2006 Land Rover Ranger Rover -- Ergonomics Aren't Us

post from Karl on Cars on 06 April 2006 09:04:38 PM. © Karl on Cars

I keep trying to convince myself that Land Rovers "aren't like they used to be" (which would be a good thing, btw). I tell myself, "They've been owned by Ford long enough to not have incessant mechanical gremlins and train-wreck ergonomics anymore, right?" Tonight I drove home a 2006 Land Rover Range Rover HSE. On the tight turns along Old Topanga Road (PCH was having traffic issues) I noted that on hard left-hand turns the axles were binding. It wasn't in low-range and all other settings were in "normal" mode but it still shuttered and groaned on hard lefts (the problem didn't exist on hard rights). I tried to distract myself from this trait by tuning in my favorite talk radio station. Problem was, my station is on the AM band and the audio system was set to FM (cue ominous "Bumm!-Bumm!-Bumm!" music). Because the buttons surrounding the LCD screen are decorated with bizarre pictograms that tell you NOTHING, and because most of the audio system must be controlled through the touch screen, I found it nearly impossible to switch bands. There are additional audio controls on the steering wheel, but these buttons -- while large and taking up a lot space -- can only adjust volume and frequency (I think...).

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