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i decided to upgrade to a liberty wagon and after looking about on the net i have seen a couple of manuals for sale. what is the better car manual or auto. i want to fit a lift to whatever i buy and use it for camping and the odd trip. also whats the best wheel size for a lifted lib?

Manual or auto is really personal preference. I prefer manuals myself but am actually building an auto wagon. You could argue all day about "for and against" with the manual/auto.

At the end of the day they both go well off road.

With a standard 2.2 in there I would suggest some thing along the lines of a 27x8.5/14 which just happens to fit on the standard wheels. FOr what you are wanting to do with it, I would suggest some of the tyres already mentioned, 2" kit and Outback struts.

I would go a manual too, esp with a boxer. The torque makes gear swapping less frequent and all of my mates who have gone from a manual to self stirrer have become worse (lazy) drivers.

I personally enjoy the control a manual gives and the extra involvement offered.

Cheers

It doesnt really matter which one you decide on i have owned both in auto and manual turbo and NA. The auto makes life real easy but once you put on some oversixe tyres the only thing i would suggest would be a higher stall converter to make the most of the engine. With a Manual and big tyres (really big ones) you will find yourself needing the low range more often than not in NA trim. In turbo manual the only thing they lack is a low enough reverse which being a Suby driver you will only need when backing up while parking on the beach

I have an auto RS turbo wagon with a lift kit see the WA section here .
I have allways found the autos to be very good on the beach taking off is very good & to date I have never used the auto in a manual mode .
The advantage with an auto is the gear ratio RS cuts are 4.444 , so running big wheels is very good 215 x 70 r16
if you need to shift the auto will let you do that as well .

you can also make the auto a better set up by fitting a switch to the center diff .

can you elaborate on the switch to the centre diff comment please seagull im not very knowledgable about libs at the moment and im not sure im following what you are saying. alsoim going to be in the market for an early model would what you say be relevant to libs that were the first models?

automatic liberty's have an electronically controlled center coupling. this varies how much drive is sent to the rear wheels.

you can easily add a switch that locks the center coupling up as tight as possible. It makes a huge difference offroad.

If you want a sand car i highly recommend the autos, i have been driving mine on the sand for years and i still havn't been towed once. a manual driven properly is probably as capable but the auto makes it so easy

are they much slower off the mark or much more thirstier than a manual.

autos are slower
fuel was the same on a trip based with my mate ( manual ) done the road same place & back

he got boged I did not

i have an ej22 auto, it uses more fuel (approx 1l/100km) than my mates manual EJ22 cars, and is slower off the mark. with 27" tyres though its still a comfortable drive, you dont fel like its struggling at all like an EA82 does when lifted..

as seagull said though - they get bogged in sand and burn their clutches. I can just ease on the throttle and walk out of just about anything

They are thirstier than the manual around town but on a trip they are much the same.