What's the rumor (or rumour, for most of you folks ;) these days?
Here in the States we were lead to believe that there was an all new vehicle based on the LR3 (Disco 3 to y'all) coming out in the next year or so. But reading the Brit magazines it appears that Land Rover is introducing a revised Defender with a new dashboard and a buldged hood and plans to keep that in production until 2010 or so.
Ah thats the problem down round here if you miss a day or two there's whole pages of stuff gone forever ( depends on your ISP policy ) we had a long long thread about the replacement Defender personally I like the idea apart from the 'huggy bear's music centre dashboard'
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its getting a nice shiny new ford engine ( as is the next gen freeloader ) I'll say nowt till I get chance to drive a new Transit TDiDerek
The latest is, as you say, a revision of the current Defender. The Defender replacement has been pushed back (to after 2010) rather than cancelled, and there have been suggestions that it will be produced alongside the existing Defender, with its production possibly going offshore. What happens will depend largely on Defender sales, I suppose. There are no details but lots of (mostly uninformed) speculation about the replacement, which presumably will be on the D3 platform for production reasons. It is unlikely to share anything with the current Defender except the name, as Landrover has virtually abandoned the utility market for the luxury market, and increasingly strict design rules round the world make it unlikely that anything as useful as the original Landrover could be put into production today. JD
'tis sad, because I would love to see a US spec diesel-powered short wheelbase that I could use for travel to Alaska and Mexico. Oh yeah ... and at a bargain price. But what I want would likely sell perhaps as many as 15 units in the States -- not exactly a volume item.
We'll just have to see what happens now that Ford seems to want to cut a deal with someone to take over Land Rover. Wasn't Kamaz or another Russian truck manufacturer mentioned as a possible buyer of Jaguar with Land Rover thrown in to sweeten the deal? Or JCB (we have a JCB assembly plant not too far from here incidentally -- it's a small world)? I'm not holding my breath but it would be interesting to see one of those companies getting Land Rover back to their industrial roots.
While that is possible, the major value of Landrover is the luxury cars (Rangerover, Freelander and Discovery), same as Jaguar, so the same constraints and values are likely to apply to any purchaser. JD
Everything in the local rag (JCB are local) suggests that JCB don't want Landrover in the deal.
Possibly as CAT , their arch enemy ;-) own the parts distribution for the older landies.
:-(
I'd like to see JCB take it all on, I feel a whole lot more comfortable knowing I could get matching Shoes, Sunglasses and pencil cases in the same brand.
The reality is that Ford are in financial difficulty and Jaguar is losing money and probably always will until it is shut down and that Land Rover make mainly big and thirsty vehicles which are difficult to move in a financial depression or when fuel is very expensive. All the while there is an increasing political and social stigma attached to owning such vehicles in many markets, whether we like it or not. Things are not easy and likely to get more difficult. In the light of this it is perfectly understandable if not palatable that Ford want to cut loose. JCB have publicly stated that they do not want LR, although this looks very much like a negotiating ploy to get it all free and with a nice sweetener thrown in cash-wise like when BMW offloaded Rover cars. JCB is a ruthless company and would not run a car factory at a loss so if they gain control of either car company, then they better shape up in double quick time or they shut and the real-estate is hived off.
It would seem not, but it has been put back again. Some say it's down to money (Ford are not doing very well at all), some say that they are tidying things up before selling LR (and Jag), one source (who may be in a position to know) suggests that they've gone back to the drawing board..... again! Lets face it, if they don't see the new Santana as a threat they need new glasses........
Unlikey - but who knows, judging by comments in this group there could be a market for the traditional workhorse, and a "sports" version (which could also cover the US market).
Worldwide was the deal - but "local" distrubition is likely to be handled by someone else. Catapillar handle parts (and vehicles) distribution for a number of manuacturers (Manitou is one, I believe), but you won't see their name on the box. Having had to wait 4 months for a 38a Gearstick knob to arrrive (amongst about 20 other parts
*still* on back-order after 4 weeks), I'm not surprised they don't advertise their involvement!
Caterpillar Logistics Services manage the parts business for many major manufacturers worldwide. In the UK they are based at Desford, Leicester. They are *very* good what they do. No doubt they provide a tailored service according to what the customer wants.
JCB made it quite clear originly that they would be looking at a much smaller Jag operation than the current one, but have since ceased mentioning that. Ford, unfortuately, have dug their own grave with regard to Jag & LR by resorting to badge engineering which has removed the very individuality of the vehicles (warts and all) which made them desirable. This has damaged then in the very market where such individuality was vauled, and they see as being so vital, - the US!
Have you had the pleasure of the customer circus department at Land Rover those really helpful people who will contact the relevent person in the parts department and expedite the delivery or get back to you that was nearly 3 years ago - any day now I'm expecting a call. Derek
I have one customer waiting for a part who works for LR - they have hundreds of the part at the side of the line - but none in the spares department. Out-sourcing strikes again! Perhaps it should be called Out-minding - out of sight, out of mind - "It's not my problem, Boss, Scroggins deal with that sort of thing".....
"beamendsltd" wrote in message news:cbdf85f4e% snipped-for-privacy@btconnect.com...
I don't recall either Jaguar or Land Rover having any success in the USA until relatively recently. Apart from engines I am not aware of much parts sharing between the two either. There is no 'badge engineering' that I am aware of except for the little X Type Jaguar that is very loosely based upon the Mondeo, though you would be hard pressed to tell. Personally I would prefer a Mondeo. As for engines in LR products, the Ford and Jaguar and Volvo [all Ford if you must be pedantic] based engines now likely to be used in the vehicles are an improvement on the TD5 and lacklustre TD6 in the Range Rover application. I test drove an Audi Q7 last week and the engine performance and refinement make my TD6 appear really dire in comparison. No doubt the V6 and V8 Jaguar/LR/Ford/Peugeot diesel engines will redress the balance in LR's favour again for a while. That is progress and what makes the world economy turn, that something new must be more desirable and/or provide positive advantages over existing products. This brings us back to the Defender and the reason I still run my old 1984 110 Hi-cap. A new one with TD5 is not more desirable and only provides one advantage which I am unimpressed by and that is more power. If the advantages of a new model were greater I would change more regularly and would thus provide a continuous income flow to Land Rover as I do for other companies and products. I bought a new Range Rover for instance. I would not have bought another of the previous model and I would not buy another TD6 even though I like my current one a lot.
Jag certainly did more than adequately in the states, it was their main market outside the UK. There is an excellent documentary about the company when it was de-merged from Austin-Rover which covers this ground in some detail. There's was suprising amount of parts sharing throughut the old BL empire (and indeed pre-Leyland), clutch master/slave cylinders, brake components, switches, instruments etc etc. There's very little on todays Jags that is not stright out of the Ford parts bins, they may change the A surfaces etc but there is still compromise. Badge Engineering is not the same as Platform Engineering!
Two entirely different machines. Audi may like to think their effrot is in the same league as the Range Rover, but it isn't, by any stretch of the imagination. The Td5 is fine in its intended application, the Discovery, the so called Td6 is just another example of badge engieering - "We need and engine for this application, we can afford to develop a new engine so we'll make this one do". I have worked in VW/Audi group and seen this problem first hand in one of their "brands" new models, and the result was the model effectively being handed to the marketing people to re-define the marques long-held image to "re-align customer expectations". In other words it was a codge!
Just keep the 110 - thats what I'm doing. I have no patricular desire to have a Td5 Defender (wrong engine for the job), so I'm keeping my 200Tdi 110 SW, which has exactly the right engine for the job. I've got nothing agaist 300Tdi's - I would feel the same about my car if it had been made a year later with a 300.
I have no interest in owning a Range Rover at all, so I can only pass on cutomers comments, which are largely that LR have lost the plot in terms of what the vehicle is "for", which for the company that invented the market sector is seriously bad news.
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