Yes Ma’am, this Sh20 million Range Rover might drive you up the wall

Hi Baraza,

It’s time we revisited our reliability debate — remember Toyota against certain 4x4s made in the British Isles by a company owned by monied fellows from the sub-continent and ran by Germans? I spent a couple of weeks with a friend in the UK who is the proud but slightly frustrated owner of a brand new 2014 Range Rover 5.0 V8 Supercharged Autobiography, L405 (yes, the big daddy in top trim, not the pretender to the throne that the Range Rover Sport is).

Within five months of ownership, the car has been to the “stealer” six times! The litany of faults include; the driver’s door not latching shut — the car has the soft-touch door closing option so the driver has had to drive with one hand holding the door shut; the navigation system conking out and simultaneously starting up again; the rear tailgate closing function not working; a water leak from the panoramic sunroof; the car going into “limp” mode unexpectedly on the highway where cars to either side of you are moving at close to 120kph; the two front shocks failing yet there is hardly any terrain worth calling “off-road” in dear ol’ blighty; and, the coup de grace, a major suspension fault leading her to have the four air springs as well as the compressor replaced. Ouch!.

Luckily, the car is new and covered by a warranty, so no out-of-pocket costs for these issues other than the indignity of driving a Mitsubishi Shogun loaner car when you’d told all your friends you have a Range Rover. Some, in particular her male, friends must have thought that she probably could not tell the difference!

Anyway, what is my point? When I asked her why she won’t sell the damn car, especially because she had a similar nightmare with the previous generation Range Rover (L322), she replied that when the car worked it was the best car on and off road. I cheekily chided her that I agreed with the off road bit, provided that the definition of off road was “in the repair shop”!

However, after driving the car around for a few days, I understood what she meant. It is certainly a more sophisticated, composed, luxurious and refined drive than anything Toyota or any other Jap brand, including Lexus, Infiniti and Acura, can throw at it; from the smell of the Oxford leather seats to the snarl of the supercharged V8 powerplant... but at a price.

So my conclusion is that if you want a Range Rover, please buy one from the local dealer here, who you are sure to get to know very well in the course of your Range Rover ownership, and get a warranty to cover it.

You’ll for sure be driving the best 4x4xFar. Do not buy a seven-year-old Range Rover you haven’t seen, and with no service history, from someone on the Internet you do not know — Kenyans are brave fellows indeed!

If you have to engage in this kind of online clairvoyance, then stick to Toyota if you enjoy a boring drive, or Honda if you, like me, enjoy a car that raises your heart rate from time to time, but is also super reliable.

Back to the Range Rover: if buying a local unit and a new one is out of your price range, then accept the facts of life and move on. You simply cannot afford it. The maintenance costs are simply too high.

Sally Birch.

Sally,

I fully agree with you. Two years ago I had the privilege of being one of the first motoring journalists — nay, one of the first people in THE WORLD (outside of Land Rover employees, that is) to test-drive the then-new, then-unreleased L405 Autobiography — whose starting price around here is roughly Sh20 million — in Morocco during a week I shall not soon forget.

True to form, on the second day of our very elaborate and lengthy test drive across Morocco, I got a warning light on the dashboard just as I approached one of the checkpoints: Suspension Failure.

SUSPENSION FAILURE! It was in an angry red font, complete with the proprietary exclamation mark. At the checkpoint, I killed the engine, gingerly approached one of the engineers and told him my car was telling me things, though in its defense the suspension did not feel like it had failed; and, anyway, the car was brand new.

When he suggested that I leave it at the checkpoint for repairs and bum a lift from a fellow scribe (meaning no more driving for you, buster!), I became uneasy... or desperate, depending on whose side you were standing during the talk.

Last resorts came in handy. Reboot. Thankfully, the warning was gone on restarting the car and I hurriedly left before the engineer made any more “suggestions”, such as the need to monitor the car in case the light came on again. Also thankfully, that light never came on again.

Anyway, that is a story I narrated at length some time back, and my point is this: Range Rovers are known for iffy electrics. It is almost a guarantee that you will head back to the shop for one warranty claim or another within the first few months of ownership.

The L322 suffered from problems of the brake discs cracking (heavy body vs. powerful engine means “oh you poor brakes, is the work too much for you?”) and transmission glitches. The air suspension also acted up once in a while.

This, depending on your amount of disposable income, may be a small price to pay for ownership of what is arguably the definitive luxury SUV. The L405 outclassed the Mercedes S Class (pun very much intended) in luxury, and we all know the S Class is the yardstick for mainstream luxury vehicles.

Some have even gone as far as claiming the L405 is at par with the Rolls Royce Phantom. But seeing how I have never ridden in a Phantom, I cannot verify those claims.

I have had unthinking members of the great commentariat allege that the Range Rover is “useless” off road. Ignoring your (genuinely hilarious) anecdote — that, technically, being garage-bound is being off road — the Range Rover can do things and go places where few other cars can.

The issue lies with reliability: nobody wants to be stranded in the wild needing an OBD II scanner or a complete suspension replacement; and cost: while the car is ultimately capable, few will consider taking a car that costs the same as a Ferrari to places where a Ferrari owner would ask: “where is the road?”.

The punishment such a fine car would receive in those undertakings is akin to a man marrying a beautiful, dutiful wife and then physically abusing her. It is sacrilegious, for lack of a better definition.

I fully agree with your conclusion, which is an insistence on what I have said over and over again in this column: buy cars adapted for this market if you want to avoid a tempestuous relationship with your transport options. Also, if you cannot afford it, let it be.

Thank you for your mail, Sally, and I’m looking forward to your next one.

********

Dear Baraza,
I have a 2005 Toyota Corolla NZE on which I have been using a particular brand of spark plugs all through, but early last month my mechanic recommended that I change to a different brand. I did, and I have noticed that my fuel consumption has decreased. My mechanic attributes this to the new plugs but I do not understand the science behind it all. Is there any relationship between spark plugs and fuel consumption, or is this new economy as result of recent service?
LM

Hello LM,

The relationship between fuel consumption and spark plugs lies in the operational efficiency of the spark plugs themselves.

Those that work properly optimise the fuel economy of a car, while low quality ones or those on the throes of death tend to send your consumption figures through the roof.

The work of a spark plug is to ignite the intake charge (air-fuel mixture going into the engine). The combustion of this intake charge is what produces power from the engine. Remember high school chemistry? Reactions either consume or release energy? The amount of energy exchanged depends on either the quantities of reagents used or the efficiency of the reaction.

A good spark plug will ensure that the intake charge is fully combusted during the power stroke, providing the maximum amount of power for the prevailing conditions (lean run, rich run, stoichiometric).

A bad plug will either: (i) not burn the entire intake charge, thus leaving some of it unburnt and wasting it, or, (ii) cause the combustion process to proceed too slowly, thus limiting engine speed and, consequently, power output.

As a result, to get the desired amount of power, one needs wider throttle openings, and wider throttle openings is a fancy way of saying “increased fuel consumption”.

Alternatively, for ECU-equipped cars, the sensors will determine that the car is underperforming and adjust settings accordingly. The first (and default) action is to increase the fuel flow to the engine.

If you have a charcoal burner and you want a hotter fire, you simple add more charcoal, right? Same logic here. Increased fuel flow means increased fuel consumption.

This is not to say that service does not improve fuel economy. It does, too.

*******

Dear Baraza,

You must be a true petrolhead, and your grammar and mechanics lecturers (I assume you did some mechanical engineering in college) did some ‘fantabulous’ job as well. I have four issues that have been bothering me for a while:

1: It’s common knowledge that when driving with the AC on, the car consumes more fuel. I guess this happens since the AC uses the battery, thus engaging the alternator, which is directly coupled to the engine. Does the same apply when the radio is on (especially if it has an amplifier and an equaliser), and at night when the lights are on?

2: What is the effect of using double- or triple-electrodes spark plugs, as compared to single-electrode ones, on fuel efficiency? Which is are the best?

3. When driving a car with a VVT-i engine downhill, after attaining the desirable speed, it’s common practice to ease on the gas pedal. Does this, and freewheeling in Neutral, really save fuel?

4. Lastly, I am pretty sure that you get to know about all the motoring events in the country. As your ardent fans, could you please be giving us a calender of events at the beginning of every month, or weekly?

Boniface Mbuthia.

Hello Mbuthia,

Thank you for your kind words. I did not study engineering in university, but pure mathematics and physics. Thank you, all the same. Now, on to your questions:

1: The explanation behind the increased consumption with use of air conditioners is not quite what you make it out to be. The air conditioning unit works with the help of a compressor, and this compressor is driven by the engine. It therefore saps some of the engine power, so for the engine to perform the same as it would with the AC off, it needs to work harder to counteract the increased load of the AC compressor, hence it burns more fuel.

The amount of electrical power that a car radio uses is not enough to create a discernible effect on the battery/alternator in such a way that the load to the engine is increased. An equaliser simply modifies the quality of sound coming out of the radio and is mostly powered by the radio itself.

The amplifier could be the scourge here. However, these get their electrical power straight from the car battery, not the alternator. All the alternator does is engage the battery in a series of charging cycles at a certain voltage. This charging voltage (which may be as high as 14vac) is set slightly higher than the battery voltage to compensate for load on the battery; the load in this case being the radio, amp and equaliser.

So, with a 12V circuit in the car’s electrical system, if the entire 12V is used for various ancillary purposes, there is still charge to spare for charging the battery (the charging voltage over and above the 12V).

2: The multiple electrodes on a spark plug are for increased combustion efficiency. Remember, again, high school chemistry? Factors affecting rates of reaction? Surface area was one of them, which is why most reagents are used in powder form rather than as solid lumps.

The multiple electrodes work similarly, they effectively increase the “surface area” (this is not the correct terminology, but I am using it for analogical purposes) of the electrical arc by creating multiple sparks.

This allows for much faster and more efficient combustion, especially at high engine speeds. It thus follows that a triple-electrode spark plug would be the most efficient, but this is dependent on engine design. It may not be necessary to use a multiple-electrode spark plug, unless provided for and specified by the manufacturer.

3: Yes, it does. If the ECU is clever enough, when going downhill, fuel supply to the engine is shut off because there is no load, so no fuel is needed. Impetus is provided by gravity and engine braking is reduced through some smart valve timing procedures and the result is no fuel at all is used.

The motion of the car is what keeps the engine turning, so this does not mean that the car is “off”. When freewheeling, some fuel (however little) is used while the engine is idling. So, while freewheeling saves fuel (somewhat), it is better to just lift.

4. I sometimes do, though I will admit, it only happens for events that I have a particular interest in. Here are two examples: the next Time Trial event (a recurring nightmare for Subaru street racers) is on October 19 on the road between Kiambu and Limuru via Ndumberi.

The next installment of the Great Run will be late November/early December, and it will be an off-road event. The rest... well, those outfits have PR departments, do they not?

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