luandacruiser

I am looking for an ISF at that price and black is a preferred colour. Unfortunately I am trapped overseas in Afghanistan so can't buy till flights restart to UK!

Thanks. I am becoming more intrigued with the ISF. I would not consider a Prado (the 120 series). They are just Hilux estate cars really and are no where near as nice to drive as a proper Cruiser. I imagine the Lexus GX470 is a bit better to drive than the Prado but I have never driven one. And that is another Lexus they unfortunately never sold in UK.

I owned an LX450 for many years in Africa. It was a brilliant motor and I made several trips across multiple African countries in it. Unfortunately, employment took me away from Africa and I now work in central Asia on a rotation basis. I am in the process of moving to UK and initially I planned to buy a Landcruiser 100 series. Unfortunately Lexus never sold the LX in UK and the 80 series Landcruisers in UK generally aren't as nice as the LX. Also, as the roads in UK are generally excellent (at least if you compare to Africa!), a 100 series makes more sense as it has better road manners than a 80/LX450. But looking through autotrader.co.uk, I stumbled across the ISF by chance. On giving it some thought, I have realised that in UK I generally do not need a Landcruiser's capability. I had not really considered a car over a Cruiser as I do not really like Jaguars, Mercedes, Audis or BMWs. But the ISF looks great fun to drive, is practical and from initially reading these forums it seems ISF owners find the cars extremely reliable and not too bad to maintain costwise (brakes a bit pricey, tyres can add up if you drive a bit erratically). The reliability claims match with my LX experience. My Cruiser used to cost a fortune but that was mainly as I had to buy parts in the US and have them shipped to Africa, pay customs charges etc which used to double or triple the cost of each part. The other problem with Cruisers is you can just keep on modding them. Upgrade brakes, stainless exhaust, aftermarket shocks, storage, tools for the road, roof racks, bull bars, driving lights. It just goes on and on! It looks like both 100 series Cruisers and ISFs hold their value well. It also looks like both have poor fuel economy but the ISF is probably better cruising at 70-80 mph on a motorway. The only disadvantage of the ISF is it is a bit small but I guess you can just hire a van if you need to move something. It also would not be as good as a Cruiser in snow. But buying an extra set of wheels and winter tyres would improve the ISF and if you need to drive somewhere in very poor conditions, one could just hire a car. The other great thing with the ISF is as stock it is a pretty impressive car and so the desire to fritter money away on mods should be diminished compared to a Cruiser. However, it does not look like the sort of car you can easily work on so aside from perhaps changing the oil and filters, all work would need to be done at a Lexus dealership. If I bought a Cruiser, I would envisage spending a few grand immediately to baseline it and get it reliable. A nice Cruiser is around 12-16k. So it would cost just shy of 20k before getting carried away with mods. A nice ISF can be picked up for that! But once purchased, do you think an ISF would be cheaper to maintain than a well baselined 100 series?