Land Rover Freelander 1.8 S Review

Overall Rating

It's a 4 wheel drive if you are thinking of getting one. Not much else

Too many too list! Build quality, reliability, comfort, interior, boot space not as I would expect. Even with the rear seats folded up, the seats position themselves taking up vital boot space when it's really needed!

I purchased the Freelander back in 1998 soon after it came out. Before even contemplating on purchasing any of the Freelanders, I would seriously peruse this review site before even taking a look at one. It seems to be quite hard to find any positives about this car! I still own the car, so my review on this is more like a long term test review!

Problems first started when the car was about a month old. My Freelander had the early problem of the 'Rear Window winding down by itself' syndrome. Although this was easily fixed, it first started when I was on a 120-mile journey and was on the motorway when it started. I had no alternative but to keep pressing the button every 20 seconds the whole journey to wind the window back up. I was not at all happy!

Another problem was the rear wheel locking up completely. The Handbrake for some reason kept one of the rear wheels locked, so I was unable to move/drive the car. This was fixed by Freelanders roadside assistance. It was really then I first had suspicions over its overall build qualities.

Furher problems arose, such as the starter motor not turning with the ignition. Turned out to be a dodgy connection on the starter motor which corrodes too easily, resulting in a bad earth.

From the outside, the car does actually look very respectable. I don't think anyone can deny that it does look a nice 4 wheel drive car? In fact when I'm driving my Freelander, and I see other Freelanders coming towards me, I think to myself ooh that looks a nice car! It then dawns on me that I'm driving the same car, and I personally think that mine is a dog of a car. The interior lacks anything inspiring, the doors and panels feel hollow, and the whole dash looks more like 70s Retro style.

This car has more 'Shake, Rattles, and Roll' than Elvis ever had! Noises started to creep into this car within the first few thousand miles. If you are ever bored on long journeys, at least you can keep the family amused by playing 'search for the annoying creaks 'n' rattles. One of the first noises started coming from the NS Windscreen where it met the plastic dash. A few carefully torn up pieces of a cigarette
Packet shoved between the plastic and windshield cured that! As soon as that one was cured, other parts of the car would start to give off the annoying creaks! I've really given up on searching for them all!

I ended up having water ingress in the boot, which apparently managed to make the alarm go off throughout the night. I paid to have this repaired, though just after 1 year and only putting on 2000 miles it reappeared. Not sure it was repaired properly in the first place, but the Land Rover garage was not prepared to repair or look at it unless I paid again! This also is from the same garage, which serviced my car, and was incapable of actually tightening up the oil sump plug after an oil change, which left oil all over my new drive!

The Exhaust box on my car has been replaced twice! This is from a car which has only done 30,000 miles. The rear box just simply rusts away! The Clutch was changed when it had done less than 30,000miles, which I feel is very disappointing. I have never owned a car as bad as this before, and the only reason I have kept it so far, is that I decided that as I had bought it from new, I may as well run it right into the ground! What a mistake! I should have just taken the depreciation as soon as possible, and let it go!

I would NEVER recommend or buy another Land Rover again! It's quite surprising this car actually won the car of the year when it was released!!.. What a joke!