Range Rover Sport 3.0 SD V6 HSE auto 4WD Euro 5 (without stop-start)

The SDV6 is Land Rover’s 3.0-litre six-cylinder diesel, and HSE is the trim level. Euro 5 is the part of this address that costs money: London’s ULEZ requires diesel cars to meet Euro 6.

What to check on this specification

Euro 5 diesel and the charging zones

A diesel car must meet Euro 6 to enter the London ULEZ without paying the daily charge, and the charging clean air zones in England use the same diesel standard. A Euro 5 diesel pays. If the vehicle will be used in or near a zone, work out what that comes to before anything else; if it will not, the emissions standard is a large part of why the used market prices these below their Euro 6 equivalents.

Air suspension

Where the vehicle has air suspension, it is a wear item rather than a fit-and-forget system. The common failure is a leak from an air spring, and a compressor that later fails is often doing so because it has been working against that leak for months. The practical test is simple: leave the vehicle parked and unattended for as long as the seller will allow, then come back and look at it from a distance. A corner that has settled, or a vehicle that is noticeably lower than it was, is telling you something. A suspension warning message on start-up is telling you the same thing more loudly.

The particulate filter

Every diesel of this era leaves the factory with a diesel particulate filter. Two things follow from that. First, a filter that was fitted when the vehicle was built and is missing at test time is an MOT failure, and removing one will normally put the vehicle outside the emissions standard it was type-approved to — which makes it unlawful to use on the road. Second, a filter only clears itself properly on a run long and hot enough to complete a regeneration; a car used for short cold journeys accumulates soot and, worse, fuel in the sump from interrupted regenerations.

On a viewing this shows up in the paperwork rather than the metal. Look for oil changes at or before the stated interval, and be wary of a car whose recorded mileage is made up of very short annual totals.

Electrics

Owner surveys of Land Rover models from this period report electrical faults as the leading complaint — engine and emissions warning lights, infotainment, keyless entry, air conditioning. Work through every function on the viewing. Individually these are small; in combination they are the reason these vehicles have the reliability reputation they do.

Ownership notes

Owner surveys report the Range Rover Sport of this generation as more robust than the larger Range Rover of the same era, with brakes and engine the most-reported problem areas.

Read the MOT history for advisories on suspension and corrosion, and check the tyres are a matched set — on a four-wheel-drive vehicle, mismatched rolling circumferences load the transfer case.

About this page

The address you are on was part of a used-car dealer site that no longer exists. The individual vehicle it once described was sold years ago; there is no stock here, nothing is for offer, and no enquiry goes anywhere. What has been kept is the specification the address itself encodes, written up as a reference for anyone looking at the same combination of model, engine, transmission and emissions standard on the used market today.

Nothing here is advice about a particular vehicle. Every point above is a thing to check on the car in front of you, and the official services linked below answer against a registration number rather than a model name.