Range Rover Classic review: how does the 'luxury' SUV drive in 2023?

The Range Rover wasn't quite the first luxury off-roader. And, if you climb aboard this original example, you might wonder if it was a luxury vehicle at all.

Well, the luxury is something deep down, not the superficial signs. It's not about carpet, leather, veneer. Or powered this or automatic that. The 1963 Jeep Wagoneer – which actually was the first luxury off-roader – had those. Not the Range Rover, not at first. This Range Rover has manual steering, wind-up windows and three pedals. The deep luxury is in its space and capability.

They were at first the tools of rescuers. Country vets had them. Motorway police loved the way they could put in a handy chase against early-1970s speeders, but also carry endless gear, and use their bull bars to shove stricken vehicles off the carriageway.

After that, prosperous civilians began migrating out of their Volvo estates. They wanted the imperious view and the unstoppability, and the ability to tow their horseboxes.

It was conceived by long-serving Rover engineers Spen King and Gordon Bashford. They basically styled it too, with finessing at the end by Rover cars designer David Bache. Like many things shaped by function, its looks possess wonderful and lasting clarity.

It sits on a separate chassis and live axles, like a Land Rover. But it adds a V8 engine, permanent four-wheel-drive (there's a lockable centre diff) and coil springs for the suspension. Those things came to the Land Rover itself once it became a 90 and 110 in 1983, and to the Discovery in 1989.

This one was made in 1971, but it's a 'suffix A', basically just as they were launched in 1970. The colour is 'Bahama Gold', and the level of colour keying in the cabin makes you think it's been wading in Colman's English Mustard.

It's an utterly distinctive place to sit. Spen King insisted on the benefits of visibility. So you sit high, the base of the windows at about the altitude of your belly button. The pillars are thin, and the corners of the bonnet marked by little castellations, so you can see just where it begins and ends. You look out over the world, and – maybe this was key to its vertiginous success – the world can look up at you.

Range Rovers are big, eh? Not to a 2023 driver. This one has a wheelbase only an inch longer than today's three-door Mini hatch. It's usefully narrow too.

Its cabin trim is wood free, leather free, cloth free, and carpet free. Its early 'Kit Kat' vacuum-formed PVC seats (vegan leather in today-speak, I guess) are a splendid piece of postmodern minimalism that matched the blocky dash. The floor is covered in rubber, the transmission tunnel in vinyl. I wouldn't hose it out mind, as a) there's some felt beneath the vinyl and b) 1970s Lucas electrics.

Between your knees lies the huge thin-rimmed steering wheel. You're grateful for its leverage because there's no power steering. Trying to turn it when stopped is a pointless struggle: just get the vehicle gently rolling first.

That steering is alarmingly vague at the straight ahead. You really do need your wits about you keeping it between the lines on a narrow bumpy road. Turning it into a bend, you've got to wait for the heroic lean. But hold your nerve because once in the steady curve it becomes really quite precise and you get a nice feel for the grip.

The roll and pitch is inevitable given the long-travel soft suspension. That's about traction and comfort. It keeps all four wheels pressed into the surface in the rough. Big road bumps get eaten alive, although you always feel a post-hoc shudder as the live axles reverberate on the soft tyres.

The clutch is co-operative, which is just as well as the lengthy gearlever is notchy and demands much of your focus. The 3.5-litre carburetted V8 has plenty of low-down torque, at least in the context of its rather mild overall performance: 0-62 is about 15 seconds. The 2023 petrol one would do it nearly three times as quickly. But its 15-20mpg thirst is basically unimproved.

You do hear a V8 noise at high revs, a soft American woofle, but mostly it's bystanders that get the benefit. At any decent speed you're assailed by wind noise and transmission whine. Both are period-correct. The air whistled round the gappy bodywork and glazing. The gear whine is from a noisy transfer case and is unmediated by soft trim. Examples from after 1983 have a chain-drive transfer case and thick carpet, which together sort the issue.

In all it lasted a remarkable 26 years in production. Gradually more luxury – superficial luxury – and refinement came along. Every time they added a new option or trim level on top, it became the best selling version. Latterly, it even got air suspension, which I'll sample in the next car in this series, the P38A.

In a Range Rover, life isn't in any way frantic. I adore its character. It sails down the road like a regal yacht, and you relax into its easeful rhythm. And after 53 years and five generations, that hasn't changed.

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