One question...

[Zeros]

Will the new ‘Defender’ be used by any military anywhere in the world?

[veebs]

Yes.

[Homestar]

I wouldn’t have thought so. LR don’t want to touch Military applications any more. They didn’t even tender for the replacement of the Perenties.

[loanrangie]

Maybe as road vehicles but doubt you'll see one in the field.

[JDNSW]

I wouldn’t have thought so. LR don’t want to touch Military applications any more. They didn’t even tender for the replacement of the Perenties.

Don't forget that this was during the period when Ford (or was it BMW?) was trying to sell the company. Certainly not under current management. And the requirements for the tender, which, from memory, included a very long service contract, were not likely to be considered when you are trying to sell the company.

Of course, this does not mean they would bid on a similar contract today, but it is not evidence that they would not, if a similar situation arose today.

[weeds]

Staff car maybe.....won’t see them in combat, combat car are purpose built thee day.

[jon3950]

Don't forget that this was during the period when Ford (or was it BMW?) was trying to sell the company. Certainly not under current management. And the requirements for the tender, which, from memory, included a very long service contract, were not likely to be considered when you are trying to sell the company.

Of course, this does not mean they would bid on a similar contract today, but it is not evidence that they would not, if a similar situation arose today.

Yes it was Ford. Ford saw Land Rover as a premium product, it was part of the Premier Automotive Group along with Jaguar, Aston Martin, Lincoln, Mercury and Volvo. As such a military contract did not fit with their market positoning and I think Ford were pretty keen to let Defender wither and die.

Probably where all the rot started. Conversely, a lot of the stuff Ford put in place enabled Tata to make it the success it is today.

Cheers,
Jon

[rick130]

Yes it was Ford. Ford saw Land Rover as a premium product, it was part of the Premier Automotive Group along with Jaguar, Aston Martin, Lincoln, Mercury and Volvo. As such a military contract did not fit with their market positoning and I think Ford were pretty keen to let Defender wither and die.

Probably where all the rot started. Conversely, a lot of the stuff Ford put in place enabled Tata to make it the success it is today.

Cheers,
JonThis.

As I've mentioned in the past, BMW were trying to expand military, Australia was to be the engineering base for military vehicles world wide but Ford canned the lot.
They didn't care for the Defender at all, it didn't fit into PAG's plans.

[Homestar]

I think there are too many wearing Rose coloured glasses here - do you seriously think the Latte sipping board of JLR would even consider such a low production run and do you think there is a model that would even pass basic inspection by any Military as being suitable for their needs or think that it could be modified to suit? I can’t see anything in their line up that would come close no matter what you did to it.

Even the 660 or 663 or whatever it is called - I’m still not convinced that is even going to make it to production yet and if it does it will be a shiny, high end nod to what the Defender was, not a true, rugged, go anywhere vehicle.

As Weeds says, maybe as a staff car for top shiny bums, but even that’s a stretch IMO.

Lets dig this thread up in 10 years and see what happened. 😉

[Zeros]

...sorry to say, I agree with Homestar.

There are a lot of rose coloured views of Land Rovers design priorities and their narrow market profile. Gerry McGoverns ‘cohesive’ design aesthetic just means every vehicle is essentially the same.

There is no way on earth any military would ever choose a monocoque aluminium framed urban SUV for any purpose. I doubt the new ‘Defender’ will be fit for purpose for anything more than the occasional weekend bush jaunt.

.::it’s pretty funny that it might still be called a ‘Defender’ - it actually says it all about Gerry’s delusional rose coloured blinkers. SUV663 is a better name. .

[JDNSW]

Perhaps worth pointing out that if we go back to when the first Landrover was introduced, it was produced with no thought of the military market - in fact, it could be considered as a "demilitarised" Jeep. And the British Army had no intention of getting "anything like that". They were well into the design and acqusition process for the 'perfect' military light utility vehicle - what surfaced as the Austin Champ. Rover had never been a supplier of military vehicles, although they had, like the rest of the British motor industry, been heavily involved in military production, notably aircraft parts and especially the first production Allied jet engines (passed to Rolls Royce in exchange for their tank engine business). Rover regarded their market as upper middle class urban buyers - sound familiar?

Despite this, within a few years, Rover was selling large numbers of Landrovers to the British Army, and continued to do so for decades after the Austin Champ had faded into history.

I can't say that history will repeat itself, just that this sort of prediction does not necessarily follow the obvious path.

[Homestar]

The Land Rovers of old weren’t made for selling to the high end of town but as a rugged, go anywhere, easy to fix vehicle, so adapted well to Military life. From where I sit, I don’t see any of those qualities with the current LR lineup sorry. All just personal opinion, but either way, time will tell.

[Pedro_The_Swift]

The problem with LR not tendering for "its " replacement was the requirement for the vehicles to run on UNLEADED....

[Summiitt]

There has been almost no talk of a ute for the new defenders, the commercial market doesn't seem to be a target for Landrover..My current 130 I'm afraid will be the last of 12 defenders I've bought new, 6 of them still in heavy duty forestry work..Im just praying that either the G commercial drops in price or ford release a `workmate` cab chassis F350!!

[RobA]

The answer is no. The life of type for defence equipment including fleet is normally in the region of 20 years or so. That is completely incompatible with normal commercial fleet evolution and development. There will always be evolutions during life of type but normally within defence parameters not WHS or commercial.

In this day and age of highly variable combat requirements but all requiring high levels of blast protection from IED et al there is no off the shelf product in the commercial fleet world that meets the need. This is why pretty much every defence force in the world has contracted specialists to build to that requirement. Quite frankly ABS, ESC and an airbag or two means jack compared to decent underbody blast deflection.

So the answer is, again, no not for Landrover or anyone else. It's now down to the specialist builders like BAE and here in Australia the range of vehicles coming under the Land 400 program

Rob

[Celtoid]

Land 400 vehicles will not tick the boxes Land 121 vehicles fill. There are going to be well in excess of 2000 G Wagon variants used by the ADF ….. we could not afford to buy that many specialist armored vehicles and I doubt the Land 400 vehicles could match the requirements of Land 121 Phase 3A & B.

Will G Wagons ever see a true combat zone or an area where insurgents are going to be extremely active? …. probably/hopefully not …. but there will always be a need for vehicles that are used in Australia for logistics and training. That's why they bought the Gs.

Chickens and eggs regarding LR not bidding in Land 121 ….. did they even have a product on the drawing table let alone classified as MOTS (Military Off-The-Shelf), which tends to pop up in the requirements a lot these days, that would come close to the mission system and support system specs?

[Zeros]

So there should be lots of ex army G’s for sale at some stage...will be interesting to see the prices.

[blackrangie]

The Land Rovers of old weren’t made for selling to the high end of town but as a rugged, go anywhere, easy to fix vehicle, so adapted well to Military life. From where I sit, I don’t see any of those qualities with the current LR lineup sorry. All just personal opinion, but either way, time will tell.Nothing is easy to fix in the field in military anymore, its all very very high tech

[Jenx]

I also wouldn’t underestimate the effect that headlines like this one had on JLR’s thinking about the military market. SAS commander quits in Snatch Land Rover row | UK news | The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/nov/01/sas-commander-quits-afghanistan)

[Zeros]

Indeed! thanks for that. ...this issue of under-investment in armoured vehicles leading to deaths is astounding and horrifying.

I wonder if the new Defender will even be used as a police car / fire vehicle / work vehicle of any kind?

My question is what is it Defending? ...Hipster lifestyle? The Land Rover image?

Why call it a Defender at all? ...It was supposed to challenge Hilux according to Jerry McG, but no sign of a ute either... ...by the looks of the 'spy shots' there's nothing so far to set it apart from a Discovery 4 IMO.

...Why not just admit the era is over - drop the Defender name, cancel the D5 and be done with it - call the new one a Discovery 6.

[JDNSW]

Perhaps time to remind everyone that "Defender" is just a rather late arrival name for what previously was simply a "Land Rover", after the company had trashed the name "Rover" and wanted to use the well respected "Land Rover" name as a company name with the introduction of a new lower price Rangerover aimed at the original Rangerover market, since the Rangerover had moved way up market. They did not want to dilute the Rangerover name, and "Land Rover" was about the only other name available that was still respected.

[Zeros]

Good point John. Actually it should simply be called - Land Rover Series VII.

Series I
Series II
Series III
Series IV (200/300Tdi)
Series V (Td5)
Series VI (Puma)
Series VII (Hybrid/EV) ??

[alan48]

Hi,
re G wagons eventually being available to us private buyers I believe from earlier posts that they are all leased and at the end of lease will go back to Merc and not be sold on-- that means our Defs may be the last tuff trucks for us. Personally I think the new Def as a wagon may surprise us but agree no news on a ute version, or something able to be customised as many of us do with the Def models. I still think the new Jeep Gladiator with a 3 ltr auto and similar shape to a 130 CC might be of interest. Still don't see why Tata have not fed one of their utes into the discussion either.[bigsad]

[blackrangie]

I also wouldn’t underestimate the effect that headlines like this one had on JLR’s thinking about the military market. SAS commander quits in Snatch Land Rover row | UK news | The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/nov/01/sas-commander-quits-afghanistan)Is Snatch Vixen still a LR?

[Celtoid]

Hi,
re G wagons eventually being available to us private buyers I believe from earlier posts that they are all leased and at the end of lease will go back to Merc and not be sold on-- that means our Defs may be the last tuff trucks for us. Personally I think the new Def as a wagon may surprise us but agree no news on a ute version, or something able to be customised as many of us do with the Def models. I still think the new Jeep Gladiator with a 3 ltr auto and similar shape to a 130 CC might be of interest. Still don't see why Tata have not fed one of their utes into the discussion either.[bigsad]

That is very interesting. I wonder what the terms of the lease are …. as in, do the vehicles get replaced every X amount of years until the life of the contract.

Merc might take them back at the end of each lease.... but you'd think they need to sell them on to recoup money or do they re-lease or sell them to some third world country?

[Celtoid]

Is Snatch Vixen still a LR?

The Gulf Wars and Afghanistan should have been a huge wake up call to the Brits. The reports of the under resourcing of their troops in both volume and type of equipment are astounding. Lack of ammunition, lack of weapons and unsound/unrealistic/antiquated doctrine are just a few of the issues.

Some of the IED have blown 30T Amtracs off the ground and wheels/tracks off M1s so it takes something special to survive that. However, a lightly armoured LR shouldn't even have left the UK let alone been put in that theatre. Some of the stuff the UK brass did was criminal negligence IMO.

The yanks also had issues with their more bespoke Hummers with troops finding that they were ill equipped to handle some of the pain that got sent their way. I used to work with guys who served in both places and they said it was a heartbreaking/sobering sight to see US troops attaching extra metal (read - like BBQ Plates) onto their Hummers in an attempt to get more ballistic protection.

[blackrangie]

Is Snatch Vixen still a LR?Anyone?

[SBD4]

Anyone?
Looks like the Snatch was a Land Rover factory produced vehicle. The Vixen variant has upgraded chassis and drivetrain to cope with the additional armour/GVM. You'd have to assume that was also done at the factory.

You can see the the info at wikipedia:
Snatch Land Rover - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snatch_Land_Rover)

Interesting how it got the name "Snatch".

[Jenx]

Looks like the Snatch was a Land Rover factory produced vehicle. The Vixen variant has upgraded chassis and drivetrain to cope with the additional armour/GVM. You'd have to assume that was also done at the factory.

You can see the the info at wikipedia:
Snatch Land Rover - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snatch_Land_Rover)

Interesting how it got the name "Snatch".

In terms of the negative PR all that really mattered was that the press, and therefore the general public, called it a Land Rover. Was quite a big thing in the UK at the time.