New defender concept dead!!

[Juddy]

D1/2 owners are different. And I should not tarnish everyone with the same stick, but 95% of rr, rrs, d4 and free lander owners never go off road, infact more here seem to like the terrible sin of fitting 21 inch chrome rims, and stupid side steps. Saying that all the other high end 4wd also get the same treatment

 

[Juddy]

Good point on the use off the station wagon wording with land rover. Have they always called them station wagons.

I wagon here is what they would call a estate car in the uk, but then some company's like Mercedes call it a estate.

It's just the use of American and English wording.

 

[Antichrist]

I never said the Freelander was iconic, but it is hugely popular.
I'm probably seeing more of them than anything else. Defenders probably a close second.
But the DC100 would never be iconic either. And if you compare them the DC100and Freelander 2 are very similar. It would take very little effort, I bet, to modify the Freelander design and production line to have the soft-road version and the off-road version with all the DC100 stuff stuck on.

As for the "truck" title being inaccurate, I don't know what else to call a hi-cap or any of the myriad other versions/conversions that the DC100 could never be.

 

[Juddy]

The Freelander is not all that popular here, mainly due to its base price tag of $54,000. I have had the opportunity to drive and have the use of a number of Freelanders for a few weeks, and in all honesty its not that a bad car, the HSE spec is far better, but at $65k plus its big money, we used to have a Nissan X-Trail Ti ( the current shape one ) at 42k on the road it was very good value against the Freelander, and it came with things like satnav, a huge glass electric sunroof, leather etc, all of which is extra on a Freelander. Its 10k over priced. Saying that even some people I know who work for Land Rover here, reckon the Defender 90, would be a better seller if they put the price down to 40k drive away, 50k is silly money when you can get a 110 station wagon for 4k more, and swb 4wd's are not big sellers here.

I thought that concept Defender looked liked a Skoda Yeti.....

 

[AndrewClarke]

Funny how Americans refere to the defender as a truck. In Europe a truck would be a scania or Mercedes ( kenworth or mack in your world )

Station wagon:


Truck:

Lorry:

 

[tacr2man]

Station wagon and shooting brake were precursor to estate which was a shortening of estate car , many were originally modifications to cars for use as their names suggested , travelling from a large country house(estate) to the station (railway) to convey the owners with their luggage , or going on a shooting trip with guns and hamper etc on ones own or anothers estate .

 

[proper4wd]

The F-type to Jaguar is what the Defender will be to Land Rover.

JLR are not idiots.

 

[Juddy]

Spot on...

 

[proper4wd]

Seriously... Jaguar enthusiasts have been pining for a real 2 seat sports car for years. 2 seats, RWD, 500hp supercharged V8, will be available as a coupe or convertible and with a manual transmission.

You want a real off road capable Defender? My bet is you will get it... but not at $25k or $30k. The F-type is strategically priced to steal market share from both the Porsche 911 and Boxster and Cayman.

The Defender will do the same. Expect a "base" package" to be $10k higher than a top level Wrangler. $50k+

Now you all can complain about how you got what you wanted but it costs too much money...

Edit: for the record, the DC100 was built on the LR3 chassis. Hardly a "car" and definitely not comparable to the LR2/Freelander 2

 

[Oilworker]

...and it could be so simple to design the new Defender.
Well I am not a designer but just a driver and that's just the decision makers in their taylored suits should listen to.
Until the introduction of the 2.4l engine the Defender was a working man's truck and with the 2.2l Puma that truely died.
JLR should remember what the first Land Rover was build for and what it achieved by it's simplicity and toughness, it's true modularity that allowed owners anf drivers all over the world to adapt to their requirements.
And what do we have 60 years later? A car of which you need two truckloads of to make James Bond look good ;-) pretty sad....

 

[I Leak Oil]

I don't share Adam's bright future of a viable off road capable new defender that will satisfy the traditional defender market and I have no doubt that the DC100, if it had made it to production, would have been in the $50K realm anyway. I'm sure Rover could make a vehicle to technically compete with a wrangler but I don't believe it wants to. It wants to stay upscale and wants to make mall crawlers because that's what makes them money. That's what they're in business to do. If rover really based it's business plan on a small percentage of it's U.S. customers we would have had the 300tdi long ago. DC100 failed because it was trying to scratch an itch that was already being scratched by their current line up.

 

[proper4wd]

I understand where you are coming from. I will again point to the F-Type as an indicator of what the mindset is at JLR.

Jaguar hasn't sold a 2 seat car, OR a manual transmission car since 1974. Yet here you have both in the F-Type. It is the "successor to the E-Type", they have said. As far as reinventing icons goes, a tall order indeed. And a very good exercise for reinventing the Defender.

 

[Juddy]

And what do we have 60 years later? A car of which you need two truckloads of to make James Bond look good ;-) pretty sad....[/QUOTE]

Er, not really, any film that uses a vehicle will have a number of the same to use for different scene shots, be it a Land Rover or a Toyota, and James Bond looks good anyway, and what else would 007 drive other than a British car. Excellent film Skyfall.....you never know Felix might turn up in the next one...

 

[roverrocks]

I don't share Adam's bright future of a viable off road capable new defender that will satisfy the traditional defender market and I have no doubt that the DC100, if it had made it to production, would have been in the $50K realm anyway. I'm sure Rover could make a vehicle to technically compete with a wrangler but I don't believe it wants to. It wants to stay upscale and wants to make mall crawlers because that's what makes them money. That's what they're in business to do. If rover really based it's business plan on a small percentage of it's U.S. customers we would have had the 300tdi long ago. DC100 failed because it was trying to scratch an itch that was already being scratched by their current line up.

Totally spot on. Land Rover started selling out it's off road/agricultural roots quite a number of years ago especially in the US of A. Such is life. LR has evolved for the 21st century and it is we LR off road enthusiasts that need to evolve and move on from a NEW off road oriented Defender for it is a dead issue.

 

[Antichrist]

When I said the DC100 made no sense because of the Freelander 2 I didn't mean because they share components or chassis. I was looking at the overall design asthetics. The fact that thry have about the same wheelbase, both somewhat areodynamic and both small and fairly low.
The DC100 was a heck of a lot closer overall to the Freelander than it was to the Defender.
You'd be hard pressed to find a single person who looked at one and knew nothing about it being what it was claimed to be who would say, "Oh, obviously a replacement for the defender."