Wednesday, Oct 15, 2014 at 10:38
Sounds like a crusty old mob of Toyota drivers that can't accept that there are more capable vehicles than theirs.
The two Future Systems vans I travelled weighed in at 27 & 2800 kg. We had no problems keeping ahead of the traffic, mostly, the only time we had problems was when we caught up with a convey of vans being led by a Toyota 100 series towing a light van. As far as lasting qualities go, my D40 has 110K km up on it with over 50% of that towing vans. My Disco D2 had over 260K km and was still a good performer when I traded it (reason for trading - I wanted to get back to a twin cab.)
Engine power is not the B all and end all of performance. Gearing plays a big part. One example I likes a mate quoting was from back in the days when the Valients were supposedly king. He had one. On the way back from the coast to
Canberra he could see an Austin 1800 towing the same van as he was towing. He made every effort to get in front of the 1800 but when he got to the Clyde Mountain he was right behind it. When he got to the top of the mountain the 1800 was no where to be seen, it took him nearly a half hour to catch up to the 1800. Gearing won the day.
There are usual uninformed quotes of hand grenades and tow bars falling off. The tow bar problem was quickly fixed. There was only 2 years of the 3 l motor problems, this was corrected and then there has been over 10 years of reliable production. Toyota front suspensions falling apart was more worrying than the few tow bar problems.
As for the Navara struggling on the
Moonbi Range. That sounds like the 3 l D22. They are not a patch on the later 2.5 l D40s. To me that's a good example of how a modern 2.5 l European engine will will out perform 3 l Jap crap.
How about you blokes crawling into the 21st century.
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