Defender - A love story

[Valentin]

text : Alex Lapidus

[Alex Lapidus grew up on a ranch on the California coast. He is now an emergency room physician in Portland, OR, where he lives with his wife, Jessie, daughter, Adina, and dog, Larry –ed]

 

My affliction began gradually, and in retrospect at an age too young to be considered a mid-life crisis. First came BMX bikes, then mountain bikes, then rock-climbing, then kayaking—really, anything outdoors would do. I had a serious allergy to pavement.

 

Then, while driving back to college in 1994, I passed the Land Rover dealership in Santa Barbara and spotted a vehicle unlike any other, slowly revolving on a rotating display. Even from my fleeting vantage point on Highway 101, I could tell that it was overbuilt. Boxy in shape, it was not for everyone, but it was for me.

 

Over the next 13 years I graduated college, secured and quit my first real job, enrolled at medical school, moved to Oregon for my residency program, got married, and bought a house. But my disease was never in remission, only barely under control. I explored remote parts of Oregon from the saddle of a BMW 650GS dual sport bike. I found off-road motorbiking a solitary sport; I could not share it with friends, including my wife, Jessie. Then, in the summer of ’07, while riding the BMW down fire roads in the Mt. Hood National Forest, I passed a soft-top Defender. Inside sat a family, including a dog, whizzing by me with wide grins and waving hands. With visions of that boxy car from ’94 spinning through my mind, my disease resurfaced in a full-blown relapse.

 

After several months of scanning Craigslist and online forums, I found what I was looking for in November ’07— a ’94 Coniston Green soft-top Defender 90, in good condition, with a spare tire mounted on the bonnet. The only hitch was that it was 2,565 miles away, in Alaska. “Hey, weren’t these vehicles built for adventures?” I asked myself. I presented the same question in rhetorical form to Jessie. By this point in our marriage I had learned that the greater her skepticism, the better my idea! After a few phone calls to Ross Brudenell, the Defender’s owner, I hatched a plan for us to fly to Anchorage and then drive and ferry the Defender back to Portland.

 

Not long after came the happy discovery of Jessie’s pregnancy, and for a moment, the best laid plans of….well, you know the rest. Too late—in my mind I had already hit the road through the Yukon in my new Defender. Time for a new plan!

 

“It was like the Make A Wish Foundation called me,” my dad told me when I met him in the airport in Anchorage. Since being diagnosed with cancer several years prior, he had become somewhat of an armchair-explorer. My mother worried about his driving, and the chemotherapy sometimes exhausted him. But when I called him five days earlier, he didn’t hesitate to accept the offer of an adventure. Ross and his wife, Jackie, insisted that we stay with them before heading out. Ross was a longtime Rover fanatic who had owned Series Rovers, a Discovery, and most recently the Defender. The next morning after breakfast with Ross and Jackie, we set out for home. Until this purchase I had never sat in a Defender; it felt right. The simple controls reminded me of the tractor we had as a kid on the family farm. The growl it made as it accelerated never reaffirmed its status as a true utility vehicle. Anchorage disappeared in the rearview mirror and before long, we felt far, far away from civilization. Late that pitch black afternoon we pulled into Tok, AK. We checked into Fast Eddy’s hotel, the last hotel in this direction on the Al-Can before entering the Yukon. Before going to bed, we plugged the Defender’s block heater into an outlet outside our room.

 

The next morning we felt the bone chilling -10 F degrees. The Defender’s door seals crackled as I opened the driver’s side. I slipped the key into the ignition, unsure of how this vehicle might react to the cold. It snapped to life instantly, and I let it run while we loaded up. We got some coffee for the road, and left Tok as we had arrived—in the dark.

 

We had a long day ahead of us, over 450 miles to Haines Junction. The Yukon is bigger than California with a population of less than 35,000 people. If you like wideopen spaces, that’s a fantastic ratio. The Defender never missed a beat as it took us through the desolate landscape. Just as the needle in the fuel gauge dipped into the red, a lonely outpost would appear in front of us. We’d stop, fuel-up, refill our coffee mugs, and return to the road. During the hours that passed, my dad reminisced about the adventures he had as a younger man: riding mopeds through Europe, hitchhiking out of Morocco in a Citroen, only to hitchhike back with the driver after the Citroen caught fire and burned to the ground. Then came my turn and I reveled in his elation when I told him of Jessie’s pregnancy.

 

We stopped in Destruction Bay for lunch and gas. It was already getting dim outside. We wolfed down our food, and hopped back in the Defender for the final leg of the day’s journey. As we had the previous night, we pulled into our destination with the headlights on and the heater blowing full-blast. We had a few beers with the locals that night at the Kluane Park Inn in Haines Junction. In the morning we left the Al-Can, and headed south on Highway 3 for Haines where we hoped to catch a ferry to Washington. The Al-Can had seemed a thin black line through an otherwise extreme environment, but it only took a few miles of Highway 3 to realize how good we had had it. Our new road rose and fell, twisted and turned, as it led us through frigid valleys between enormous peaks on our way to the coast. Occasionally it disappeared entirely under a layer of fresh snow.

 

On this road the Defender revealed itself as a true workhorse. The temperature dropped as we climbed in elevation and the snow fell harder and harder. On top of Chilkat Pass, I eased us onto the shoulder to take picture, and what had appeared to be solid footing turned out to be deep, soft snow. The Defender quickly sank up to its axles and listed to the passenger’s side, such that my dad’s door hit snow when he tried to open it.

 

I got out and immediately sank up to my knees in soft snow. My assessment was that we were in deep trouble. I got back in and tried to keep a poker face about our predicament. My dad looked at me with the calm of someone who had been in similar situations, and then suggested that I lock the center differential. The center differential light lit up on the dash, and the truck rocked back and forth as I played the clutch. On the fourth or fifth try, I opened the throttle. The engine roared, and the tires found what they were looking for beneath us. We shot back onto the road.

 

It’s nice to have a partner on adventures, whether it is a friend, a family member, or even a trusty vehicle. Nothing could stop us now, and we pushed down the pass towards Haines. My dad was having the time of his life. Before we arrived in Haines, we switched seats. He buckled himself in and gave the steering wheel a good shake, before declaring, “Feels sturdy.” He drove us the rest of the way down out of the mountains to the coast. Later that evening we loaded the Rover onto the M/V Malaspina, a heavy-duty ferry on Alaska’s marine highway system. For the next several days, we watched as a pristine coastline moved passed our stateroom porthole. We made new friends and even celebrated Thanksgiving on board the ship somewhere south of Sitka.

 

When we finally disembarked in Bellingham, Washington, it felt odd not to drive on packed snow or ice. As planned, I dropped my dad off at the airport in Tacoma, on my way back to Portland. When I returned to the driver’s seat, I was surprised at how much I felt his absence.

 

I had heard the stories of his adventures a million times before, but it was on this trip that I realized that he and I had never shared an adventure. My daughter, Adina, born in June ’08, has grown like a weed. By her first birthday, I had already detected subtle signs that she, too, suffered from my disease. In the hottest months of summer, she likes nothing better than being buckled into her seat in the back of the topless Defender, with her basset hound, Larry, by her side for a drive around town or to the mountains. Ours must be a hereditary disease, passed down from one generation to the next.

[hcampian]

Re: Defender - A love story

 

N-am vrut sa deschid o discutie noua si nici n-am gasit una mai generala despre Defender, dar chiar simt ca vreau sa spun cateva cuvinte despre aceasta masina.

 

Si mie, ca si multor altora, masina mi-a ajuns la suflet de la prima vedere, mi s-a parut perfecta din toate punctele de vedere, dar fara sa ma urc vreodata intr-una. Eu am fost pe munte de mic, de la 14 ani am batut muntii cu prietenii, in special am facut speologie si am mers prin pesteri, batand mai ales Apusenii la greu.

 

Apoi, la un moment dat, prin 2000, printr-un proiect s-a cumparat un Defender 110 nou la Federatia de Speologie, cu care am avut ocazia sa merg ca si pasager. Mi-a placut teribil stilul rustic, functional, era modelul un pic mai vechi, fara dotarile mai noi de confort - bancheta spate era din doua scanduri acoperite cu vinilin. Din nou mi-a intrat masina la suflet, dar tot nu am avut ocazia sa pun mana pe masina mai mult, pe post de sofer. Au urmat apoi dezamagiri: am inteles ca au fost multe probleme la el, roata de rezerva pierduta de cateva ori a ajuns pana la urma sus pe portbagaj, cardanul zburat din mers pe autostrada, probleme electrice cu bordul, mi-au mai taiat din elan. A ramas in mintea mea ca o masina superba dar stricacioasa.

 

Dupa inca vreo 10 ani, a venit insa si momentul pe care-l asteptam: noul meu loc de munca e dotat cu niste Defender 110 modelul nou, echipate complet heavy duty (punti, planetare, etc...), cu troliu, cauciucuri Michelin M/T, superbe. Nu e masina mea personala de lucru - le ia cine are nevoie, dar am ajuns de multe ori sa o folosesc: prin noroaie lipicioase, pe forestiere proaste dar si la drumuri destul de lungi, de mai multe sute de km pe asfalt. Astfel, e interesant cum au evoluat sentimentele mele pentru aceasta masina.

 

Am urcat prima data la volan plin de admiratie. Prima senzatie de care m-am lovit a fost pozitia inghesuita inspre usa si pedalele care parca nu erau unde trebuie, nu mai zic de contactul cheii si maneta de deschis geamul. Se vedea clar cum a fost mutat totul din dreapta in stanga fara niciun calcul suplimentar de ergonomie. Apoi, cand am iesit din parcare, am urcat direct pe trotuarul de pe partea cealalta a strazii. Nu mi-a venit sa cred ce putin vireaza masina la maxim! Dar, intr-un fel ciudat, toate astea mi s-au parut frumoase...

 

La drum insa, mi s-a parut complet instabila, aveam impresia ca o sa ma rastorn in fiecare viraj. Cand ieseam de pe sosea, brusc masina devenea docila, trecea peste orice, mergea prin noroi pe care nu puteai nici sa pasesti de parca era pe asfalt, cu TC facandu-si treaba impecabil acolo in fundal. Tin minte un deal cu noroi lipicios in Dobrogea unde altii cu un Navara urcau efectiv in derapaj cu lateralul masinii, fugea in toate partile, Defender-ul nu a avut nici cea mai mica ezitare. Totusi, am inceput sa regret ideea mea de a avea un Defender. Mi se parea totusi o masina foarte incomoda si instabila la drum lung si doar abilitatile off-road nu ma mai impresionau cand ma gandeam ca trebuie sa abordez cu 50 km/h orice curba pe DN. Stiu, probabil gumele alea inguste de noroi sunt cauza instabilitatii, daca ar avea unele de 235 A/T cu siguranta s-ar imbunatatii treaba considerabil.

 

Dar vremea a trecut, m-am mai obisnuit cu ea la drum lung si mi-am dat seama ca de fapt masina nu e chiar asa de instabila cat pare, de fapt are un oarecare ruliu lateral dar sta foarte bine pe directie, astfel ca am ajuns sa depasesc cu ea masini sportive si sa abordez cu 80-100 km/h dealuri cu serpentine gen Dealul Negru fara emotii - cel putin pentru mine, pentru pasageri cred ca e cam.... extrem :wink: E clar, masina necesita o oarecare acomodare.

 

Acum, am ajuns din nou sa imi doresc un Defender. Nici cu fiabilitatea nu ma mai stresez, astea de la lucru au fost bune, s-a mai dus cate un ambreiaj, dar e normal fiind folosite mult pe off-road fara mila. Din pacate, cheltuielile necesare sa tii o masina cu motor asa de mare - taxe, intretinere, consum - sunt peste posibilitatile mele acum, motiv pentru care cand am reusit sa imi iau un 4x4 a trebuit sa ma orientez spre ceva mai economic, dar sunt convins ca in cativa ani in fata casei va sta si Defenderul 90 pe care mi-l doresc.

 

Singurul lucru este ca mi se pare o masina inacceptabil de scumpa de noua. Da, e foarte tare, mecanica e de exceptie, dar totusi: 45-50.000 de euro pentru o masina cu dotarile unui Defender e mult exagerat, parerea mea e ca platesti mai mult legenda decat masina. Am luat lista de preturi si am calculat cat iese masina de la lucru si m-am oprit pe la 50.000... Dar la SH, cu 7-8000 de euro cred ca se poate lua una in stare foarte buna.

 

Ideea e ca mai aveti un fan Defender in zona, in expectativa sa devina candva si proprietar, pana atunci citesc cu mare placere tot ce scrieti voi pe aici.

[DCM]

Re: Defender - A love story

 

:grin:

N-am vrut sa deschid o discutie noua si nici n-am gasit una mai generala despre Defender, dar chiar simt ca vreau sa spun cateva cuvinte despre aceasta masina.

 

Si mie, ca si multor altora, masina mi-a ajuns la suflet de la prima vedere, mi s-a parut perfecta din toate punctele de vedere, dar fara sa ma urc vreodata intr-una. Eu am fost pe munte de mic, de la 14 ani am batut muntii cu prietenii, in special am facut speologie si am mers prin pesteri, batand mai ales Apusenii la greu.

 

Apoi, la un moment dat, prin 2000, printr-un proiect s-a cumparat un Defender 110 nou la Federatia de Speologie, cu care am avut ocazia sa merg ca si pasager. Mi-a placut teribil stilul rustic, functional, era modelul un pic mai vechi, fara dotarile mai noi de confort - bancheta spate era din doua scanduri acoperite cu vinilin. Din nou mi-a intrat masina la suflet, dar tot nu am avut ocazia sa pun mana pe masina mai mult, pe post de sofer. Au urmat apoi dezamagiri: am inteles ca au fost multe probleme la el, roata de rezerva pierduta de cateva ori a ajuns pana la urma sus pe portbagaj, cardanul zburat din mers pe autostrada, probleme electrice cu bordul, mi-au mai taiat din elan. A ramas in mintea mea ca o masina superba dar stricacioasa.

 

Dupa inca vreo 10 ani, a venit insa si momentul pe care-l asteptam: noul meu loc de munca e dotat cu niste Defender 110 modelul nou, echipate complet heavy duty (punti, planetare, etc...), cu troliu, cauciucuri Michelin M/T, superbe. Nu e masina mea personala de lucru - le ia cine are nevoie, dar am ajuns de multe ori sa o folosesc: prin noroaie lipicioase, pe forestiere proaste dar si la drumuri destul de lungi, de mai multe sute de km pe asfalt. Astfel, e interesant cum au evoluat sentimentele mele pentru aceasta masina.

 

Am urcat prima data la volan plin de admiratie. Prima senzatie de care m-am lovit a fost pozitia inghesuita inspre usa si pedalele care parca nu erau unde trebuie, nu mai zic de contactul cheii si maneta de deschis geamul. Se vedea clar cum a fost mutat totul din dreapta in stanga fara niciun calcul suplimentar de ergonomie. Apoi, cand am iesit din parcare, am urcat direct pe trotuarul de pe partea cealalta a strazii. Nu mi-a venit sa cred ce putin vireaza masina la maxim! Dar, intr-un fel ciudat, toate astea mi s-au parut frumoase...

 

La drum insa, mi s-a parut complet instabila, aveam impresia ca o sa ma rastorn in fiecare viraj. Cand ieseam de pe sosea, brusc masina devenea docila, trecea peste orice, mergea prin noroi pe care nu puteai nici sa pasesti de parca era pe asfalt, cu TC facandu-si treaba impecabil acolo in fundal. Tin minte un deal cu noroi lipicios in Dobrogea unde altii cu un Navara urcau efectiv in derapaj cu lateralul masinii, fugea in toate partile, Defender-ul nu a avut nici cea mai mica ezitare. Totusi, am inceput sa regret ideea mea de a avea un Defender. Mi se parea totusi o masina foarte incomoda si instabila la drum lung si doar abilitatile off-road nu ma mai impresionau cand ma gandeam ca trebuie sa abordez cu 50 km/h orice curba pe DN. Stiu, probabil gumele alea inguste de noroi sunt cauza instabilitatii, daca ar avea unele de 235 A/T cu siguranta s-ar imbunatatii treaba considerabil.

 

Dar vremea a trecut, m-am mai obisnuit cu ea la drum lung si mi-am dat seama ca de fapt masina nu e chiar asa de instabila cat pare, de fapt are un oarecare ruliu lateral dar sta foarte bine pe directie, astfel ca am ajuns sa depasesc cu ea masini sportive si sa abordez cu 80-100 km/h dealuri cu serpentine gen Dealul Negru fara emotii - cel putin pentru mine, pentru pasageri cred ca e cam.... extrem :wink: E clar, masina necesita o oarecare acomodare.

 

Acum, am ajuns din nou sa imi doresc un Defender. Nici cu fiabilitatea nu ma mai stresez, astea de la lucru au fost bune, s-a mai dus cate un ambreiaj, dar e normal fiind folosite mult pe off-road fara mila. Din pacate, cheltuielile necesare sa tii o masina cu motor asa de mare - taxe, intretinere, consum - sunt peste posibilitatile mele acum, motiv pentru care cand am reusit sa imi iau un 4x4 a trebuit sa ma orientez spre ceva mai economic, dar sunt convins ca in cativa ani in fata casei va sta si Defenderul 90 pe care mi-l doresc.

 

Singurul lucru este ca mi se pare o masina inacceptabil de scumpa de noua. Da, e foarte tare, mecanica e de exceptie, dar totusi: 45-50.000 de euro pentru o masina cu dotarile unui Defender e mult exagerat, parerea mea e ca platesti mai mult legenda decat masina. Am luat lista de preturi si am calculat cat iese masina de la lucru si m-am oprit pe la 50.000... Dar la SH, cu 7-8000 de euro cred ca se poate lua una in stare foarte buna.

 

Ideea e ca mai aveti un fan Defender in zona, in expectativa sa devina candva si proprietar, pana atunci citesc cu mare placere tot ce scrieti voi pe aici.

Am citit povestea ta și am o soluție:

Un fundas 1996 110 LSC 300Tdi cu o istorie foarte interesanta.

Este dreptul Hand Drive și am condus-o tot drumul de la Africa de Sud.

Sună-mă dacă sunteți interesat în utilizarea / fixarea ea până mă întorc ...

+40744914096 Sau +40721651277

[sean70]

Re: Defender - A love story

 

Defenderul e o masina a extremelor - ori o iubesti ori o urasti,cale de mijloc nu exista.

E mai mult decat o masina,e un mod de viata.

E singura masina pe care nu intentionez sa o vand vreodata,vreau sa se dea si copiii mei cu ea.

E o masina mai fiabila decat multe alte marci laudate si cine sustine contrariu vorbeste din carti in majoritatea cazurilor - statisticile spun ca 70% din totalul masinilor produse (Seriile si Def) sunt in circulatie.

Exista o piata aftermarket imensa si accesibila pentru troacele astea.

Nu ratez niciodata ocazia de a iesi de pe asfalt cu Defenderul,in offroad o apreciezi la adevarata valoare.

In concluzie,"love story"!

[Tavi D.]

Re: Defender - A love story

 

Piata de second-hand arata valoarea unei masini, si la masinile in discutie preturile de second sunt destul de piperate, iar asta spune totul.