Well what can I say? Stirling work by my local garage had my shiny new VCU and bearings installed and boy do they make a difference! It's like driving a new car, no tightness in steering, its a bit quicker and it's not making any nasty noises.
Which made me think about the flak the Freelander gets for VCU failures. Yes there may be better ways to achieve AWD, and a failing VCU damaging other components is in no way good. But let's face it, this is not a Nissan Micra, it's more complicated than that and the owner of such a vehicle should be aware of the related service costs.
I'll generalise here, but the Freelander is possibly a victim of its own marketing - "Soccer moms" buying them to take little Johnny to school because they are "safe", but having no interest in the upkeep.
And the upkeep isn't really that bad (w.r.t. the VCU). Take the clutch, about £400 to replace and it lasts about 30,000 miles. That's accepted, but a VCU costs about £300 to replace and should last twice as long. Why is that regarded as bad? It's an added expense of owning an AWD vehicle.
But hey ho, I'm riding high right now - my Freebie is running sweet and my little tweaks are just falling into place.
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