@@fragelicious Thanks for watching and the comment. Yep, lots of undercut sections there. And from time to time sections on the face break away as the cliff erodes. If you are sensible you can see down along the cliff the undercut sections so always best to assume where you are is also undercut. As you say the drone shows it really well and in our case I realised that while we were far enough back it was a significant undercroft. We camped about 25 meters from the edge. Paula wanted to be closer but I wouldn’t do it 😉😂🙄. (More like the other way). It never ceases to amaze me though how some people pull up and walk right to the edge and take selfies etc. Some were even balancing on loose rock piles. Most people are pretty judicious and it’s quite safe to get a wonderful view from any number of spots if approached sensibly. But it is also great not to have to rely on rules, restrictions, policing and fences and signs on these remote sections and being able to free camp on such a speccy location is brilliant - when the weather is good. My one regret on this vid was that I didn’t take the drone low enough to get even clearer footage of the dolphins surfing. TBH we don’t want to annoy the wildlife, but in this case it was hard to see the drone against the water when it dropped down and with big waves even the altitude reading can be misleading so I didn’t want to risk losing the drone. There is a significant updraft near the cliffs and the poor little drone was working pretty hard to keep a stable shot in any case 😉. Thanks again for the comment. Much appreciated.

Thanks Paul for the kind comment. Glad the Disco(s) have gone well for you and yes hopefully we might see you out on the road some time. All the best and safe travels. David and Paula

Thanks again and I’ve added a long reply to the comment on the pack and consumer guarantee because its a really good topic IMO. cheers

Thanks again for watching and another great comment on the views on water and how much you carry. It’s a whole extra topic isn’t it about what you need vs what you’d like etc? people will have quite varied approaches to how they want to use their vans. In our view, If weight and fuel economy were not an issue then you’d always carry as much water as you can. For sure. I suppose for many people - us included -is they are watching weights, they might not be able to afford the best new truck etc in every case or they might be managing the ongoing costs like fuel. And American truck isn’t an option for us due to access for where we live at home in any case. One of the take away for us in our wash up was we’d like to go a bit smaller / narrower not larger. In our case we always operated around 300kg below GCM, but also had to manage the rear axle capacity of our Defender once it was set up and loaded and hitched we were within 20kg of GVM And we also got better and better at managing water and knowing our usage. So we took the view in the vid that just because we had 270 litres capacity, if we were confident where the next water was we didn’t need to carry more water than we had to. Hence 1-2 tanks normally and filled the third if we were going into less well known or longer off grid options. We knew we’re going to get cut off for a while in the GRR/Kimberley as an example. We kept filled up for the first half of the GRR but as the road opened we also knew that getting water was easy. Very easy. So we dragged less with us. People will always have to make their best judgement for themselves and the risk balance for their own risk tolerance, which compliance and safety aside the thoughts we share are how we operated, but we know others will set up differently and that’s great. One thing is for sure - there is no use buying extra water capacity if you are overweight when you fill to capacity and there is limited use having 270 litres of fresh water if you have to be self contained with great water while off grid. And no question if you got trapped for a while and had to compromise and release some grey water you would (but we’d urge people to be considerate where and how they do that to protect eco systems or where people are going to camp etc - but beyond that if your trapped for a bit you’d compromise) Another great topic and it really could be a whole new video - but we won’t as we touch on it here and in a couple of other places in the series. We’d leave anybody else wit the thought that you should set up your van as you intend and expect to use it - not just max on everything. If you don’t like spending 2 weeks completely off grid you might never need extra solar and and extra water. If you don’t want to do Gibb River Road or the Cape or the Oodnadatta track you might not need the top level off road suspension systems. None of those things are necessary if that’s not how you swing. If you do go very remote, if you are into sitting by a very remote river for 3 weeks at a time and dropping a line in then yes you need more water and higher levels of of solar and battery and the more of all that and the bigger the van the more you you need a bigger and upgraded tow tug etc and that means more expense and wider access and firmer sand access etc. It’s a great comment and if anybody else is following and had a view on this topic please let us know. Thanks again.

Yes everyone attacks the setup in different ways. We carry a couple of water bladders (160L) as well. Our tanks only hold a bit over 200 L so hence the extra capacity. You can make power but water is the limiting factor when off grid. Yes American trucks are big and bulky (and not cheap but when you look at setting up a new landcruiser or a chopped cruiser they are in similar price bandings) we are luck enough to have space to put it up to the driveway. Great information. Love the quality of your videos.

@@jorobson1cheers. And yes a portable bladder is a good idea. All the best.

Thanks for watching and taking the time to comment. You raise an interesting point and while I agree with your general comment, the case of the jack probably highlights some of the grey area that people might weigh up. It’s worth noting up front we’ve had a great response from Zone overall and even then some people have a different view to us on where the line gets drawn between what Zone builds and warrants and what happens in the case of third party components. I think this is a general issues across the industry. But that aside we’ve been very happy with Zones response to our requests. But let’s look at the example of the jack and how that might compare with other items. Firstly and most importantly everybody should be aware of their consumer rights and expect to their manufacturer to comply and consumers also have to be reasonable also. The consumer guarantee requires goods to be fit for purpose and durable and that can sometimes go well beyond manufacturers warranties . It is also true we’ve seen too many cases in the motor and van industry of suppliers trying to dodge their responsibility and the law. The fit for purpose rules are important. So take an easy case. A van builder guarantees their chassis and the body for say 2 years and at 3 years there is a major split or failure. The manufacturer says sorry but it’s outside warranty. In this case, unless the van builder can demonstrate the van was used improperly (for example taking a touring van off road ) the consumer would reasonably expect the chassis should for normal use, last much longer and they’d be right. In that case unless they can convince a manufacturer to meet their obligations, they would need to go to a tribunal to get a ruling. But before that they probably have to pay a lawyer to draft a formal letter and seek to get a better response. And regrettably some dodgy companies do just say no to see how long it is before the consumer gives up. For a catastrophic failure of that nature it is worth it for the consumer to pursue their rights. BUT everybody needs to make sure they understand the full law. Let’s say the failure occurs after 5 years. Is that a reasonable time and duration? The law isn’t clear here and “reasonable” takes on some more subjective considerations. In this case a tribunal would consider various factors including relative cost of the good etc. In this case an inexpensive van (they’re all expensive but you know what i mean) would not be expected to last as long an expensive van where the marketing emphasised toughness and going everywhere etc). So, in the case of our jack we didn’t even contest the durability. While we would have liked the van - which are very happy with overall - to have had a better jack in the first place, it was clearly a crappy jack of limited materials and build. Yes it would be nice if it lasted longer as many have, but it was a cheap and nasty jack on an otherwise expansive van. In the Base it was how they kept costs down in an otherwise good off road van package. In this case the options are clear. You might argue they should have put a better jack on it (true) but they didn’t and you can’t expect them warrant a cheap jack in the same way as an expensive one. So you can’t really ask somebody who fits a less expensive and less durable fitting to ensure it performs like a more expensive and hardier one. It still has to be safe though and still do a reasonable job - but only to the level of its general build and cost. Going to a tribunal wouldn’t guarantee getting a better result in that case and there is a cost of pursuing a consumer claim properly. Which would have likely exceed the cost if the jack. Zone wouldn’t replace it free but they would sell an equivalent cheap one noting they were no longer fitting that type in their vans and they recommended the Blackjack. The problem with any expensive manufactured good is that they also comprise a range of third party components and people understandably get annoyed if they have to deal with a run of breakages. So we were in Kununurra, we couldn’t get a new jack of any type at least until Katherine. We could have replaced a jack we didn’t really like with one at the same cost plus postage or buy a better one. TBH even if we wanted to fight the fact even the cheap jack should be replaced under the consumer guarantee - we’d have been cutting off our nose to spite our face. We don’t like the jack. This would be completely different if, say, just out if warranty we defended the cracks in those couple of sections of composite cabinetry had the manufacturer declined to make good. In that case the material is a big issue - it’s a key part of why the manufacturer says the items are lighter and stronger and you would expect the durability to be much longer AND you pay a lot for it. As you saw in this vid, we don’t like the jack and we don’t like some things like the drawer and door catches. But overall we love the van and we had no issues with Zones making good of the couple of issues we had. We could have pursued warranty for the broken gas flameout mechanism in the stove but we would have had to follow that up with Thetford and likely taken it to another place on different times for assessment and repair. In that case Coolum RV found the issue and repaired it for us and the cost was reasonable and much more convenient for us to pay and get it fixed than pursue the warranty in that case. So it really is an interesting issue - thanks for raising it - and we’d urge anybody to be reasonable in their approach with a manufacturer in pursuing their consumer rights and expect the manufacturer to be reasonable in return. The only BUT here is people should read all of the consumer law together and if it is a major issue and you aren’t getting a good response it might then pay to get a good consumer lawyer to assist also. There is some really good case law out there including cars and vans now but don’t confuse the general obligation for manufacturers and sellers to make good on items and repairs with the fact that there are some grey areas around what “reasonable” durability etc means , you can’t expect a cheap item to perform like a specialist build expensive item, some consumable events or components aren’t expected to last as the rest of the car or van. The other area that gets messy is around modifications which some manufacturers try to use to get out of their obligations and in that case the mod had to be related to the breakage and the onus is on the manufacturer to demonstrate the mod caused the issue and in that case you might have a claim from the modification supplier. If anybody has views on this let me know because we did hear of any number of issues people had with both cars and cans during our travels and the different responses they got. Great comment and thanks again -

Hi thanks for watching and the feedback, much appreciated. Sorry I never weighed it completely cleanskin with no passengers etc. When we did the weights with the rig early on, we did it loaded, rack on etc because the operative issues for us was actual GVM and GCM vs compliance plate, hitched and unhitch. And of course since then we added more accessories and removed the rack and third row seats temporarily. When we had to weigh in WA that was still loaded and hitched as they were checking GCM and we know the car was about 40kg under max GVM loaded and hitched. But that doesn’t help your question. Sorry about that, but you are right the Australian spec is slightly heavier than the paper/ european spec.

@@nextleveloz Thanks very much for your reply. Still helpful. Rear axle weights seem to be the big issue. I dont really want to spend an extra 5K for a 3rd row of seats I will never use but I might have to just for the extra axle weight. Although I presume the actual 3rd row of seats will take up part of that extra load availability.

⁠@@jayson6954Yes correct. The rear axle - like most tow tugs in the class - is the issue but you can’t get/ do an upgrade. And yes the third row seat takes up approx half or a bit under half of that extra rear axle rating margin between the 5 and 7 seaters. Hope that helps. cheers

Thanks Ken and thanks for watching. We did a wrap up of how the Defender went at the end of the Lap, which, apart from some of the recaps of the downsides was overall much better news if you’re interested and happy to say all is working very well and a couple of the legacy issues now fixed on our return and some great service from our home dealership which was massively improved with changes to the previous service team there. Thanks again for watching. Cheers David

@@nextleveloz ordered a 25 , 110 the other day. I’ve done lots of research and think I’ve found a strong dealer. Best wishes!

Hi Peter. Thanks for watching and the feedback. We really appreciate it. Yes the standard JLR hitch (tongue) is too low. We use a Hayman Reece part number either 202126/ 21161 (3500kg/350kg rated 195mm hitch). We use it upside down which it’s fine to do with that model I’m not sure if that part number still exists but HR will likely have an updated equivalent. Ours is the best compromise we could find to balance both the LR recommended specs and the towing height needs for the Zone Base and we are a tiny touch nose down which is fine and right on the minimum recommended tow height of 490mm. Im assuming you are getting a Pergrine or Sojourn?? I’m not 💯 sure but I think the tow heights for the Gen 2 vans differ a touch from the Base. So check with Zone or do a search on the zone owners site on “tow height” as this gets canvassed regularly and lots of good info. If you are getting the expedition the tow height is a bit different again. My best recommendation always is - confirm with Zone the tow height for your model van. Take that info and the JLR recommended tow hitch length (175mm from the Defender iGuide) and go to a HR dealer and they can measure your hitch receiver (make sure you’ve started the car and are in travel height ) and they can find the best hitch / tongue for you. You likely won’t find one exactly meeting every recommendation but from experience it’s better to be ever so slightly longer than shorter on the hitch length to reduce the risk of the trailer brake hitting the tyre when hitching and unhitching. That incurs a tiny but not excessive weight penalties on the rear axle so don’t go too long (our is 190 or 195mm). In our case we had a hitch that was too short and solid so a touch heavy so we took the whole rig into Arrow Towbars at Brendale on Brisbane’s north and they trialed and errored until they found the best match which was also slightly lighter as well. But if it helps and the tow heights of the new vans are in the 490-530mm range our hitch is the 202126/ 21161. Final comment check on the Defender forum and use a search term like “towing zone” because there is lots of discussion without having to post a new question and there are several Defender and Zone owners who have shared their setups and experiences also. All the best with the new rig and safe travels. cheers David and Paula

@@nextleveloz Thanks David, very informative. That has definitely been the problem, finding a hitch length that is at the recommended JLR length of 175mm and to be able to achieve the tow heights of the 490-530 that you have correctly surmised of a Pergrine, which is the model we are ordering. I’ll check in with a HR dealer as you suggest. Thanks again and much appreciated. Cheers, Peter.

Hi. Thanks for watching. 25-26 psi on the van and front of the car. 28-30 on the rear of the car. The only trouble with the Cape is the road conditions vary so much. There are stretches of sealed and in some places good graded gravel and only a few stretches of pretty horrendous corrugations. So we we stayed aired down from Hann River and just kept to a modest speed even on the sealed road and kept aired down. Thanks again. cheers

The y62 was certainly a consideration for us. A bit big for our narrow access at home. Petrol availability has improved but there were a couple of places during our lap where they ran out of ULP and a number of stations only have enough for their domestic use. But it’s still improved. Ours hasn’t had dpf issues. Be interesting to see what happens with the y63 and while it won’t affect current owners euro 6 regs will challenge a few. The Defender is already compliant. The Defender will be better on soft sand and some of the off road stuff which doesn’t trouble it and clearly the y62 has the points for the heavier end of towing given its upgradeability as well. Not sure what you’re towing but 21.8l/ 100km seems a bit low from what i’ve seen but good work. The only point Id make note broadly is we did see both LCs and Y62/ on tilt beds. Not sure why but no piece of machinery is unbreakable. For our money if we hadn’t gone the Defender it would more likely have been the y62. What the y63 and subsequent models will do will be interesting to watch. For the time being we are happy the early model issues we experienced with the Defender have been fixed. Not one of those was either diesel engine or emissions control related . I also think going forward the complexity argument will start to fall away because all future model cars are going to have to comply with increasing regulatory demands. Whether that means the Defender is ahead of the curve - something JLR are often accused of - remains to be seen. For the moment though it sounds like yours is doing really well for you and that’s a good thing. All the best, thanks for watching and safe travels, cheers

@@nextleveloz yes true mate--i hear a lot of fuel economy crap about the y62--- i didnt buy it for economy i like the fact its heavy so it makes a safe tow rig--- i drive at highway speeds everywhere and fuel amazes me at 22l /100, its very good and i check by fuel and kms not dash reading, its far better than my lc200 was, we test drove a 300 series in 2022 and paid a deposit--- then we drove the y62 and cancelled the 300 series as it wasnt impressive and did seem 30k overpriced, i will be changing tow rig in a few years as i do regularly as i like a change and its good comparison, i even had a v6 amarok for 12 months and it was superb towing but with all the gear it was over its gvm, the y62 has been the pick so far, but in the next 2 or 3 years i may go a landy--- we will see, if labor arent voted out we will all be towing with electric scooters with a solar panel on our hat--

cheers and safe travels

Hi mate. Thanks for watching. I’ve replied in a bit more detail on your comment on the later video which is probably a better overview of the Defender with 52,000km the ful lap behind it and a couple of those early production model issues fixed . The y 62 has its limitations but it has no problem towing 3.5 tonnes. It was likely our alternative if we hadn’t gone the Defender. Thanks for the comment. Much appreciated.

@@nextleveloz hello mate--i love the look of the defender but i cant risk any issues towing in remote areas, id like to think i could get one next car--- i change tow vehicles every 3 to 5 years and have had many--- the issues i have seen and read with landrover puts me off, as the nissan has had zero issues from new towing a 3300kg van -zero, and we have done a lot of towing, maybe ill change my mind later on--- cheers mate--- drive safe

Hallo. Thanks so much for watching and the kind words. We try to call it as it happened. And we get to send some money to charity while we enjoy life. Maybe one day we will get to South Africa, you guys enjoy a bit of overlanding and a good braai. Maybe if the Wallabies are a chance to beat the Boks?? 😂😉. All the best and thanks again. Totsiens, my vriend!

Thanks for watching. It might help to see the wash up / Lap wrap up on the car and how everything resolved. We tried to be fair noting this vid is a bit older now and we have completed the Lap. Thanks again for watching. cheers

Hi. I’m not sure I understand what this was responding to. We’ve been known to drop the odd swear word also, but the caps suggests there is some frustration here - but it would help if i understood what it was referring to. It’s been a while since we posted this one so I might have missed something. Thanks for watching. cheers

Yes. I’m not sure why TBH. They still seem to have the D250 in the mix but moved from D300 to D350. Same displacement. About kw extra on power and a bit more torque. We found the power and torque great for towing and off road in our experience and good fuel economy and don’t need any extra acceleration. But not sure what else on the drivetrain has changed if needed. Anyway who knows. D250 and D300 was essentially the same engine setup except tune so I’m not sure if the D350 is the same power plant tuned better. I’m sure we will find out at some stage but doesn’t really affect us unless parts are changing and that affects ability. For now the D300 does our job well. 🤔🤷‍♂️

Hi thanks for watching. No car sized potholes when we crossed. A couple of small bull dust holes and corrugations in the middle third but nothing to swallow the car! Yes a couple of road trains, but TBH a couple of fast moving LCs without trailers and with no regard to others caused more risk with overspeed driving and kicking up stones than the couple of road trains. But the few cars/ vans and trucks we passed were mostly very considerate and safe. The road was being rapidly improved in sections so there were a few bypass tracks at road works and some of those roadworks will likely be completed or sealed and the section from Jervois to Gemtree is pretty much sealed or well graded. There has been another wet summer season since we drove later last year so I’m not sure what impact that had and where this years grading is. But in our trip the road wasn’t as terrible as the road reputedly was years ago. The worst bit for us was the Tobermorey to Jervois section which did get a bit rutted and corrugated and even then, airing down and taking our time meant it was ok. Hope that helps. As you know it can vary seasonally out there but the Plenty was overall not too bad for us.

Hi. Thanks so much for watching and a lovely comment. The shoes are Merrell Choprocks. TBH Merrell have become our fave hiking shoes full stop - no association they just seem to fit and wear well for us. I love my water shoes and makes it a lot more comfortable doing the wild water swims and short hikes as well. I’m not sure the Choprocks are still available from Merrell. We have a quick look in case we could find a link. We found one link found a link to put version model at brandhousedirect.com.au. But we know nothing about that site. So if you’re interested check out whatever Merrell have replaced them with and/or see if there are any limited available sizes that suit on other sites or ebay etc. There are two types of choprocks one is the sandal which we didn’t like or the shoe variant which is what we have which and which has similar strapping to the sandal but a more fulsome mesh upper which lets the water straight out and a nibbed more substantial sole to protect your sole and give some grip on rocks in creeks etc. So they are a bit more substantial than the beach shoes some people have. As always even shoes designed for the wet can still be a bit slippery on some wet rocks especially if there is some algae or moss on them. Hope that helps and thanks so much for the comment. Safe travels. Paula and David

@@nextleveloz thanks guys 🥰. We are planning our WA trip for next year and watching what you have done has been great inspiration. Hope to see more of your travels now that you have finished your gap year 😊. Can I also ask how you managed with your toilet cassette over your extended time on the gibb. Notice that there are limited to no dump points 😱

@@cherriehalliday8883 Thanks. Just got back from a short trip to Queenslands southern downs. We are doing something a bit different this year and weighing up what VLOGs we might do to explain it. Also weighing up our van (keep it because we love it or change it if we can find something slightly smaller and more agile but still comfy - 🤷‍♂️). Anyway! WA is wonderful - loved it, especially the Gibb. We have composting so disposal wasn’t a problem for us - even with the extended stays due to the floods. For our friends that we traveled with they made absolute most use of the loos at the station stays and roadhouses. So yes that does limit the feee camp options a bit but each of the major stopover locations have loos of varies descriptions. In our case Mt Hart, Mt Barnett/ Manning Gorge campground, Mt Elizabeth Drysdale Station, - the intersection at GRR and Kalumburu Rd Ellenbrae all had facilities. Some people carry an extra cartridge with them also. Again in our case the composting loo meant we didn’t have to use a dump point and as the wee bottle is untreated / not chemical it can be disposed of anywhere including septic and drop loos. Sorry that doesn’t help and we know others had the challenge but between an extra cartridge and max use of the facilities that were around that helped especially if you aren’t held up. cheers

@@nextleveloz thanks for being so helpful. Really appreciate your time replying. We downsized from a full sized van to a MDC hybrid and haven’t looked back. We are QLD based also so look forward to seeing your next adventures. Happy and safe travels. Maybe will see you on the road one day ☺️

@@cherriehalliday8883 You too. cheers

Which yard is that you are referring to Ryan?

Thanks John, appreciate you watching and hope you enjoy them as much as we love sharing them. The issue of technology and complexity is the $64 million question isn't it? It's a much debated topic. I've expanded this answer a bit because others might read it and it's a question I keep asking myself often also. Keeping in mind we wanted a crossover capable car that could do an excellent job in town and remote, a bit of dodgy off road, a lot of towing and comfortable and easy to drive for most of it. So that means auto/ AC, comfort, auto airbags, but good water depth can get in and out of most of the OTT and stable capable towing etc with as few mods beyond factory as possible. We shared why we bought the Defender, but the argument increasingly applies to the top model LCs and the big American trucks as well. We've seen them all bogged, broken down or on tilt beds for different reasons. In our case we shared a couple of issues - and one in particular required repair that disrupted the trip by a few weeks including a 750km recovery from a remote but not inaccessible location. So of course we get a bit of stick. And that wasn't the really high tech it was a turbo and those turbos are made by one of the couple of major turbo manufacturers supplying most brands. So keep in mind very few cars in this class are going to be naturally aspirated simple engines in the future - it wasn't the high tech that failed it was an electrical fault in a turbo (I suppose that is tech, but its a common part). But while I'm very attracted to the notion of a simple car I can fix with some fencing wire etc, I'm also old enough to remember a trail of simple cars breaking down along the road during the summer with overheating, we see plenty of even upgraded cars with broken suspension so there is also a bit of nostalgia that blinds some people to the fact older cars, not so long ago weren't that reliable either. Planes, spacecraft, advanced expedition shipping etc increasingly has very advanced technology and the aim is that redundancy along with lighterwight technology hopefully means that many cars are overall more reliable as well. In our case at no stage did the car stop nor was even going into limp mode catastrophic. Yet I saw I well known overlander/ expedition channel get stuck on a beach because of the mechanical failure of a $90 low range selector rod in a near new cruiser/ troop. It lost low range which is pretty critical off road and hardly tech, but failed it did. Not knocking the troopy - it's a good car in its way (but needs lots of mods) but it puts in some perspective this thorny debate. the reality is with increased regulation and demand, cars are going to get more tech. So maybe they need more inbuilt redundancy and more capable. My biggest fear is that fewer of us actually really want to do what some of these cars promise to do. Many, many more people drive Defenders and Cruisers in town than heavy duty overland and off road and that means the manufacturers are incentivised to promise big, deliver little and charge lots knowing fully well that the minority will test them. Where does the Defender reach its limits? Towing it can do a few more remoter places than we went but in fairness you don't tow across the Simson or up the Kreb etc. Not towing and with extra fuel it can go pretty much anywhere others can go with the right mods and if you have the variants that can be manually put into neutral to tow (there's a few that can't apparently). Hope that seeds a few thoughts. But bottom line is they are going to get more complex, so users need to demand appropriate redundancy in these complex systems. Thanks again, great question and glad you've enjoyed the channel. cheers Dave

Thanks for watching and glad you enjoyed it. Great your Defender is going well. I get the appeal on the smaller van. We haven’t had too much drama towing the Zone but as we reflected in our van wrap up ideally we’d like to find something a touch smaller - not as small as yours - that retains some of the comfort of our current van. Not sure if our ideal van actually exists. But yes yours would be even easier than ours to tow. Thanks again for watching and the feedback and safe travels. cheers

Hi. The problem with reviews is they do tend to spend disproportionate time on problems, noting only one took us off the road and even then for a matter of less than 3 weeks total. Overall we had a great year as the rest of the video series shows. And all fixed. We saw different people with different cars have their trips ended and that wasn’t our experience, so we tried to give some perspective as well. But would have been equally wrong to try to gloss over a couple of the more important items also. It’s a tremendously capable car. People have to weigh their views though. Van and car contributed to a brilliant year and that’s the bottom line even if it wasn’t glitch free. But that’s also why I included the summary package of the overall trip and emphasized the fact the car out of the box was a very good tow car.

Thanks for watching. It is expensive for sure, especially if you are taking the van across on the ferry which is why we say it’s really at least a lot least a two if not three week destination to justify the cost. As we said somewhere it’s a great place and maybe because of time and expense it’s a destination in its own right and maybe not ideal for most Laps. But a great place nonetheless. Thanks again. cheers

Hi. Thanks for watching and great to hear it’s working well for you and yes they are good stable tows. When you upgraded the car did you do a GCM/ axle upgrade or just wheels and airbags. We run at 6400kg fully loaded and a bit under if we only fill one tank of water. In our case the airbags were standard on the car so the two rigs are within the same ballpark. Thanks again and safe travels.

@@nextleveloz thanks for reply. No we avoided gvm upgrade as best we can. On tow we run rear car bags at 40psi, rear tyres at same pressure and front at 35psi. Keep in mind we are travelling with less than 50kg in the car, method wheels and Mickey Thompson tyres. We now have a roofrack which will carry lighting, maxtrax and an awning. We have no bullbar. Having had a launch for many years we learned about weights. Eg: we love coffee in the morning so bought the smallest breville mini at a third of the weight of the bells and whistles model. No inbuilt grinder. Every item for the van was purchase with weight in mind. We’ve just completed a 3000k trip with 16lt diesel per 100k. We prefer to shop locally when travelling rather than loading up supplies. The additional cost of doing this helps save with fuel economy. Manage the 270 kg on board water in an “on demand” way. Coastal travel in Eastern states doesn’t need to be with full water tanks. Each to their own I guess. Safe travels

@@brianhood9779 Thanks Brian and safe travels.

Hi. Thanks for watching and the lovely comment. I’m a bit tied up for the next week or so but I’m happy to come back with a few comments. Keep it simple, sound is probably more important than the technicalities of the vision, keep in mind who your audience is and of course it is hard to monetise but in our case that was a secondary consideration as every cent goes to charity so we didn’t do some of thinker cross platform stuff and a few other extra bits you need to do to make it work financially if you need the money. I can offer some thoughts on the actual videography / editing when O get back to you. If forget, don’t hesitate to give me a hoy in a couple of weeks. Thanks again and thanks again. Glad it got a bit better as we went of course. cheers Dave

Thanks for watching. If you’re interested, check out our final wrap of the car after 32000km full lap around Australia. Yep we had some issues 😢but we also ended up with some very good customer service as well. So our issues got resolved and good support during and at the end. Yes the parts availability needs a massive improvement! Thanks again - all the best.

Thanks for watching. There are a couple of episodes on the Defender but if it helps the final wrap up on the Defender is now posted. The link is below. How did our New Defender go on a 32,000km Lap of Australia? Mods & tips. Warts & all wrap up. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Dmowp3lAt0Y.html On the D300 you have to change the rear brake calipers to fit the 18s. It’s pretty straight forward and Tuff Ant organised the mod and certiifcation. Thanks again for watching. cheers

Thanks for watching. We bought it from Zone at a Zone RV muster a couple of years ago. Not sure if they still sell them.

Thanks mate. And yes you’ve had some service issues as per your last note. The new Toyotas will be less like the old ones. The issues in my Defender are out there. Plenty of people reporting no issues also. Just be careful not to make make our issues look like a bigger list. The turbo issue and limp mode was one and the same and it’s a third party component by a brand used in many other cars also- not good but worth noting . It wasn’t the wake up that caused our battery issue - as much as i’d prefer a camp mode, it was a collapsed battery. Yep replaced the transfer case most likely because of a faulty sensor but yep. As best we can tell that was a very rare issue and it didn’t stop us thankfully. Suspension annoyed me because it looks like a quality control issue and that’s on JLR. Didn’t stop us. But yes that’s the frustration isn’t it? Toyotas won’t get less complex as we move forward and more people feel as you do. But the only thing we can do is share our experience and as far as we’re concerned people have to make their judgement. Was our Defender a rarity like you 79 issue? Who knows? Time will tell if there are recurring issues for sure. We didn’t like the 300 but it wasn’t going to be available for us when we bought the Defender. We know of several people who’ve been across the Simpson and we’d like to do that and maybe the Canning - news to put a platform on for that and can’t take the van of course. Thanks for the comment, it sums up the dilemma. All the best

Thanks for watching and great share thanks. Good to hear your feedback on your dealer. The more of that the better. And yes it tows very well.

Thanks as always Stephen. The car is most certainly not a mall crawler - even if there are a few buyers who do pimp them i’m that way. Let’s hope the early issues are few and far between and resolved as they become known. I’m not sure about the Octa TBA. And Od like to think JLR make their existing marques perfect before they keep stretching their resources. A petrol V8? It will be sexy, no question but we needed a car that crossed over between a town car and a worker on the backroads so no site it appeals being the initial wow factor. Let’s see. All the best and thank you again. Safe travels. D & P.

@@nextleveloz Thanks David I agree regarding Octa It will have a wow factor etc And some great new technology And the BMW V8 But Hugely expensive ! A real shame JLR are not trying to release less expensive versions of Defender, that from the showroom floor, suit people who want a vehicle ready to tackle the outback etc The workhorse vehicle ethos is what the Defender originally was, and its reputation was built upon that heritage… In today’s market, JLR are chasing big profit via fancy versions of Defender. And all of their vehicles continue to go more upmarket. Understandable, but a shame, as they are moving away from being a utilitarian and rugged vehicle, straight off the showroom floor. I suppose JLR are happy to leave that market to Ineos ? The Defender platform is rugged and utilitarian, but ( sadly ) the JLR focus is on expensive versions of Defender, that most can’t afford, and 23” wheels etc, perpetuate the mall crawler image, as most are used by wealthy people as a city / suburban vehicle 🤷🏻‍♂️

@@StephenFogarty2023 The Ineos is still a work in progress. It’s more expensive than they originally suggested, more tech and perhaps not as customisable as “old” Defender enthusiasts might have wanted. I will keep watching it, but how the service coverage goes and parts delivery etc suggest it’s not as good as some might have hoped. Imperfect choices, but at least there are choices ATM albeit each with pros and cons. But the ability to woo well off city drivers and cash in on the premium they might pay for “Bond” cars is a concern for those of us that want the tourer/tower/ crossover. 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️😂

@@nextleveloz Exactly 👍

Thanks for watching and the feedback. Love it 🙏. As you’ve seen we aren’t brand tribal so everyone has to work out the car that best suits them and their needs. Great that the 300 is going well. Yes the price of the 200s was just silly at the the time we were looking. A lot of people paid over the odds for old, expensive to run cars that will need a bit spent on them and the values will come back to normal. In our case - no question we bought an early production run mew model and everybody has a view but in our view it is a contributor to a couple of the things JLR have addressed 🤷‍♂️. But the important thing is where you’re going to head to and see and enjoy. There are some magic places we got to see and hopefully more to come. Enjoy your forthcoming trip 👍👍We’re sure you will have a ball and if our travels gave you some ideas that’s terrific. All the best, safe travels. David and Paula.

Hi. Great to hear and thanks for watching. Yes we’ve had to replace a windscreen. We picked up a tiny stone on the M1 of all places and the subsequent crack was too big to repair. Replaced it under insurance with Obriens and it had to go to the dealership for calibration. That was before the Lap. We have a few stone chips from the Lap, the two slightly deeper ones were able to be repaired by us with a filler. Which reminds me, I might need to replace that kit in our spares box 🙏. Thanks again. Enjoy your Defender and safe travels.

Thank you for watching and the terrific comment. Much appreciated. We’ve learned heaps from other travelers, Defender owners and others and enjoyed sharing our adventures. Always more to come. Life is not a dress rehearsal. Thanks again. cheers

Our pleasure! Enjoy your trip. cheers

Glad you enjoyed it and yes, fixed. Just need to follow up insurance for the minor body damage from the the big roo near Borroloola now - again the bar helped heaps. thanks for watching. cheers

Thanks for following along. We know you have done so pretty much the whole time. Thank you. We had a ball in our car (a couple of well known moments aside) and were confident you will also. Safe travels.

Thanks for following. Your experience is regrettable and rein forces one of the things I think needs attention not juts by JLR but others, which is the timeliness of repair part supply. And the variability of the service experience. It's an excellent vehicle, hopefully the BiSG replacement is resolved soon ands all the best for your future travels. thanks again. David and Paula

Hi, thanks for watching. Sounds like the Disco has been around the blocks a fair bit!I can't do much more on the Defender having pretty much shared the whole story. The tail gat hasn't really worried us. Hitching and unhitching is fine once you have the optimal length tow hitch (our is 190mm, 15mm longer than the JLR recommendation. Our van is also pretty high. But the car systems are good for seeing and help guide over the hitch. The rear mounted wheel with the swinging tail gate can restrict access while hitched at some angles but it's generally been fine. You've touched on the paucity of JLR service centres - which is why they have a pretty amazing roadside assist recovery policy. If you are covered by Land Rover Roadside Assist they would have come much further out of Alice to get you (I'd say not the middle of the Simpson though) and taken the car to either Darwin or Adelaide. As you point out RACQ has a good failsafe of getting you home. If you have RACQ ultimate or RV that will also get the van home or if your car had to go to say Adelaide it would likely get the van to Adelaide in that case corresponding to where the car went. In essence RACQ RV provides van towing up to a fine.cia limit of $7,000 a year (which is recovery from the Tip to Cairns plus some incidentals). I'm told the issue we had with the turbo wasn't the same as the issue the Discos had, whatever that really means. Thanks again and safe travels for the rest of your trip. cheers

Thanks Dave. My turbo issue was an air type relay that failed to kick the high end turbo on demand. Once on fairly flat ground I was able to achieve up to 90 k/hr which got me to Alice. The local garage had claimed LR capability but was soon found wanting. RACQ got the vehicle back home, flew me back and picked up the accommodation tab. I thought that was exceptional. You did some comprehensive modifications to your Defender and I was most interested in fitting the 18” wheels. Do you mind telling me who did it and I presume you were happy with what they did.

@@lawriemunro9493 Tuff Ant. Great people. (Natassia Pomroy is one of the convenors of the New Defender Australian Owners group on FB). You are in Brisbane but arrange the conversions across Australia and in a couple of places OS. While it seems like a bid mod, in reality it’s quite straight forward changeover of one LR caliper for another. The bigger pain in my case was getting the TPMS sensors changed over when I fitted tyres to the new rims. But Tuff Ant now also sell compatible TPMS transmitters and I’d pay to have those and leave the old ones in the OEM rims. But seriously not a hard process with TuffAnts help. And on the the other stuff, one of the big learnings for anybody - with or without a LR i’d have good recovery insurance/ cover in place for car and van. All the best.

Thanks for watching. Yes, as we pointed out, not having the GAP tool was a regret and it's now in the kit. Great story and glad the RR has treated you well. One of the common criticisms of the Defender and Land Rovers generally - and that's extending to other makes as they catch up on technology - is concern about the fact stuff and "sensors". I get the concern about complexity which I think is coming anyway. But the sensor one I've had a rethink on. Sensors can tell us if something is going wrong. it might be catastrophic but then that's not about the sensor, or it could be an early warning or tip. That's only a problem if you don't know what it is, but if you do AND can reset it if the circumstance warrants it, then it's not a problem. You get where you have to be then deal with it before catastrophic failure. Amazing the number of people who thought limp mode on ours was a failure. It was a real pain, but we reset it in that case and were able to get 280km safer before we had to send the car away. To my thinking, without the sensors and limp mode we would have kept driving until the thing did fail much worse. So never happy when these things happen but for some reason when a Cruiser or a Ford blows an engine because the intercoolers weren't good enough people juts say it's rare and accept a blown engine. When a Land Rover goes into limp mode and 3 weeks later we are heading to the Gibb River road towing 3.3 tonnes, everybody talks about unreliability. Anyway, too much. Great share, thanks again for watching and safe travels.

Thanks Steve, I'm still learning all the tool can do and it would have been very handy to identify those codes we got when they appeared and before being reset. Yes they get logged, but when you are deciding the best course of action when and if something pops up, its useful to be having the discussion with better knowledge of what's happening and of course codes on minor issues can be reset. cheers

Thanks for watching and your thoughts on this. Some good perspective. I've said it elsewhere, I don't have an issue with Toyotas or other brands, it's just the tribal nonsense that sometimes comes without any balance. Toyota's do have issues, some of them well known and the Defender is an exceptional car out of the box and in my view best in class. Doesn't mean it's all beer and skittles of course. Never is with car ownership if you are driving outside of city limits. Your new Defender will eat up that job, it's capable of much more and you will enjoy driving it. cheers

Glad you enjoyed and thanks for following along. the car did much more than the knockers say it can. Yes we did share some down moments and that of course attracted a lot of comment, but it was important to provide the wrap up how it all worked out. All the best.

Absolutely

Very true! The pennies fall where they fall, but for us it has to be based on actual evidence not claim. We aren’t rusted on LR owners, it’s about functionality and purpose with a good eye on value. No issue for us if people choose another product and if they are satisfied then well and good. It’s a car. The struggle for us is when people make claims like this brand doesn’t break down etc. Some things will come down to a particular brand and support, but we’ve pointed out elsewhere many components are common to brands. The ZF transmission for example. Turbo technology is dominated a few widespread brands so a fault is likely low incidence but can happen in any number of supplied makes. Safety, performance, comfort and reliability - for a given purpose for a given price. That’s roughly the equation isn’t it. And over that, some people will regard it as an emotional buy - sizzle or insurance. The fuel economy was great and it interesting to watch some rusted on 70series and 200 series content creators absolutely stumped by the fact the new 2.8litre turbo, 8 speed cars Toyota has juts brought out can do pretty much as much on less fuel. Same people who swore by old technology only a couple of years ago. Anyway. I knew this vid would do my head in! Cheers

Thanks for watching.So much could be said. Maddening sometimes. We don’t gloss over the turbo issue. But keep in mind it’s a third party manufactured component, and that technology isn’t limited to LR and the car never stopped running. And if the purchase of a Toyota is an unloved “insurance” buy by many, good on Toyota’s brand presence. They pitch it as a safety play but charge a premium price. The best value tow car we looked at was the Patrol - but look at Nissan’s market position compared to 20 years ago. We had two decision points. the best car available to us then. We explained that. And now the relative utility and cost for a change now. We have the luxury of a couple more years of warranty to see if those things were rare or not and what’s that means relative to the driving joy this beast represents when it’s on song. Thanks for watching, we get it.

Sorry to hear that. We carry minimal gear in the car. The specs are constantly changing but yes, weigh up the best value for your needs. Some of the options are pretty expensive. All the best and glad the bid helped with your thought process. cheers

Shane, thank you and team for wonderful service in a challenging moment. Steve coming all that way to recover us and a special mention to Ravin. We mentioned it in our original vid, but on a wet, cold and windy long weekend for Ravin to come in to expedite the diagnostics to help turn us around is above and beyond. He made a brief appearance on the vid 🙏👍. I noticed you avoided the camera 😉😂. It’s far too complicated explain in our vids now - it’s past - but there were some matters beyond your control that got in the way of what you were tying to do to help us. No question in our minds that had the recovery and parts turnaround been done with our van first time up, I’m convinced the whole recovery to back on the road fully repaired would have been around 2 weeks. It was still only marginally longer in total time across the two attempts. That’s outstanding. And perhaps even more important, everybody was friendly as well. So Kudos. Wishing you all well. BTW the photo used in the video thumbnail is Cape Leveque. About a week after we left Geraldton and we were still fingers crossed on the Turbo. 23,000km later and not a peep on that front.

Thanks for watching and the feedback. Much appreciated. Cheers

Thanks for watching and good question. We try to do the routine service every 15k including engine oil and filter. We were considering the transfer case pending the outcome of the 2WD light issue - but they’ve replaced the transfer box. The transmission is conditions based servicing also and we haven’t done anything extra there but we are discussing the options with the dealer. Transmission has been good - but yes it’s worth keeping all that in mind given our usage will make it prudent to reduce intervals as we have with the engine oil.