Defender 130 V8 revealed as £116,000 flagship

As the name suggests, this new version of the Defender mixes the largest body style with the largest engine, with eight cylinders to match its eight-seater capacity.

Packing the ubiquitous 5.0-litre supercharged V8 engine, the 130 V8 has 510PS (375kW) and 610Nm (450lb ft) to shift its considerably sizeable body. That should get it to 62mph in 5.4 seconds, on the way to a top speed of over 140mph.

As this isn’t a full-blown SVR, it stays a bit more subtle about its hidden potency. While the bodywork stays largely as it was, giveaways include a few V8 badges, the droopy quad pipes out back, the smoked tail-lights and the 22-inch alloy wheels. Another suggestion that the big menacing Defender you’re looking at could be a V8 will be its colour. If its anything other than Santarini Black or Carpathian Grey, it’s not the real deal, given that is the long and the short of the 130 V8’s colour palette. Of course, everyone will know exactly what’s up once you press the starter button.

Price? You won’t be paying any less than £116,000 for what is the bona-fide Defender flagship. If that sounds expensive to you – and it does to us too – some context does help. If you want something similar from Mercedes-Benz, the only V8 G-Class on sale has a G63 badge and a starting price of £174,665.

Even the G400D starts at £131,333, which is some £15,000 more than the upper-most Defender you can currently buy. If we were JLR, we’d be chomping at the bit to get a fully-fledged, kitted-out Defender SVR to market for around £140,000. It can’t be long now…