Labour exchange
Time to make the Defender work for a living by towing another great old name from British motoring legend. By James Dennison
When it became clear that hiring someone to transport my MG Trophy racing car from the Midlands to West Sussex was going to be prohibitively expensive, I subtly enquired about potential towing vehicles on CAR’s long-term test fleet. When that fleet includes a Land Rover, there was only ever going to be one sensible answer, so I ended up depriving Ben Pulman of his Defender 110.
After all, these are cars famous for their towing ability, not to mention I’d wanted to have a proper go in the new Defender ever since it broke cover back in 2019. As a piece of design, I reckon it brings old and new together seamlessly, yet any thoughts on aesthetics took a back seat while I pondered the mammoth task of several hundred miles in a day with my pride and joy riding on a Brian James trailer.
As a towing novice, I engaged the services of my good friend Will for practical advice andmoral support, and set about hitching the trailer to the Defender. At which point, we ran into problem number 1 – the trailer electrics plug wasn’t compatible with the Landie and I didn’t have what would be a very cheap adaptor. I was lucky enough to have a back-up, and after a quick trailer swap all was well and I set about hitching the rig to the Defender.
Helpfully, CAR’s Defender is fitted with the £2285 Towing pack that, among other things, includes the electrically deployable tow bar and Advanced Tow Assist, a system that works by recognising the presence of a trailer and subsequently doubling up the Terrain Response dial as a basic joystick. The system takes control of the trickier bits of reversing the trailer.
It’s an invaluable piece of kit that works brilliantly, and not the only feature that helps make the Defender feel perfectly suited to towing. For example, the extra rear visibility afforded by the ClearSight ‘virtual’ mirror helped enormously and, together with the myriad cameras (viewable at all speeds rather than just walking pace), meant I had a great view of all four corners of the car and 14ft trailer.
The technology was impressive, if not quite as impressive as the old-fashioned grunt afforded by the 3.0-litre diesel engine – highlighting how much will be lost if these engines continue to be out of favour.
Accelerating hard up the M40 slip road was such an effortless experience that, for one awful moment, I wondered if the trailer had become unhitched and left behind on the last roundabout. Once up to speed, smooth stability is dished out in abundance as the miles quickly slip by amid excessive consumption of Lucozade and sherbet lemons.
I covered around 600 miles in the Defender and, as a tow car and mile-muncher – and so much more besides – I couldn’t fault it.
Land Rover Defender 110 SE Month 7
The story so far
Living with Land Rover’s ‘reborn’ icon
★ E ortless towing; excessive sugar consumption - Racing is life – everything else is just towing
Logbook
Price £64,035 (£78,360 as tested) Performance 2997cc twin-turbodiesel straight-six, 245bhp, 8.3sec 0-62mph, 117mph E ciency 30.8mpg (ocial), 28.4mpg (tested), 241g/km CO2 Energy cost
22.5p per mile Miles this
month 1029 Total miles 18,596
Advanced Tow Assist is not the only feature that makes the Defender perfect for towing