I live in Southern California. More specifically, I live in the Pasadena area, which, if you were paying attention to the news on January 7 of this year, experienced some especially devastating wildfires that essentially leveled the Altadena neighborhood and caused untold amounts of damage.
My wife and I are super fortunate because, despite being on the border of a mandatory evacuation zone, the house we rent and all our stuff were more or less untouched. We evacuated as a precaution because the air quality was unbearable, even inside with everything sealed.
Leaving the house at 4 a.m. through a haze of smoke and dodging downed trees on main streets without knowing if we’d ever see any of our stuff again was harrowing to say the least, and it was made worse because my only car at the time was my 996-generation Porsche 911. Between me, my wife, and our three cats, we didn’t have room to bring any of our important, valuable, or sentimental possessions with us as we fled to my in-laws’ in Orange County.
The whole affair freaked me out on a fairly fundamental level, and even though Kia very kindly let me borrow a Sorento PHEV that week to go back and get some of our stuff, I knew the days of me living my 911 dream were done. It was time to grow up and get practical.
So, like a total idiot, I bought a 2008 supercharged full-size Range Rover with 160,000 miles.
I’ve always wanted a Land Rover. I used to go to random used car dealers in my early 20s to just sit in P38 Range Rovers and Discovery 2s. It’s a sickness, I know, but after doing way too much research, and knowing that I’m already comfortable working on unreliable Euro trash (I’ve heretofore owned a bunch of BMWs, an ’80s Audi, a ’70s Mercedes, etc) I decided that getting a 2006-2009 full-size L322 Range Rover would be the most sensible route into Land Rover ownership while also fulfilling my mandate of having a car that can carry stuff and go anywhere.
This particular example also happens to be in amazing shape both mechanically and, short of all the clearcoat having departed the roof (it’s a California thing), it’s also in great condition aesthetically.
Why the L322?
I’m aware that Range Rovers are punchlines to every joke about British reliability—and that’s not without reason—but not all Range Rovers are created equally. The L322 generation of Range Rover is the third generation overall and ran from 2003 to 2012 in the U.S.
In addition to being arguably the best-looking SUV ever made, it has a few things going for it when it comes to being actually a good car. First, the L322 was conceived under BMW’s ownership of the Rover brand as a replacement for the unmitigated shitshow that was its predecessor, the P38 (which was designed under British Aerospace’s ownership). The era in which BMW owned Rover also produced some of the best Bimmers ever, like the E39, E38, and E46, so we’re starting on a good foot when it comes to design and fit/finish.
The pre-facelift L322 is easily the most BMW-like of all. The engines, the switchgear, the infotainment, the instrument cluster, etc., were all pulled right out of Munich’s parts bin. These models, which span the 2003-2005 model years (in the U.S.), aren’t ideal to buy now, mostly because of the M62 V8 and its myriad issues with timing chains, etc.
The next generation, aka the first facelift, ran from 2006-2009, and this is the sweet spot. By this time, Ford had bought Land Rover and Jaguar from BMW, and while it would still source a bunch of stuff from the Germans, the powertrains would get a massive overhaul. Enter the AJ V8 engines. Despite being Jaguar motors at heart, the 4.4 and 4.2 Supercharged engines are probably the most reliable ever fitted to a Land Rover. The N/A 4.4 produced around 300 hp while the supercharged 4.2 made around 400 hp. Both engines were paired with the ZF 6HP automatic gearbox and full-time 4-wheel drive (4WD).
The final facelift for the L322 came in 2010 and ran until 2012, and while in many ways they represent the best of the bunch, they were cursed with the 5.0-liter engines that universally suffer from timing chain guide wear that can and will lead to catastrophic engine damage. This issue stems from the use of a steel plunger on the timing chain tensioners that wears through the all-aluminum timing chain guide, reducing tension and making bad things happen. This repair, if done at a shop, can run upwards of $7,000-$10,000, if you find a shop that is willing to do it.
The Best 4×4 By Far
In 2007, the Range Rover got a recalibrated Terrain Response system from the LR3, which added off-road programs for sand, snow, mud/ruts, rock crawling, etc., and it turned an already capable SUV into arguably the most capable production 4×4 on sale at the time.
These programs act on the vehicle’s traction control system, differentials, and air suspension to allow the Rover to just crawl over and out of just about anything. Watching videos of LR3 and Range Rovers from this period driving off-road, looking so comfortable, composed, and unbothered, is enough to make a Jeep Wrangler weep
About that air suspension though, it’s the last thing that really pushed me to the L322.
I’ll pause for laughter and derision.
Seriously though, the air suspension on the L322 is relatively simple and robust, provided the vehicle is well-maintained and used regularly. The air suspension is also what makes the Range Rover so magical, both on-road and off. On the pavement, the ride is supple yet controlled, making it easily the most comfortable car I’ve ever owned. The ability to drop the car by two inches to aid ingress and egress is awesome, and it makes all but the most cramped parking structures accessible. In off-road mode, the suspension lifts another two inches over the standard ride height, with even more height available should the computer determine it’s necessary. People can also add lift rods that trick the car into thinking its lower than it is, giving even more ride height but at the expense of ride quality and component longevity.
But first, tires
When I bought the Range Rover, it came with some very nice, very new Toyo Proxes ST3 low-profile tires. These were fine for around town, but since we’re planning on doing some light-to-medium-duty off-roading, I figured the first change I made should be to some real all-terrain tires.
After doing a ton of research, I settled on Bridgestone Dueler A/T Ascents in the stock 255/50R20 size, which Bridgestone very kindly sent over for me to try after I asked very nicely. These are fairly new tires for Bridgestone, and they were created for more or less my exact use case: luxury SUVs that spend most of their time on pavement but also see dirt.
Despite looking super chunky and aggressive (which rules), I’ve been super happy with how smooth and quiet the Bridgestones have been on the road. The last thing I wanted in my big, dumb luxury SUV was to have a bunch of tire noise or vibration every time I hit the road. I haven’t gone off-road yet, but I’m betting these tires will be more than up to the task, especially if I air down.
CarPlay
The biggest downside to my second-generation L322, especially when it comes to everyday use, is the lack of good solutions for adding Apple CarPlay. There are a couple of very expensive systems that basically hack into the factory navigation system and mirror your phone in the Rover’s potato-quality touchscreen, or there is the option of going with an external head unit, which is the route I’ve gone.
I picked up the Minix CP89HD external head unit for a little under $200 on Amazon, and I’ve been surprised at how well it works. It has a few options for connecting to the car, including dual-Bluetooth, aux-in, and FM modulation. It’s not perfect, but it works, and the screen is both sharp and super responsive. I also love not having to modify wiring or cut up the dash at all, making the system easily removable should I want to swap it to another vehicle.
The annoying thing about using this or any system with the Range Rover is that to get anything working with decent sound quality, you have to use the aux jack. You’re probably asking yourself why that’s a big deal, but Land Rover decided (somewhat inexplicably) to only have one and to place it on the back of the center console. Even those nav-based systems run a cable up to the console to use that jack in order to get sound through the speakers. It’s lame, and I hate it, but you can’t win them all.
The Plan
Now that I’ve got my Rover, I plan to use it. My wife and I decided that it’s time to get back into camping. Since real vacations are probably off the table for a few years *gestures at the economy and the world in general* and also since we had such an awesome time overlanding with a modified Ford Ranger a few years ago, we have decided to start outfitting the Rover for overland duty.
I’d love to get a roof rack and rooftop tent eventually, but since they are just heinously expensive, I’ve decided to focus on more practical modifications to start with.
One of the first things that I’ll do is use an EasyLift module. This little box retails for around $400 and gives you significantly more direct control over the air suspension than you’d otherwise be able to have. It also adds functionality like self-leveling, which will be key if we get a rooftop tent.
I already have a GAP IID tool (a must for any late-model Land Rover owner) that allows me to perform some air suspension adjustments. More importantly, it’s basically a dealer-level scan tool in a Bluetooth dongle and app. It lets me scan and delete codes, ‘natch, but also do live data monitoring, vehicle coding, individual component activations, and more. It’s expensive at $500, but that’s nothing compared to a couple of tows and visits to a shop.
Going off-road without support vehicles in a Range Rover seems like not a great idea on its own, so I’ll likely also get a winch fairly soon. There’s a great company from Italy called Land Rover Passion that makes a winch tray for the L322 that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg, and a seriously cool device from Garmin called the PowerSwitch that lets you wire things like winches and lights directly to it under the hood rather than drilling into the vehicle body, while you control those functions via an app.
My plan is to document the vehicle build and my Land Rover experience here at the Hooniverse. If you have product recommendations (other than buying a Toyota) or advice, let me know, and the rest of you can revel in the grade-A, top-tier vehicular schadenfreude.