubishi Pajero and a Toyota Land Cruiser, I never had the need to replace tyres under 80,000 km. To be fair to the dealer they have had everything fixed under warrantee though now expired last month so heavens knows where I go now. Not what you expect for an $85,000 outlay. Never again!
Well my sister’s Disco 3 is towing horses and generally
going interstate, or climbing up the hills on the farm.
No faults after a year.It has electric brakes fitted for the Horse float, and no problems with that either.I am
beinghonest. My 1951 Landy is still in use, and has been
and done ‘everything’-towing tractors,crossing the simpson,
and deep water crossings.Definitely the best of all my cars
for reliability.Original parts most of them-including the master cylinder has not yet been resleeved.Why? in continuous service, and oil kept full.[that's what it asks
you to do in the handbook under the seat]
If anyone is considering getting Landrover, i stronlgy recommend they visit this site first http://www.haveyoursay.com/
Had a quick look Thomas – I might ask what you would expect to find on an Anti Landrover blog site.
One of the bloggers (the one who runs a Helicopter operation) must be so stupid he’s unbelievable. His tyrant of comments concerning design issues with his range Discoovery begs the question did he not look at one before buying it.
Having said that i wouldn’t buy the dated Prado either.= if thats what your getting at.
Cupid stunt, what is the purpose of your little rant?
My mate had similar problems with his brand new HSE, before he gave up and sold it!! And the word gets around about the LD3 reliability!! Especialy when one had to be towed back from a 4wd Action 4wd of the year (2006) comparo.
The Guy who runs the helicopter operations certainly knew what he was on about!!
Offcourse you would’nt get a “dated” prado, you drive a little dak-dak astra don’t you?
Thomas why are you such a grumpy old tw8t. Your adversarial at the best of times.
The Anti LR website is full of Grumpy old tw8ts slagging their expensive and unreliable LR’s off. Any consolation my boss a a LR sport and is having no end of problems. Happy Now?
Oh and by the way I run a 3.0 CDTi Vectra Wagon and a 2.7 TDi Audi A6. Sold the Astra years ago, what great little car that was.
Cupid stunt,
There you go, calling names again!!
Do you ever have anything on topic to contribute?!
You seem to comment more on the posters then their post themself?!! mate, this isn’t facebook!!
And why wouldn’t the people on the site be grumpy, when they have been so let down by landrover!!!
Lets not forget majority of them are land rover owners, who have spent money with the company!!
Durrrr isn’t that what comments are about commenting on?
Jeeze…I even partally agree with you on the LR stuff. Seems some folk love to bait all the time and you’re numero uno.
Tell yer what Thomas – I won’t respond to your comments from now on then you’ll have less to talk about in your lonely old world.
Yeah I’m afraid I’m going to have to agree with Cupid here, which is something I very rarely do. I found that website years ago and I wrote to them saying how good my Discovery had been, they didn’t post what I had written. They only care about people who are having trouble and make no space for the fact that not everybody is having crippling problems with their Discoverys.
Their problems are legitimate I’m sure but why on earth did somebody who had “endless problems with a Discovery 2″ buy another Land Rover? Seems a bit silly to me. And it’s not as if people don’t have problems with the Audi Q7 that he harps on about – http://accident-audi-q7.skynetblogs.be/
Tomas, the fact is that people who are having a nice smooth ownership experience aren’t the sort of crack pots who would bother starting a website about it. Every brand puts out a few lemons here and there but that’s no reason not to buy one. My Land Rovers are fine. Everybody who I know’s Land Rovers are fine (and thats over thirty assorted LRs).
And at the end of the day, they’re just about to get new engines from Jaguar (who just beat Lexus in US reliability surveys) and a major quality overhaul.
Cupid Stunt Says:” Durrrr isn’t that what comments are about commenting on?”
No, it’s about commenting on the subject matter, and not the poster!!
Cupid Stunt Says:” “Tell yer what Thomas – I won’t respond to your comments from now on then you’ll have less to talk about in your lonely old world.”
Deal!!!
Alex, I’m not surprised with your point of view, since you are one of the biggest Land rover fans on this site!! Few years back, I have even considered getting an LD3, but after looking into, and reading about it’s quality issues I got turned off, especially on a vehicle costing that much…
I belive one of the 4wd magazines refered to it as “Lada niva quality, at a prestige price”
Anyway good luck with your vehicle!!!
Don’t get me wrong, being 4wd enthusiast I’m all pro 4wd only brands like Land Rover and Jeep.
The LD3 is brilliant on paper, hopefully the next generation, under new owner ship will less issues.
By the way, I like the fact that they still sell the old defender, and I wouldn’t’ mind one, that is if it had front and back diff-locks and a little bit more powerful motor!!
So what do you advise those that wish to purchase a 200 series after reading some of the stories on this thread Tomas ? You being a Toyota lover and all that ;)
http://www.caradvice.com.au/78.....00-series/
what is the best selling 4WD in australia?what is the best selling brand in australia?which brand is the world’s largest,richest,respected,trusted auto maker?the best auto makers will survives.however dinosaur days are over.the good news is there will be less bogans and less dinosaurs from next year.only bogans came here and shamelessly talked about how good their dinosaurs are{in fact..they are rubbish.just another taxi…right].well..the times will tell…..OH WHAT A FEELING!
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First of all if Holden and Ford did cease production and pull out of Australia I don’t think that the hyndreds of thousands of locally built Fords and Holdens including Falcons Commodores Lasers Capris Kingswoods Toranas etc would disappear overnight
Even If Holden and Ford did leave there would still be thousands of People in their Falcons and Commodores 10-20 years from now…because unlike Toyotas they are built to last.
Sure according to you and the handful of other toyota fans on here they might not be that reliable However; reliability and longevity are two different things and Holdens and Fords are a sh!tload cheaper to run repair and maintain than Toyotas.
I mean how many original locally built 1958 Toytas do you see on Australian roads?
Toyota may be the worlds richest, most respected and trusted auto maker but [according to a report in the Washngton Post a couple of years ago] they are also the wolrds most recalled cars as well
SOB if Holden and Ford did cease production and pull out of Australia what makes you think that Toyota will remain as the only local car assembler?
Given that the Canary is made in other countries apart from Australia – If times get tough for Toyota [which they could well do if their F1 teams fails yet again to win a race let alone championship despite having a budget bigger than McLaren and Ferrari combined]; they could infact decide to Pull out of Australia and import the Canary.
If Toyo-Oz made a car that was a [unique] addition to the Toyota line up – like an affordable RWD sports sedan; instead of merely a replica things might be different
Yes GM may end up filing for Bankruptcy under “Chapter 11″ However that doesn’t mean that GM and their subsidiaries including Holden will cease production – its more of a form of protection against creditors to stop them from seizing any assets etc until it is deemed that the company is viable and making a profit again.. so they can continue making Camaros and Commodores.
It’s just that the US Govt has a bit of influence and control in the companies operations/finances etc
Not only that but you may have heard that Opel want to breakaway from GM. GM own the rights to the Opel name their designs and tooling.
Therefore; if GM wanted to they could transfer production of the Insignia [for example] to Australia – which would make Holden [one of the most modern flexible productive facilities in GM] more viable.
Not to mention the the rumours that despite GM dumping Pontiac [and the G8] that the VE COmmodore could be rebadged as the new Chevy Malibu.
On Autoblog there are a number of car enthusiasts in the USA who believe the VE is an awesome car that should have always been a sold Chev
So you see Holdens future looks as though it could be better than what you think
Bavarian Missile (.)(.) Says:
“So what do you advise those that wish to purchase a 200 series after reading some of the stories on this thread Tomas ? You being a Toyota lover and all that ;)”
Bavarian Missile, since you and wheelnut, seem to have a rather unhealthy Toyota fascination and frequently break the code of conduct by bringing up toyotas, with intent to incise off topic arguments. I suggest you go back to the article you provided the link for, and look up the 2 very first comments made by “Tomas79”… and then tell me who the reall Toyota Lover is?! I dare you to show me a similar comment made by you about BMWs, or Wheelnut about holdens?
Unlike you, and wheelnut, I’m not a badge fanatic, and don’t claim any manufacturer to be 100% perfect!! I have not bought a LC200, so I have no advice to give!!
But the LC3 did tick the right boxes for me, so I have seriously looked into getting one.
But the amount of issues I have heard/read about made me pull back!!
By the way, I read many 4wd magazines, forums, and although LC200 do have bit more problems then the usual landcruisers, I doubt a lot of the comment on that page were made by genuine Lc200 owners!!
Wheelnut Says:
“SOB if Holden and Ford did cease production and pull out of Australia what makes you think that Toyota will remain as the only local car assembler?”
Wheelnut, you never studied economics, have you?
Otherwise you’d know with the competition gone, and the demand for fleet cars/large family cars still present (even if slightly reduced by the loss of brand loyalist and the new trend towards smaller cars) Toyota would prosper by greatly increasing it’s market share!! Toyota would now have enough capital to keep the currently common part suppliers running. And the part suppliers in order to stay in business, would have to be very price competitive among themselves in order to keep Toyota interested in buying their wares!!
By the way, nothing Toyota produces locally at the moment interests me!!!
Wheelnut Says:
“On Autoblog there are a number of car enthusiasts in the USA who believe the VE is an awesome car that should have always been a sold Chev”
Well a lot Aussies believed that the Mitsubishi 380 was an awesome car too (including myself), its just that most believed that something else suited them a little better!!
And common, the yanks aren’t idiots, changing the badge won’t make any difference!!
Tomas, anybody talking about problems with the Land Cruiser probably do own them. It’s just that not many people, whether they like Toyota or not, say that they are unreliable because that usually isn’t the case. I know people who have had problems with the new Land Cruiser, mostly dust related. It isn’t the most reliable of Toyotas.
I dont think that Land rovers have been around since Jesus’ times but do know for a fact they were troublesome vehicles ever since the Brits used it in the desserts of middle east and Africa during the two world wars.I live near Dulwich hill and theres a big garage there which services ONLY LANDROVERS, and theyre always full of vehicles for repairs and every time i drive by i see unhappy owners hanging around looking at their vehicles and bills.So i would take the statement “that they have improved them” with a pinch of salt.They obviously didnt want to improve the electricals and other mechanical issues but were charging an arm and a leg.It still looks like the vehicles never improved beyond their dessert days going back 60 years or so.How can one do these frequent trips to the garage,those were the 70s and 80s.We live in 2009 and in an age where you buy a car and forget about it,not where you want to forget that you ever bought it.
Times are a changing and these guys should also get their act together.
Sorry i was so hungry that i wrote desert as dessert.My bad,sorry for that.
I had a 05 Land Rover Discovery and haven’t spent €3000 on repairs in 6 months with less than 100,000 km on it I decided to sell as it was developing problems with the bearings on the front wheels. Never again I have to say, mid-life crises is now cured
I am a country Vet with a 2005 diesel discovery 3. Its done 220,000 kms on all types of terrain and often at high speed on corrogated dirt and gravel roads. It gets irregular servicing by a local country mechanic. I pull cows out of drains and channels with it and spend lots of time driving through paddocks and channels.
I have never had any trouble with it whatsoever except for self induced damage.
Its a sensational vehicle and still goes and drives like a new car. At around 200 Hp with 6 speed auto and turbo, it does chew up the tyres but changing to Cooper tyres fixed that problem with the current set having done 70,000 kms. This is my third discovery, The first did 440,000 Kms ( 1996 diesel ) the second sold at 330,000Kms ( 2000 TD5 ) I would take some convincing to change back to any japanese models which usually gave me around 160,000Kms of trouble free motoring ! Thank you Landrover for superior vehicles.