tackb your a bitter little lady on this one ! Here speaks a man with true experience for you , I own / drive 6 landrovers , a disco and 5 defenders . One of them recently clocking over 210 ,000 miles . There's a reason why we still have them , because no one else makes anything to compete with them in my opinion .
They are better off road ,
1. all the jap stuff is using a suspension system invented 3 century's ago ( leaf springs ) these WILL snap , I've seen it happen ! And they don't articulate ! Meaning you'll get cross axles in deep ruts !
2.due to a landrover being made of aluminium , it's much lighter than the competitors , meaning a lower gross weight , ergo you can carry a bigger payload legally as less of your gross weight is used by the vehicle .
3. Landys are classless , you could be a farmer or the queen in a defender , lets be honest what vehicle do you normally see your friendly local pikeys in ? You got it ! The chromed up pickup ! , trust is an important factor in our business when you turn up at a customers .
4.you can still service the current defender by yourself .
5. I agree its pricey , but they hold thier money bloody well , I should know , I bought another one last year ! How many jap pickups built in the 90s could still fetch over 5 k ?!
6.your toyota amazon will not match a disco 4 offroad buddy , it's like comparing the latest iMac to a house brick , you could be an incompetent offroad driver and still use the disco4 offroad easily . It's on board system is great .
If I'm honest I think if company's like Toyota were still turning out a similar car to the hilux 10 years ago , land rover would be in trouble , but there's no real competition , sure the japs are great for chucking a few dead deer in the back and running off down a stones track , but try towing 40 sheep across muddy Wealden clay , that's offroad ability !