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Did you actually go over Walna Scar to Long House near Seathwaite in the Duddon Valley?

I had less than 10 miles on the clock, it was 5.30pm, I was a solitary vehicle and it was getting dark so I didn't go too far off-road. Dealer advised me that there is a narrowing of the track just past where I was that he reckoned isn't suitable for a brand new £40k vehicle!! We turned round and headed for the B+B.

Looks like an interesting track though so I'm looking forward to going back to the Lakes for my first service......

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JMC - we will have some more snow to test it in tonight!!!!

Hi Randalls. I'm sorry to say, I've already been in the snow with the D3 and I was tempted to go home for the 300TDi instead. Headed for the B974 (you know where I mean!) and I only got 1/4 of the way up before I was stranded All the electronics were doing things I didn't enjoy, and I was longing for a manual diff lock and no ABS!!

Put it this way - when your car has spun itself through 90 degrees, and you are then sliding down a hill sideways with the car pointing across the road, HDC isn't any blo*dy use!!!

Once I got straightened out, I made the mistake of hitting the brakes and the ABS let me go faster still. HDC isn't the first thing on your mind when you are not used to having it there in the first place. Not a nice feeling in a £40k car when you already know how to sort the problem but the car wont let you!!! Instinc would have been to plough into the side of the road but I didn't want to damage my new motor. I don't like ABS in the snow and I think all cars so equiped should have an ABS switch (like my Audis and my motorbike have 8) ).

In truth, I think the cost is the prohibitive aspect here rather than the capability - but I still reckon the 300TDi would have gone further up in the first place. We can put that down to tyres though (BFG A/T).

Later in the day I was on low level routes with 'blin drift' and I was pleasantly surprised so it isn't all bad. My main concern is that if something does go wrong in a bad situation, you can't take manual control of everything.

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I'm not suggesting you're not a good driver by the way!

It's OK Dan - I didn't think that way and I reckon you know exactly what I'm talking about. The fact is that, when you know how to drive, it is a bit disconcerting to have a machine take over from you with no manual over-ride. This was my first step in the snow with the D3 so I suppose I will have to re-learn how to drive this particular vehicle.

Randalls, I don't think you have to worry. I chose not to go into a D2 for this very reason and I still think the D1 is better when the going gets tough than the D2. LR took me out at the Pre-launch of the D2 and I got stuck on a moist grassy incline that the D1 would have sailed up even if I had been walking alongside it.

The D3 is one hell of a complex beastie, and as I said in my previous post, if it had been a case of 'somebody elses car' then I may have pressed on regardless. Despite owning more vehicles than I can drive for each day of the week, I still cant afford to 'bin' a forty-grand motor, and I'm sure that was the main problem yesterday. Time to insist on my LRE half day I think

JMC wrote:

Time to insist on my LRE half day I think

You'll love it! Although the full day level 1 is even better