Jamison, I shall try to reply as politely as you asked your question.

Would you compare any Rover to any Mercedes?

Would you compare any Ford to any Mercedes?

Why do people insist in comparing Range Rovers/Land Rovers to GWagens?

Follow the advice contained in one of the previous posts and get yourself a Landcruiser, a Pajero or a Patrol if you haven't got the cash to buy and keep a GWagen, but don't waste your hard earned cash on a Rover. 

Just my 2 cents

Let's rub it in a bit. ;)


What do you call a Land Rover that doesn't leak oil?
Empty!

Lots of fun has been written about this legendary vehicle, best jokes
from the LR owners themself!

Check this out:
How do you know you own a Land rover?
http://www.landroverclub.net/Club/HTML/howdoyouknow.htm


This guy use humor as therapy.
http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/for.html

I always liked the Lucas jokes. (Prince of Darkness).

Lucas - Inventor of the first intermittent wiper.
Lucas - Inventor of the self-dimming headlamp.
Alexander Graham Bell invented the Telephone.
Thomas Edison invented the Light Bulb.
Joseph Lucas invented the Short Circuit.

Did you hear the one about the guy that peeked into a Land Rover and asked the owner "How can you tell one switch from another at night, since they all look the same?" "He replied, it doesn't matter which one you use, nothing happens!"

"I've had a Lucas pacemaker for a week and haven't experienced any prob...
If Lucas made guns, there would be no wars.

Why do the English drink warm beer?
Lucas made the refrigerators, too.

Recommended procedure before taking on a repair of Lucas equipment: check the position of the stars, kill a chicken and walk three times sunwise around your car chanting: "Oh mighty Prince of Darkness protect your unworthy servant."

The three-position Lucas switch - DIM, FLICKER and OFF.
The other three switch settings - SMOKE, SMOLDER and IGNITE.
The original anti-theft devices - Lucas Electric products.
Lucas dip-switch positions: LOW and BLOW.

Guy in a LR pulls up to a toll booth. Toll collector says "Two dollars". LR owner says "Sold!"
Lucas denies having invented darkness. But they still claim "sudden, unexpected darkness"

The LR has very nice prices and TONS of gear you can buy to them!
I use to look through the international LR magazines to get a view of the outfit to those cars, amazing!

(LR1.jpg)

LR1.jpg (35KB - 3 downloads)

Lucus humor items - excellent. You had a couple I had never heard before...and I owned Triumph sports cars in the 1960's. From the TR manual: "At intervals of 10,000 miles, remove the cylinder head in order to de-carbonize the piston tops, combustion chambers, and valves."    

 There is the observation that the battery is located at the highest point in the TR because of the hydro-electric theory of electricity employed by Lucus - power flows best down hill.

roughneck: You might feel LR parts are cheap. I have two thoughts about that: 1. You live close to the parts source, thus cheaper. 2. And, the parts are cheap because you will need a lot of them.

Where I live (a small sample I know), Landrovers (from 1950's to the newest 2007's) are more commonly towed to the nearest LR mechanic than any other vehicle, expect perhaps, Saabs.  Oh, there is the one neigbor who insists on driving a 2004 dark green, London Taxi - diesel. I like the dark green leather with bright yellow-orange trim - :ohno:  But, her vehicle, "Nigel" is towed with regularity.   

In spite of Landrover's distractors and ills, there are many in my neck of the woods. The owners love them, but all complain about the cost of dealer repairs, parts cost, poor mileage, the frequent events of being stranded somewhere, and being towed. I have for years noted that LR has done a great job, at least historically, of selling this product. In fact, the whole civilan SUV rage is attribitable to LR and their ability to sell the concept of adventure. I have tapes of the history of the LR's birth and evolution. These are great fun videos. The hunting lodge dealerships in the US (now mostly gone), were masterful tools for telling the LR story. The Brits do this much better than Americans or Germans. Can you imagine a pile of rocks to drive over, and a log cabin sales-show room building, next to a Mercedes-Benz dealership?

DB/DC could have easily touted the history of the 4x4, since they produced such vehicles for many years prior to first LR. Unfortunately, the great technological leaps of DBAG were besmugged by WW I and WW II. Having said that, VW's were able to overcome historical impediments with ease.