"Acura decides to load up MDX"

This article prompted me to ask this meaningless question... They say:

"The offspring of Honda, which has the distinction of being the first luxury nameplate from Japan"

Did Honda make the Sterling?

Rover made the Sterling in England using the Honda/Acura Legend as the starting point. Some claim that Honda and Rover co-developed the Legend and Sterling.

The Legend was both popular and considered reliable in the US. The Sterling was neither.

At that point in time Rover was pretty much what was left of the British Leyland fiasco with the exception that Jaguar had managed to get itself free. As such Rover owned the Rover (including Land Rover and Range Rover), MG, Triumph and Mini brand names and probably a few others as well. Few in the US know it, but Rover was a large maker of family cars in addition to the Land and Range Rovers. Prior to the Sterling fiasco, Rover cars hadn't been imported in the US since

Honda had made an investment into Rover and was cooperating on many things. Slightly later Rover sold itself to BMW, which pissed Honda off greatly! BMW lost a pile of money on this misadventure and eventually sold the Land Rover portion of the business to Ford, kept the Mini for itself and sold the remaining Rover & MG brands and business for next to nothing to some UK investors. The UK investors then lost all of their investment and then some. Finally Rover shut down and some of the remaining pieces were bought by the Chinese.

john

Going even further back, around 1980 I think, British Leyland started building Honda Ballades for sale in the UK, and badging them 'Triumph Acclaim.' They sold a hell of a lot of them.

John Horner wrote in news:TR_Yg.10008$gx6.9982@trnddc05:

The Legend was a wholly Japanese model, based on the Accord.

From my understanding, the Brits resisted Honda involvement, but were unable to counter the heavy pressure exerted by the government. Apparently the assembly workers were most opposed, and engaged in active sabotage of the vehicles on the line.

From what I've read, no Rover model has been well-built or reliable since the P6.

Bought by Ford in 1989.

About the early-'80s. The SD1 was sold here only with the 3.5 V8, as the Rover 3500.

When the British government finally decided to cut their losses in the early-'80s and sell BL, Ford was interested in it. They were intending to retain the Range Rover/Land Rover and Jaguar brands and in selling off everything else.

The government was aghast that the damned Americans might own British icons, and turned the deal down. The remnants of BL were then sold to British Aerospace (BAe). BMW bought it from BAe.

Who formed the ill-starred MG Rover Group, recently in the news during their impending takeover by the Chinese.

And Ford ended up owning Range Rover anyway!

Wikipedia's entry has a slightly different take on it:

John Horner wrote in news:f98Zg.3449$4T6.2864@trnddc02:

Shit. I shouldn't rely on memory so much, should I? :( It appears the Legend and the Rover 800 were in fact a collaborative effort.

No mention of Rover resistance in the Wiki article. It was there, though. At the time, there was the thought Honda-Rovers would not be "real" Rovers. The government prevailed though.

Don't be sure Wikipedia has it really right either :).

John

Much more in depth than I thought. Thanks for the great reply.

I'm glad you appreciated it. Now if only the nitwits in Detroit would have studied the history of the once great and now vaporized UK based auto industry then perhaps they could have avoided the situation the 2.5 find themselves in today!

John