It was time.

Time to give up the workhorse, a 2014 Cayenne GTS with 85,000 miles on it that didn’t have even a hint of trouble since new. Not so much as a squeaky wiper blade, a rattle, a tear in the leather seats. NOTHING. So far, a perfect car that surprisingly got 21 mpg on the highway—impressive for a 6,000 pound flying brick of an SUV.

Why, you ask, was it time? It just was. The body style was aging, the face lifted Cayenne looked like a vastly different car, Carplay was the go-to screen which this particular Cayenne didn’t have, safety features, wear and tear. It was time. Most importantly the expectation that a German, high performance SUV with a propensity to drink oil would basically cost nothing to own for the next several years was a daydream. We decided to rip off the band-aid and let it go before the trouble began. Oddly enough, the couple that bought the car are still great Butler Tire customers and haven’t had a lick of trouble in the 20,000 miles they’ve owned the thing. Don’t call me bitter…

Anyhow, what replaces the most reliable car you’ve ever owned that would satisfy the following needs:

1. Good looking.

2. Reliable.

3. Highly customizable.

4. Large enough for a family of four, and two 90-pound dogs.

5. Indestructible.

6. Available.

7. Easy enough to keep clean with a toddler spilling milk and fruit snacks and chocolate all over the place.

8. Fun to drive.

9. Tunable (more on this later).

10. Rare enough you wouldn’t see one at a stop light next to you too often.

11. Has acceptable resale value.

12. IS AVAILABLE IN THE SPEC WE WANTED!

So, the hunt begins. New Cayenne? Nope, already got one in the family, and just let one go. Audi RSQ8? Too sporty and fragile for the wife to drive. For me, perfect…more on this later too. G-wagen? Had 6 of them already. Try closing the door with a sleeping baby in the back and let me know how that goes. BMW X7? Not rugged enough for the dogs. Cadillac Escalade? Way too big, and the fake wood is, um... fake. Range Rover? Also too fragile for the dogs, and a baby would kill the interior in record time. Jaguar. Nevermind. Rivian R1-S? At the time, 18 month wait list, boring, but safe - like baked chicken. Volkswagen Atlas? Don’t wear glasses or vape, goatee game is weak, so that’s a pass too. We were running out of options. New Hummer EV? Thanks, owned for 16 hours.

Enter the Land Rover Defender. I’d seen ‘em. Quite a few of ‘em actually. But not like the one that was currently in front of me on the highway with the clear, blocky brake lenses on the rear and the wide arches. This one was different. It was special. It had some SOUL. I could hear the thing accelerating and it got away from me - quickly. When I finally caught it at the next stoplight, I saw the difference:  It was a Defender 110 with a V8. "What?? They put a proper motor in this thing??" I had no clue, but a quick google search told me that this was the old Rover Sport SVR motor, a 5.0 liter workhorse with a supercharger for the heavy lifting. Now folks, we have ourselves a contender!! Wide hips, factory flared fender arches, plenty of room in the back for a family of four (and dogs), seemingly built like a brick shithouse, somewhat available and…bonus: the entire interior is baby proof. There are no carpets, just rubber mats on top of a rubber floor. Bonus round for 104 degree days in Atlanta: cloth seats that are heated and cooled—no leather here. Most importantly this handsome fella checked every single box above. Every. Single. Box. So, we now have a platform, but being a Butler family car, it absolutely cannot remain stock and needed to be a fully built car meaning body, wheels, tires, lights, exhaust, tuning, wrap, suspension, etc. Whatever we had, we were going to throw at this thing.

Enter Urban Automotive. Butler Tires and Wheels was Urban’s first USA distributor, buying from them when they were only selling in the UK. We started with a few containers of G-wagon parts, paying exorbitant freight just to have the parts here in the US, and we couldn’t keep them on the shelves.

The timing was perfect, sort of. Urban had just launched their Land Rover Defender program in the United Kingdom and to our knowledge there wasn’t yet a fully built Urban Defender in the United States. Now, the decision had been made that this was going to be the new family truckster, but the real challenge remained: how does one, during COVID when cars were already scarce, find a white on black Carpathian edition Defender, fully loaded, with a V8 and factory fender flares? Well, you make the calls! One single call to Jaguar Land Rover Buckhead told me that a client of theirs had THIS EXACT CAR ORDERED, IT WAS LANDING THE NEXT DAY, AND THE CLIENT WAS 99.9% NOT TAKING THE CAR.

My sales advisor told me he would FaceTime call me the second the car got off the truck, and that call came the next day at 8:45pm. It was exactly what we were looking for—white, black interior, LOADED, V8 and all and most importantly…it was available. “I’ll take it” couldn’t come out of my mouth quickly enough. In retrospect, asking how much the thing was going to cost was probably a better start but hey, this was where we were going and I had to make a decision before hanging up the phone or it would have been gone in an instant.

Vehicle delivery happened the next day and we didn’t even spend one day enjoying the car as it came from Land Rover—big plans incoming and the excitement to get this thing built sent it straight to our body shop with a Sprinter van behind it full of Urban Automotive parts including:

- Front roof visor with high-power lights

- Rear roof spoiler

- Carbon fiber hood (or bonnet if you want to go with what’s on the paperwork) with vents

- Wide arch kit

- Front splitters

- Side steps

- Hood top vent kit

- Hood side vent kit

- Embossed spare wheel cover

- Urban branding pack which removed ALL of the Land Rover emblems

- 22 inch Urban x Vossen UV-X wheels with Michelin tires

- Milltek valved exhaust system

- Urban tuning module adding approximately 100 horsepower and 100 pound feet of torque

While the big guy was at the body shop getting all of the Urban bits installed and wired we decided to add Suntek stealth film to the entire Yulong White body for a more stealthy look. Months later, there isn’t a single rock chip to be found, and the stealthy, satin white look is universally praised for looking great while protecting the car.

The body shop and clear film installation took about a week, and as soon as we got the Urban Defender back to Butler, on went the 22” staggered Urban x Vossen UV-X gloss black wheels with Michelin Defender LTX tires. We installed the tuning module as well as the Milltek valved exhaust, and fired it up for the first time. Now, you know that feeling you get when you hear a Ferrari wailing at wide open throttle or a Lamborghini starting up and revving itself until it’s good and warmed up? That happened. The thing screamed. At an idle you could hear the blub blub blub like an old, cammed, big block V8. Revving the thing to anything over 4,000 RPM evoked a sound that I hadn’t quite heard before. It was sort of Jaguar Type R meets AMG old school, naturally aspirated V8. Whatever it was, it was intense.

Sticking your right foot flat into the skinny pedal on our little ‘test track’ did something to my brain I can’t quite explain and wasn’t exactly prepared for. The thing moved. Like really, really moved. Not that it was slow when it was bone stock, but seven hundred something horsepower from the tuning module made the back of this thing squat so hard it felt like I was driving uphill. It was responsive and revved so quickly, but also sounded like it was going to eat your family for breakfast at wide open throttle. Our decision was totally confirmed. This was the right choice.

Now, there is a lot of good stuff to say about this Urban Defender but let’s be fair and point out some of the quirks, nuances, and subtleties that one may not notice on a short test drive.

1. Whoever calibrated the throttle pedal likely hadn’t ever driven a car before. Feathering the throttle was not a thing--it was simply impossible to slow-roll into anything resembling acceleration. Basically, you had the choice, if you wanted to be somewhat smooth, to either go flat-footed, or recalibrate your entire right foot. We had to choose the latter as 11 miles per gallon wasn’t going to cut it for a “practical” family car.

2. The brakes had a similar feeling to putting your right foot into a bucket of jello. There is NO pedal feel until about three-quarter pedal application, and then it sort of gave a tiny bit of feedback.

3. The fuel economy is horrific. Granted, 700 plus horsepower, a 5.0-liter motor, a tune, and a supercharger didn’t help, but still, 10-11 miles per gallon is a great way to cozy up to your local Chevron owner, real quick.

4. The steering is vague, at best, and even pulling into a parking space, turning 90 degrees, seemed to take the same amount of effort as a cruise ship would. Moving the steering wheel back and forth even an inch or two kept the car going straight down the road, and on-center feel was non-existent. Vague is a compliment…

This is a relatively short list of gripes considering how many things Land Rover got right with this platform, and ultimately we think that we greatly improved on the looks and performance of the standard, out-of-the-box Defender.

What are your thoughts??

For more information, pricing and availability on this build contact us at: 770-428-8473 or online.

Words by Craig Dobrin