Gary Pusey
“I’m not a fan of gratuitous electrickery although I understand why all car manufacturers load their vehicles with as much as they can squeeze in, even if most customers use only a fraction of the tech that’s available. It’s because the industry is locked-on to the idea of driverless, autonomous vehicles. And if these are going to become a safe and reliable means of transportation all the tech we are seeing now, and more, must be made bulletproof and reliable. At the moment we are all guinea pigs in a vast global beta test to make it so.
“At a time when carmakers have developed engines that can go on for half a million miles, and structures that are all but rot-proof, it seems a shame that it’s all that tech that is likely to lead to a vehicle being scrapped.
“Having got that off my chest I have to say that I am mightily impressed with the new Defender and, thanks to Bob’s generosity, delighted at last to have driven one. It’s on-road manners are impeccable and it’s off-road capabilities are impressive, but I’d rather trust my toolkit than some Software-over-the-air, so the 300Tdi would be my choice for that solo crossing of the Sahara, I’m afraid.
“What JLR have come up with is a completely new vehicle, consistent with their position as a maker of luxury, premium 4x4s. As Professor Gerry Mcgovern said, JLR had to create ‘a new Defender for a new age, respectful of its past but not harnessed by it’. In this they have undeniably succeeded, and I am sure it will sell in the hundreds of thousands, but they have not created a simple, practical and cheap vehicle that people can go off to explore the world in. And that’s a shame.”