I Don't like Mondays

[BritinUSA]

I don't like Mondays...

So I head off to work on Monday morning. I try to start the car and it won't..., start I mean. It just makes this weird clacking sound. I call up Land Rover and they send out a guy with a tow truck. He says I have a dead battery, I checked under the hood and I noticed that I also have a distinct lack of coolant in the expansion tank. I mention this in passing to the tow-truck guy who says it should be no problem.... But I know better.

I tell him to haul it off to the dealership while I call a taxi to take me into work. I wait 40 minutes for a taxi... No taxi. I call the taxi company again to enquire about the lack of taxi in my driveway, they are big, yellow things, they are hard to miss but one is definitely NOT sitting in my driveway. They tell me that they have no taxis available at the moment, I bite my tongue.

I walk to work. It's only about 2.5 miles but the wind is blowing in my direction (about 40 mph at a rough estimate, which does not sound like much but it is apparently more than my Freelander is capable of).

Land Rover calls me mid-morning. "We found the coolant, unfortunately it's in the engine."

sigh

They call out the warranty representative to look at in on Tuesday as they have to inspect anything that's going to cost several thousand dollars to fix. They find a leak, but the size of the leak does not account for all the missing coolant, so now they are trying to find where the rest of it has gone. I suspect it's gone into the heater core, that's where it went last time. Did I mention I got a new heater core a few months ago, it seems the coolant was leaking into it, funny thing that... Henning noticed it, he said, "Your car smells funny", I figured, "What does he know" , he's Norwegian, he probably grew up with the smell of North Sea fish, he knows nothing about what coolant smells like.

So now I'm waiting to find out when my car will be back on the road. They are replacing the head gaskets, including timing belt. This is the engine that replaced the engine that died after 47,000 miles cos it had coolant in it (just 3,000 miles before the warranty ran out). This engine failed after 34,500 miles, about 3,000 miles before my extended warranty runs out. Somebody up there likes me, I hope.

The battery is toast and the expansion tank has some cracks in it but not enough to replace at this moment (according to the warranty people), so I have to wait for that to fail. It will probably do so on my way to Nationals this year (assuming I get a slot), I am sure a long haul to Nevada is just the thing to finally finish this car off. Five years ago it was a shiny new car that cost me about $30,000, now it's a shiny car that I'm afraid to drive lest it fail on a busy highway as it has to numerous others.

When I bought this thing I had visions of reliability, after all two thirds of all Land Rovers ever built are still on the road. That's what I heard, I don't know if they were mobile on the road or just abandoned on the road, perhaps in hindsight I should have asked.

I had high hopes for this car, I pictured myself zipping through the Colorado snow, and pounding through rocky terrain at Moab. Perhaps even the occasional jaunt into the Serengeti to hump wildebeast, or maybe running over Skippy's relatives in Australia. But it was not to be..., instead of hauling my Land Rover out of muddy swamps I had to haul it out my garage instead.

It is not so much a Rugged vehicle as a Ragged one. Two engines, one heater core, power steering mechanism, two failed batteries, parts of the roof rack that fly off in high wind, a cracked roof, broken sunroof, and numerous other sundry issues. The car is just over 5 years old, I don't know what that is in cat or dog years but apparently it's about 90 in car years..., or at least it is for this car.

So I have a few hundred dollars to pay to fix the out-of-warranty issues (I've taken to calling them issues, instead of steaming piles of crap which is what they really are). The warranty company is picking up the tab for the rest of it, I think they forked out over $10,000 the last time the engine failed. I'm afraid to ask about extending the warranty further, I think they will come after me with a big gun.

I have decided that the next time something breaks it will stay broken, I will haul this car off to the junk yard. Never again will I be tempted to buy a Land Rover, after all the repairs, the time off work to drop-off and pick up my car, the inconvenience, the hassle and the stress, it's simply not worth it. According to Kelly Blue Book the trade in value for this car is between $2500-$3500. It's five years old, it's value has dropped 90% because of all the engine failures that this car has suffered across USA and the rest of the world.

When I think of all that money I have lost... I could have bought two cars for that money and they would still be running today. Instead I have a rental car (again) while I wait for my Freelander to undergo major surgery (again).

Did I mention that I don't like Mondays (I should write a song about it)

Edited February 13, 2009 by BritinUSA

[G-ManBart]

Ouch! That bites big time. Bad Rover, bad Rover!

Few things are more annoying than having a relatively new vehicle let you down.

I know a guy who runs a shop that specializes in Rovers and he says they keep him more than busy enough since there are quite a few here. I read an article about LR a while back and seem to recall reading that they lost their way after another major auto company purchased them a few years ago. I guess I've been assimilated like much of the rest of the world and our garage now has two Toyotas in it....FJ Cruiser and a Tundra CrewMax.

[kimel]

I'll second the Toyota. Or a Subaru.

A local had a LR that they were immensely proud of (I think the hope was for a lengthened "member"). After giving them a ride home in my Subaru a couple times (blown engine once, blown tranny the second time) they traded it in on a FJ Cruiser. Haven't given him a ride recently so not sure if he is happier or not.

[boz1911]

I believe Land Rover was designated as the most unreliable new vehicle on the road. Yours is certainlly proving that point.

[John Dunn]

Perhaps even the occasional jaunt into the Serengeti to hump wildebeast

I can't stop laughing!

Sorry for your troubles.

[Seth]

I know something about Land Rovers. DON'T OWN ONE!

A good Rover Mechanic once said: If a Rover isn't leaking, its empty.

Seth (I've replaced more head gaskets on freakin' discoveries, gotten dripped on by more leaking pan gaskets, and marveled at their horrid drivetrain more times than I can to recall)

[Merlin Orr]

One of my friends has one. Well, actually he also has the donor truck in the rear yard so I guess he has two of them. Listing to him describe his experiences with his Rover is kinda like hearing someone talk about their ex from hell or their drug using kid who steals the TV every time they come to the house. You know... you really don't want to hear anymore but you can't quit listening...

His new ride is a Toyoto.

[Seth]

I was a partner is a business called RoverTym. We made bumpers, lift kits, steering parts, etc.. for Discoveries and Range Rovers. Once a week like clock work, we'd get some $40k car in the shop for the works. Now mind you the cars were $40k new, and worth about $20k the immediate next year. They were worth about $8k after that. Talk about depreciation... but I digress.

On this $40k car, I'd routinely get a face full of oil dripping off the pan. New car leaking oil. Unreal. The old ones were NASTY. They'd leak out of ever pore. Amazingly, it was VERY common to have a spare ENGINE for them. We had several brand new, crated engines in our shop just in case one of the shop cars popped on and we didn't do mechanicals, just accessories.

But the head gaskets were the real disaster. The 99-04 Discos were notorious for consuming them in under 60k miles. Atrocious, horrible cars.

Edited February 13, 2009 by Seth

[Tzygä]

I feel sorry for your troubles.

Nice to notice that you haven't lost your sense of humor.

[davidwiz]

I'd still kill for a D90 or D110.

[Nemo]

About 5 years ago my dad bought a 97 Discovery (which seemed to be in pretty good shape at the time) just to haul his bass boat to the lakes all over the Island. I think he got about a year of very troublesome fishing trips out of the LR. For the last 3-4 years the LR has been just rotting in the yard and he keeps telling me he'll get it fixed sometime...

I'll e-mail him a link to this thread.

I'm sorry about your troubles Paul. For the next one Toyota, Subaru and don't discard Honda.

[JimmyZip]

I don't like Mondays...

When I bought this thing I had visions of reliability, after all two thirds of all Land Rovers ever built are still on the road. That's what I heard, I don't know if they were mobile on the road or just abandoned on the road, perhaps in hindsight I should have asked.

This part rally got me cracking up!

BTW, good luck with that. I have a similar story for a 86 Ranger 2.9L truck that I owned as a young man with little money and even less sense. It is unfortunate we sometimes get a lemon. I hope your next runs like a Swiss watch.

Jimmy

[ken hebert]

after all two thirds of all Land Rovers ever built are still on the road.

Yup, the rest made it home.