You have got to admit that compared to a few years ago MG are making much better cars that appear to be more reliable and seem to be aimed at a broader market.
It is still a British name so in my books I hope it gets stronger and better and then we won't have to buy German or Japanese cars but we can all drive around in an MG knowing it's reliable and well built and feeling proud to be British.
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Curious that in user satisfaction surveys Rover/MG do rather well with the exception of the MGF sports car, and the 200 and 400 series, adn even those are by no means bottom. In fact many of their range do rather better than Audi, BMW, Mercedes, Volkswagon and ... oh you finish the list, I'm bored.
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Sean, there are some wacking huge big gaps in your knowledge.
It is very easy to overlook that MG Rover has a £2bn turnover and directly and indirectly employs 100,000 people around the country.
You overlooked project R8 which produced several big sellers in he 1980s to start with.
To be as objective as possible, Rover had been denied serious investment for as long as 20 years before Honda stepped in.
Mainly down to a timid board of directors not facing up to the Jaguar board of the early 1970s BMC days. If you look up project like P8 and P9 Rover would have had a devestating line up of cars that would have carried them throughout the 1970s, a sports saloon (P6), SD1 was on its way, a sports car (P6BS), a big merc-eater (P8) and a big coupe (P9) not to mention inventing the leisure 4x4, the Range Rover. And not forgetting a motoring legend, the Buick/Rover V8 that was going to power them all.
Incidentally, Rover did not design the Metro at all, nothing to do with it other than facelift it got during its ownership of the Austin brand.
Rover has done well even to survive the 1980s, it was mainly down to the expertise of being able to make cars on a shoestring budget. Honda's mechanical expertise helped greatly and also the licensing deals (although restrictive) gave Rover access to modern chassis and floorpans to build cars like Project R8. R8 spawned the original 200 which was a big seller for the company.
BMW for all its faults did pour in around £2.5bn into Rover and updated most of Longbridge with state-of-the-art plant and facilities. Longbridge now is an very advanced car plant and capable at full capacity of producing 450,000 cars.
Will they survive? Well the 75 sells very well, the MG tuned versions are also doing well. However, Rover need to get Project RDX60 out as soon as it can based on the TCV concept to replace the 45. Financially they aren't in bad shape, very little debt, low inventory costs and they a positive cash flow at present but really need to make a profit soon. The 45 sales are in decline, you can't hide the 2nd Gen Civic platform for much longer, plus they have to pay royalties to Honda on every 25 and 45 sold.
They do have some very exciting cars on the drawing board, TCV has winner written all over it and it looks as if they will repeat the R8 formula of making several different body shapes to appeal to a wider market. Some of the leaked spy shots do look encouraging. Project X70/71 offers a medium sized sports car under the MG brand that offers a Bhp/tonne in excess of 220 which would put it in Audi TT territory.
They need the 45 replacement out before the end of 2004 and it must be a winner otherwise it could get very difficult indeed for them.
I hope they do suceed, I come from the area they are made and my family and their friends all have ties with Rover, no-one in the West Midlands doesn't know anybody with ties to the company.
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I\'m all for patriotism and keeping folks at home in a job. When I spend my own money buying an expensive purchase, I want a quality product. In no way would that be an MG Rover
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If this thread degenerates like the previous Rover thread did, it will be pulled rather than edited.
Continue your discussion by all means, but do it in a civilised manner rather than arguing. Thankyou.
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Dynamic Dave
Back Room Moderator
mailto:dave_moderator@honestjohn.co.uk
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Fantastic insight 3500S, I'm with you on this one, I have to say I have driven a number of makes of cars over the years, and I have always been impressed with Rovers, including both the old 200/400 and newer civic floor plan 400. I like the 75, would I have one, yes I would. An interesting point about the steel though, I have heard this mentioned before on the Parkers forum, if it is true, then we will have to wait and see, time will tell if there are any quality issues, mind you, it would mean that I can pick up a nice 75 quite cheaply:-) Every cloud and all that. I guess I'm a Rover fan, and very much hope that they survive and go from strength to strength.
Anyone interested in the history of Rover, see the link posted below, as was posted on this superb site before.
austinrover.mg-rover.org/
Oh and by the way, Nice one dave.
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As far as I'm aware it is Swindon Pressings that supply the pressed steel for the Rover 75. To my knowledge it is still a BMW owned subsidary supplying the pressed parts for the Mini and also Ford's Land Rover.
MG Rover has no say in Swindon's suppliers other than they use Corus automotive steel. This is heavy guage zinc coated and for some components, high strength lower gauge steel alloys. This is sent by train to Longbridge where it is secondary primed and painted. The process is industry leading, not only do they electropaint four coats of primer including a second zinc phosphate coat over the zinc treated steel but also anti corrosion primers and a key primer for the final paint. The final colour coats are applied to a thickness of 40 microns per coat and several coats are applied. Finally a 500 micron PVC/UV underseal is applied to the underside of the car.
As for the welding, the 75/ZT production line has 170 ABB welding robots, each reporting back on the quality of every single spot weld of which there around 6000 for each 75 and 7000 for the estate version running on the same line.
It is no coincidence that the 75/ZT production line has more ISO 9000 accreditations than you can shake a stick at and it was the first car company to be awarded them in the UK.
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As for engines, look up the low pressure casting technique for the Rover K. It's patented by Rover and uses an industrial method of casting used by Formula 1 engine manufacturers because of the excellent cast tolerances it offers.
Incidentally it is licensed to Aston Martin and Jaguar for their engines as well as a host of others.
MG Rover cars are really improving in quality, it isn't by accident and it's not done by cutting corners on rumours of cheap steel.
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Having commented on the 75 thread about posts getting personal can I say that this is fascinating, end to end stuff.
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I always thought Rover acting as Honda's junior partner in the UK was a solution that worked very well in the early 90s. They got access to contemporary platforms, plus engineering expertise with industry-leading reliability that just didn't exist in-house. In the case of the 600, a few clever styling retouches instantly made the car more upmarket and interesting looking than the equivalent Accord; it could thus be sold profitably for more dosh with less standard equipment.
It's a pity that Honda never had a decent supermini for Rover to plagiarise - it could really have helped maintain their UK market share in an important sector as Metro sales dwindled.
Anyway, that partnership is dead and the mooted one with Tata looks potentially seriously misguided to me; if the Indica is really so basic and uncompetitive that MGR are unwilling to debase their brand name by sticking their badge on it, what's the point frankly? They desperately need a mass-market contender, not a niche product.
I would love MGR to survive and prosper as a volume producer, but I just don't see where the investment is coming from. Clever though the MG Z-cars are, the 25 and 45 are already ancient, and the 75 will start to be described as dated within a couple of years. Tie-ups with fifth-rate third world manufacturers are not the answer, at least not in the affluent West, where the market is brutally competitive and product cycles are getting ever shorter.
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Nobody's knows what the Indica will be called or what it will retail at but component suppliers that will be supplying the interior components will be different to those that supply TATA version. Chances are that this will be exported for inclusion and then the finished car re-imported.
The Pune factory is regarded as a state of the art facility by the automotive press.
I have my own reservations as well, the suspension set up, engine performance and interior will need to be several grades higher than the current Indian version.
However, there is one thing TATA has that MG Rover needs, fresh designs. TATA have spent a small fortune on chassis and floorpans for a new range of cars and a host of concept cars. If a technology transfer becomes possible it may be just what MG Rover needs. TATA have expressed an interest in engines, MGR have plenty of capacity to manufacture those for TATA under license.
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I'd heard the plan was to price it around £6k - bang in the bargain-box sector alongside Perodua, the Kia Rio and base Saxos - and possibly badge it "Standard". In other words, tart it up a bit, accept that it can never compete with Fiestas, Polos and Corsas, and avoid negative brand associations. Not good.
I would have thought that there was a limited amount MGR could do as far as re-engineering was concerned. Would the budget stretch beyond cosmetic tweaks to encompass the transplant of the existing K-series units, let alone tooling-up for a new fascia and other interior trim? Seems doubtful.
I hadn't heard about the possible engine supply deal, but that does sound much more promising from MGR's point of view. As far as the Indica is concerned, it's a pity that they can't simply license the basic platform and base their own clean-sheet design on it. Time & money being the issues I would guess.
Even better - though presumably not feasible - would be basing a Golf-sized car on a chopped-down 75 floorpan.
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Even better - though presumably not feasible - would be basing a Golf-sized car on a chopped-down 75 floorpan.
That is pretty much what RD60 is - the replacement for the 45, coming somewhere around the end of next year. They've been hurt by the collapse of TWR, as the engineering group was in the middle of productionising the car, otherwise it should have been on sale sooner.
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It's good to see that MG Rover are improving quality standards. I've always felt that Rovers have been underrated, mainly because of image, and I see the new MG range as a positive step to widen their market. I know some people see the colours and bodykit as a bit "Max Power", but I definitely think they widen the appeal of the cars, especially when they get such good reviews for driving and handling in the motoring press. To be honest, I think they all look really good - I think this impression some people have of "plastic stick-on rubbish" has come about because lots of the cars are bright yellow! The darker colours look a lot more sophisticated, and help the 25 especially to look a lot more modern than it actually is.
At the end of the day, what's wrong with a bit of blind patriotism when it comes to buying cars? The french have been buying their own rubbish for years, with the result that they now have three distinct marques all doing very well, and producing good cars. I really hope that MG Rover are successful, and manage to shake off the reputation that people like Sean will not let them escape from.
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Or should that be hear hear!
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Presumably the big increase in the quality of Rover cars has been due to investment by BMW.
I think this impression some people have of "plastic stick-on rubbish" has come about because lots of the cars are bright yellow!
I thought this too. But on the way home today I passed a Rover garage and there was a dark metallic Red MG ZT out front. Apart from the rear spoiler, that looked superfluous, the styling was really rather appealing and quite impressive: I was surprised. I suspect Rover suffer a bit from past hostiry.
The Rover MGZT was better much looking than the souped up Ford Escort syling of a BMW 3 series. (Ooops. Better run ...)
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I read on one of the rover sites, I think it may have been rover torque, that a lot of Rover dealerships are either dumping Rover for another make, or sharing the showrooms and reducing floor space to Rovers, which isnt going to help bolster sales.
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The French have been buying their own rubbish for years...LOL.
What I don't like about MG is the constant re-branding that takes place because it's cheaper than Resarch and Development. Namely...
Metro starts Austin, Rover and then MG. A terrible car, especially in a crash.
Rover 25, 45 and 75 rebranded as MG ZT, OTT and RIP
Tata/Rover tie in is not to be called Rover/MG because it would 'devalue the brand'
I've read through the thread and accept that plenty of this is out of necessity, but it's trying to pull the wool over customers eyes.
If a product is decent, you'll notice that car manufacturers stick with it's name, like the Golf. If it's not, the name goes, like the Z3 and a new product is launched.
With MG, it's 'Tell Longbridge to crack open the new badges, we've been found out again'.
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If this thread degenerates like the previous Rover thread did, it will be pulled rather than edited.
Final warning If I have to edit one more post in this thread then it gets pulled, which would be a shame as there is a lot of technical input that has been put into this thread.
So, for the very last time of asking:-
NO LIBEL COMMENTS & NO ARGUING.
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Dynamic Dave
Back Room Moderator
mailto:dave_moderator@honestjohn.co.uk
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