Hi, I've just joined having bought a 2003 4.4v8 yesterday for my wife.

The worst thing on the car is a damaged and rusty upper tailgate. Are the 06-09 tailgates interchangeable with early ones? I'm expecting to repaint and move my trim across.

Expect many further questions!

Thanks

Yes but the early ones last much better than the late ones which rust very quickly... Whatever you get fill it with your favourite antirust...  Pete
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2014 L405 Autobiography SDV8 4.4 Loire Blue Ebony interior
2011 L322 Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8 Baltic Blue. Parchment over Navy Interior. Sold
2012 L322 Autobiography 5.0 Supercharged Ipanema Sand, Jet Interior. Sold
2002 L322 Vogue 4.4 V8 Epson Green, Ivory over Aspen Interior (Fatty Offroader) Sold
-Click for Project Fatty off roader-

Thanks!

If you ever get to park next to a later ffrr.... tap the upper tailgate, with you nails, just above the Range rover badge, and then try the newer car I compared mine against a 2011 TDV8 and to say it was tinny was the understatement of the year

FYI if Pete's tailgate is still in one piece then that is a testimony to the quality of the steel that BMW / L/R used..as Pete's car spends a lot of it's time under water

There are a lot of peep's complaining of rust issues... but they are normally the newer cars... I'd go so far as to say the newer they are the quicker they rust  Yesterday I couldn't spell Engineer... Today I are one!
Inventor of the 'Guide-o-Matic automatic wheel alignment tool'
Former long term L322 owner, Up/Down graded to a Classic Tractor!

Mine has one very small, less than a 5p bubble of rust on one bottom corner which I think is where the last owner chipped the paint off the corner... apart from that, nothing... and mine is 14 years old soon....  Pete
__________________________________________________
2014 L405 Autobiography SDV8 4.4 Loire Blue Ebony interior
2011 L322 Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8 Baltic Blue. Parchment over Navy Interior. Sold
2012 L322 Autobiography 5.0 Supercharged Ipanema Sand, Jet Interior. Sold
2002 L322 Vogue 4.4 V8 Epson Green, Ivory over Aspen Interior (Fatty Offroader) Sold
-Click for Project Fatty off roader-

My tailgate looks like the one in my first car, an X red Fiat Strada made from discarded Italian washing machine steel - a couple of months and it will have rusted through! Absolutely shocking for a car which was £70k when new. The misses has a BMW 3 series - less than 1/3 of the price new and it's not got a spot of rust on it.... 2007 Zermatt Silver TDV8 Vogue SE - now sold but was a great car!

Just as a related comment on the tailgate, never (if asked) allow anyone to push your car using the tailgate letter area, as it will dent inwards very easily, this happened on my old p38, which was all squashed in, (when I bought it) and I changed it out. The l322 has similar contours, and no doubt, same will happen.
Obviously, not many incidences will arise, when you will have to push it... But you might want to push on the rear pillars, and get covered in mud from the wheels, etc.

I certainly have had much more corrosion on my 2012 car than I had on my 2004.

I recall someone knowledgeable saying that the more recycled content in steel the quicker it rusts, so that might be a factor. Also, the paints available now are more environmentally friendly but less protective than in the past. I had a BMW motorcycle from 1990 to 2010 and it had hardly any corrosion (admittedly not used on salted roads and well looked after). When I was looking to replace it I looked at various BMWs that were a year or two old. The finishes were very poor, quite shocking considering how good BMWs had been in the past. The dealer explained it was down to paint regulations, I suspect also use of different, lighter alloys. I have Triumphs now, which seem better finished.

So the deterioration may be more to do with those factors than BMW being better than Ford or Tata. One thing that has certainly changed is that in the P38 days vulnerable panels were galvanised and then painted with anti-chip paint before the ordinary undercoat and topcoat. Only Range Rovers since 1988

So are saying that the later Range Rovers are made from recycled Lancia Beta's , No wonder they rust so quickly, but it's impressive how L/R have managed to slow the process down...... Lancia's would go rusty in the showroom  Yesterday I couldn't spell Engineer... Today I are one!
Inventor of the 'Guide-o-Matic automatic wheel alignment tool'
Former long term L322 owner, Up/Down graded to a Classic Tractor!

Well at least Lancia, Fiat, Ferrari and other Italian car makers of the 70's and 80's had a valid reason to build cars that rusted and it was nothing to do with them, the Italian Government in their infinite wisdom decided that vehicles should be made from a quantity of recycled steel, the processes they had then were not as good as today and an amount of iron oxide was left inside "new" steel... hence the uncontrollable rust in places that weren't even water traps....

So what's JLR's excuse, they made them OK from 2002-2005ish then decided to save 50p a boot and obviously changed the paint preparation stage somewhat....  Pete
__________________________________________________
2014 L405 Autobiography SDV8 4.4 Loire Blue Ebony interior
2011 L322 Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8 Baltic Blue. Parchment over Navy Interior. Sold
2012 L322 Autobiography 5.0 Supercharged Ipanema Sand, Jet Interior. Sold
2002 L322 Vogue 4.4 V8 Epson Green, Ivory over Aspen Interior (Fatty Offroader) Sold
-Click for Project Fatty off roader-

The top tailgate on my 2011 is rusting, and is much worse than the 2007 tailgate I fitted to my 2003 car.....

Joy of joys..... 2011 Range Rover Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8

Previous cars :
2003 Range Rover Vogue TD6
1999 Discovery Td5 ES
1995 BMW M5 3.8 6 speed
1992 Range Rover 3.9 Efi Vogue
1992 BMW M5 3.8
1988 BMW 735i SE
1989 Ford Sierra XR4x4 2.9i
1981 Ford Fiesta Supersport

Steel is made by adding scrap steel and carbon to molten iron to start with. The alloys that are added to it play a much larger part in determining the qualities of the end product than the scrap. The treatment of the completed steel part is the biggest factor in corrosion resistance though. Cleaning the steel, using a good quality galvanising process and the subsequent primers and paints are the main reason your car rusts a lot or not.

If you'd blast steel from an old Volvo and an old Fiat/Alfa/Lancia then you'll find they both corrode quite quickly relatively speaking.

The biggest problem with British, Italian and French cars of old was bad prep and paint. Just trying to cut cost. MY 2010 5.0 SC Galway green and sand interior!!
Have the Faultmate MSV2 Extreme to be tinkering with the settings etc. !!

Part of the background here will be the boom in the price of iron ore due to Chinese demand. That made it economic to collect and incorporate scrap, rather than use new ore. Other symptoms were the rise in metal thefts and the removal of the old vehicles that used to add interest to visits to Skye and the like. I don't know to what extent manufacturers could control the 'recipe' of the steel they were buying. Maybe Tata would have been best placed to do so, as steelmaking is part of the group, but that would be more costly than using standard sheet and the preparation and paint changes won't have helped. Only Range Rovers since 1988

mjdronfield wrote:

The top tailgate on my 2011 is rusting, and is much worse than the 2007 tailgate I fitted to my 2003 car.....

Joy of joys.....

That'll teach you to go all up market of us

I've said it before, but I'm shocked at how poor the quality of the materials are they use on the later cars, and that they don't appear to either rust proof or sound deaden, and then they have the balls to charge more  Yesterday I couldn't spell Engineer... Today I are one!
Inventor of the 'Guide-o-Matic automatic wheel alignment tool'
Former long term L322 owner, Up/Down graded to a Classic Tractor!

The headlining is not as good either, just like a normal one. My 2003 TD6 was more "fluffy".

I've put the wheel arch rubber strips on so hope that may help down the line.

 2011 Range Rover Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8

Previous cars :
2003 Range Rover Vogue TD6
1999 Discovery Td5 ES
1995 BMW M5 3.8 6 speed
1992 Range Rover 3.9 Efi Vogue
1992 BMW M5 3.8
1988 BMW 735i SE
1989 Ford Sierra XR4x4 2.9i
1981 Ford Fiesta Supersport