Opinionated introduction

[Dan Higgins]

Congrats on the new little one! I can see a hint of a smile. Probably because your first words to your baby was to say that you have a Land Cruiser and you’re going to go to all sorts of amazing places together.

 

[stiffarm]

Welcome, see you somewhere on US395 soon!

Yeah, when Chevy Suburbans start going north of $70k sticker, the LC at $84k doesn't all seem too bad. New car wise, the only other cars I'd consider other than the LC is the Nissan Patrol/Armada as they call it in the USA. They are getting heavily discounted for the '17 model. My buddy just bought a brand new SL (leather, AWD, Nav) for $41.5k......they are made in Japan. I love the XC90, it seems modern now, but once it is out of warranty with the turbo/supercharged 2L, that would seem like a nightmare along with the huge, but very nice looking nav stack.

Anyways, the comfort of the 200 is bar none. Such a high upright seating position with lots of clear views with huge windows. Only other car I've been as comfortable is the xc90 with the Swedish designed seats and supple leather. Worst comfort I've been in, is probably the current Escalade and X5s.

The Nissan Armada/Infiniti QX may be the worst looking SUV ever--butt ugly.

 

[stiffarm]

Great to hear you loved it and that it was reliable. As soon as my wife jumped in to test drive one, she was sold. She ended up picking the 14way seats. The 18way are really nice as well but when wearing big ski coats it might get a little snug, so the 14 was the better option for us.

Let me give you a short lesson in the value of German "engineering"--I bought a VW Touareg with the Audi based V8 for my daughter in 2006 with the sophisticated crawl AWD system. A mini-LC. Loved the car, lots of power, safe, etc. UNTIL the Xenon headlights took a crap. Turns our that the Germans went green with the wiring in the lights (Valeo), and the heat from the ballasts caused the insulation on the wiring to liberally crack and slough off. The result was that the pin connectors all corroded and killed the lights at the point where the wires arced. Lots of nice green corrosion. I changed ballasts, insulate wiring with electrical tape and Plasti Dip until my fingers bled. No luck. New lights were $3,500, and since the car at that point had a terrible resale value, I just literally gave it away. 100,000 miles. Cannot believe that the idiots designing that lighting system would use wiring not designed to sustain the heated environment in the light itself. No excuse for that. There was also an issue with the $2,500 electronic module that recognizes the key....but I dodged that while it would still run. Be very careful all Cayenne/Macan owners.

 

[Angelo1]

Let me give you a short lesson in the value of German "engineering"--I bought a VW Touareg with the Audi based V8 for my daughter in 2006 with the sophisticated crawl AWD system. A mini-LC. Loved the car, lots of power, safe, etc. UNTIL the Xenon headlights took a crap. Turns our that the Germans went green with the wiring in the lights (Valeo), and the heat from the ballasts caused the insulation on the wiring to liberally crack and slough off. The result was that the pin connectors all corroded and killed the lights at the point where the wires arced. Lots of nice green corrosion. I changed ballasts, insulate wiring with electrical tape and Plasti Dip until my fingers bled. No luck. New lights were $3,500, and since the car at that point had a terrible resale value, I just literally gave it away. 100,000 miles. Cannot believe that the idiots designing that lighting system would use wiring not designed to sustain the heated environment in the light itself. No excuse for that. There was also an issue with the $2,500 electronic module that recognizes the key....but I dodged that while it would still run. Be very careful all Cayenne/Macan owners.

Good thing the Porsche Macan I bought has PDLS “Led lighting” Also Porsche shares very little with Volks and Audi. Pretty much the only that Audi Q5 shares with Porsche is the chassis as Porsche engineers everything else in house. However, I’ve owned many actual German made cars and the ones I had the most issue with are Bimmers. Reading from actual owners of Macans on the Macan forum site seem to all be very happy with theirs and a couple already have over 100k on them without issue. I will still buy the additional 4yr 100k extended warranty as i would with the LC so i can sleep better at night.

 

[TonyP]

The 80s era German cars were the pinnacle. I'm assuming that's where the German engineering came from. It's been spotty since. Don't get me started on late 90s/early 00s Mercs...

 

[SWUtah]

Had a 1984 SL, built like a tank. Had a 2008 SL550 nice but expensive to maintain. Don't even ask about my 2008 CLS63 AMG, needed new brake pads at 2000 miles, plus the resale really sucks. I never want another Mercedes.

 

[mcgaskins]

Let me give you a short lesson in the value of German "engineering"--I bought a VW Touareg with the Audi based V8 for my daughter in 2006 with the sophisticated crawl AWD system. A mini-LC. Loved the car, lots of power, safe, etc. UNTIL the Xenon headlights took a crap. Turns our that the Germans went green with the wiring in the lights (Valeo), and the heat from the ballasts caused the insulation on the wiring to liberally crack and slough off. The result was that the pin connectors all corroded and killed the lights at the point where the wires arced. Lots of nice green corrosion. I changed ballasts, insulate wiring with electrical tape and Plasti Dip until my fingers bled. No luck. New lights were $3,500, and since the car at that point had a terrible resale value, I just literally gave it away. 100,000 miles. Cannot believe that the idiots designing that lighting system would use wiring not designed to sustain the heated environment in the light itself. No excuse for that. There was also an issue with the $2,500 electronic module that recognizes the key....but I dodged that while it would still run. Be very careful all Cayenne/Macan owners.

Macan is completely, totally different and the only shared components on are between it and the Audi Q5. I had one and it was very reliable and well built and could be one of the most fun to drive cars on the market right now.

 

[Angelo1]

Had a 1984 SL, built like a tank. Had a 2008 SL550 nice but expensive to maintain. Don't even ask about my 2008 CLS63 AMG, needed new brake pads at 2000 miles, plus the resale really sucks. I never want another Mercedes.

My MY14 CLS63s is bomb proof. 43k miles on it and replaced the brake pads at 20k, not a single issue. My ML63 had over 70k on it when I sold it. Only needed two firmware update to fix a couple of bad codes. I am sure some people will get unlucky, while many other have zero issues. I think Merc is much more reliable today, granted I can only speak to AMG mercs. Maybe because the engine is built by one person

 

[Kofoed]

Sort of. The owner of the dealership had one he was using for his/his wife's transportation. We got it with some "demo" miles on it, but low enough for "new" finance rates at my lender. Goes to the point of the thread... Not something I'd be comfortable doing on a BMW, and made almost zero difference in the decision on the LC. I know all 2017's are essentially "loaded" but this one even had the paint protector film, remote start, and a few other add ons. Pretty thrilled with the deal we got.

We found the same thing at dealers; no Land Cruisers in stock anywhere. We assumed the further south we went the more likely we'd be to find one. Made it to Valencia Toyota and gave up when they didn't even have one.

Nice,

That thing will be a limo out there in Ridgecrest. I'd just cringe a bit squeezing through creosote bushes and listening the pin striping being applied lol