Passed this today on the highway, Range Rover Sport completely engulfed in flames

 

At one time, I remember, you were considering one....or was it the regular Range Rover?

 

That actually doesn't surprise me.....the demographic that drives those often includes people who keep driving without maintenance until something like that happens

 

not sure i've seen painted mudflaps.
and the chrysler is molded in black, barely visible.

look fine to me. obviously your prerogative to take 'em off!

great lighting design!

were you driving on a dirt road all that time, dukes of hazard style? seems highly unlikely that just 10 hours of highway driving would 'ruin' the paint behind the wheels.

 

Or, that RRs are rolling piles of garbage confirmed by almost everyone I know who's ever owned one, and ratings.

I get the appeal of them, but they are just so unreliable and at the bottom of the list.

 

At 130mph it did lol!

 

Maybe, I'm hoping we get lucky with ours and so far it's been very good/totally worth the potential annoyance. It simply outclasses most other SUVs and something as good overall doesn't really exist. The LX/LC simply doesn't drive anywhere near the same and other competition isn't as capable overall and the power level is stupid for an SUV.

 

I wasn't trying to insult your vehicle, my bad. I just hear horror stories from people I know, bad ones.

One thing I'll say is people don't care, they are everywhere and they are building a new dealership 3-4xs the size to replace the old one.

 

Sport is a little small for me, I would want the big one.

Yeah I’m sure that was the case here.

This doesn’t concern me about buying a RR one bit lol

 

They’re all over the place here at CL. They make nice painted molded ones that look like they were meant to be on the vehicle. Mudflaps like these just scream 1990s to
me, ugly.

 

Oh it's all good lol! I am very well aware of the issue that these can/do have but it's one of those things that is overblown due to idiot owners.

The one we have has a new engine due to the first owner blowing up the original, that said I doubt we will have problems since I make sure things aren't really allowed to degrade like that. I also am strict with oil type and interval unlike most people/owned and it's amazing how just doing that alone allows engines to not die.

This is the same situation as LS vs German flagships to me, if I'm going to put the same amount of work/attention in I might as well have the better car. I found that I'm OCD to the point that the added reliability of Lexus etc doesn't matter since I end up replacing everything anyway when I buy a new car and that there isn't much difference.

The only real difference is if you ignore a Lexus it doesn't tend to degrade as fatally even if the same amount of wear stacks up, however that said my least reliable cars have been the LSs in terms of items that needed replaced and time spent on them. They have also had the most error codes/felt problems and while I know they are better than early 2000s German stuff they just never improved past 2007 in terms of what the car actually is. The competing cars however improved massively as well as on reliability and ease of work.

Plus I can buy them for cheaper and OE parts are also less. Win win in my case

 

I didn't know you had one lol.

Agreed. Lexus cars you can treat like beater Toyotas.

I really wish I could get ahold of a 2004 W220 S500 that's in meticulous shape and compare car to car. I know LS430>W22 reliablility by a mile, but still. I want to see how the M113 setup drives (how they "tuned" it) in a luxury sedan versus a sporty roadster. It's very refined and luxurious in the SL but it ain't LS smooth, but it's probably not supposed to be.

 

It’s been a long time since I’ve driven the W220 S500, but we had one together with a R230 SL500 growing up. Besides the engine being quieter in the S-class, I don’t remember detecting much of a difference in transmission tuning. Sport mode in the S500 felt virtually identical to the SL’s sport mode.

 

Was the local headline something like "Tesla spotted near scene of auto fire"? I'm joking but I've never seen a brand of car get picked on by the media as much as Tesla.

 

Get an AMG55 type, that's the best version of the engine IMO and as much as the W220 has issues that engine makes the S55 worth it to me.