We all bought the Grenadier on the understanding that it was a vehicle you could fix yourself, and that a proper workshop manual, the one the dealer works from, would come with it. It did turn up eventually, and for a while it was free. Now it costs money, and quite a lot of it.
Forum member Tom Dixon, from Berwickshire, did what most of us only threatened to do. He wrote the owners' letter to INEOS, got an hour on the phone with CEO Lynn Calder for his trouble, and this month went back to her about the price of the manual portal. He joins Krabby and me to report what she said, what she ruled out, and what's still on the table.
The short version: the pricing stays, and there's no access for less than a month. In the US that's $210 for a month, $600 for three, $1,100 for six or $2,000 for the year. Tom puts the UK figure at around £1,500 and says Australians are paying 3,000 AUD. As Tom relays it, INEOS pay the software provider per licence, opening the dealer system to owners was a quick fix rather than a plan, and Lynn's view is that INEOS are still cheaper than other manufacturers. But a PDF, an unofficial owners' manual built from INEOS data, communal logins and free access for the original deposit holders were all taken away to think about, and that's not nothing.
From there it's GlobeGuard (Tom says the deal with INEOS is signed and the reader will be sold as an accessory), parts that only come as whole units, right to repair, getting yourself home from the back of beyond with a code reader and some common sense, and a Land Rover handbook from the days when the answer to most problems was a high-lift jack.
So have INEOS kept their word? Strictly speaking, yes. They said there'd be a workshop manual and there is one, and as I said on the show, nobody ever promised it would be free. But a manual you rent by the month isn't the book on the garage shelf most of us had in mind, and around £1,500 a year, every year, for as long as you own the thing, is a fair old running cost on a vehicle sold on fixing it yourself. Lynn's line, via Tom, is that INEOS are still cheaper than the rest, and I don't doubt it. Tom would still sooner snap a few plastic clips and keep his money. INEOS took that round on points, but he's not done swinging, so get your ideas on the forum and he'll take them back in with him.
Chapters
0:00 The manual we were promised, and our guest
3:42 Tom's call with Lynn Calder: price, PDFs and day passes
25:20 GlobeGuard and the code reader deal
35:13 Parts, torque settings and the whole-unit problem
50:33 Right to repair, limp mode and getting home
1:08:10 Land Rover's "Working in the Wild"
1:13:42 Where it leaves us
Join the discussion: https://www.theineosforum.com/threads/questions-for-lynn-calder-on-the-topic-of-the-manual-subscription.12423025/
Tom's writing: https://theoverlander.substack.com
Tom's films: https://www.youtube.com/@theoverlandersubstack
Guest: Tom Dixon (The Overlander)
Hosts: Stu Barnes and Krabby
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