Coches que no nacieron

  Pensaba abrir un tema nuevo, pero creo que este es el idoneo…

  Me encontre algunos diseños de la extinta MG-Rover, diseño que en lo personal pudieraon haber hecho mucho por la marca, en especial el reemplazo del 75 que recuerda en cierta forma al Chrysler 300C además de un CLS…

  Rediseño del 75 para el modelo 2006…

  Rover 75 ’06 facelift

When the 2004 facelift 75 staggered out of Longbridge in 2004, many people assumed that would be the final incarnation of Rover’s big saloon.

They were right, but had events not got in the way, there would have been another – and it wasn’t all about giving the car a fresh new look.

Words: Keith Adams Pictures: Lee Mitchell

It lives on: MGR’s secret Rover facelift

The farce that was the arrival of the 2004 facelifts of the Rover 25/MG ZR, 45/ZS and 75/ZT will probably haunt anyone who worked at MG Rover for years to come. If you don’t remember it, then cast your minds back – MGR fans were eagerly anticipating the arrival of the new cars, the company had been struggling to get them out, and after flogging away behind the scenes, managed to ready the cars for introduction. A date was set, embargoes were created, and fans with an appetite for the new were on tenterhooks… and then, three days before the official announcement, Rover’s own advertising in the London Evening Standard and Daily Mirror, revealed the new cars in their grainy monochrome glory. Oh dear.

The idea of freshening up these rapidly ageing cars was a sound one – and on the whole, the way they ended up looking was a step in the right direction. For the 75, the facelift was necessary, as it was still Longbridge’s star car, its prize possession, and although sales had been on the slide since the end of 2003, when the Phoenix 4 pension debacle went public, it was still very much a force within its sector of the UK market.

The 2004 front-end styling was controversial, though. The majority of models received a fairly low-key restyle, which played down the Rover’s heritage by shrinking the grille, and upping the plastic content. It might have looked sleeker, but few 75 fans preferred it. However, the 75 V8’s more imposing full-depth affair – although initially harder to stomach – was judged to be more successful and fitting of the marque.

But this facelift was always meant to be a halfway house to the more thorough re-engineering job being done on ther 75, which was due to bear fruit in 2006. The main thrust of the 2006 model was to see the replacement of BMW’s M47 turbodiesel in favour of Powertrain’s impressive G-Series engine, which had started out unpromisingly in testing, but which had emerged as a fitting common rail-fuelled replacement. There were to be many other improvements, too, but the external styling was to receive a much more thorough going over, as these images clearly show.

According to a couple of sources, this car was to also incorporate a 103mm stretch in the wheelbase to improve rear room as well as improve the already impressive chassis settings. New door pressings were being developed to meet this need, although according to Lee Mitchell, this was never in his design brief. What we do also know about this car is that a revised interior was being developed, and the dashboard had been previewed in the 2004 Rover 75 Coupe proposal. It was this car that became the basis of the Roewe 750.

The favoured proposal, and the one which was approved for production was what was known within the company as the ‘interim heavy 75 facelift for 2006’. Although it doesn’t look it in these renderings, Mitchell stated that the new car would have used new sheet metal from the A-pillar forward. He said: ‘It was scarily like the Jaguar XF, and this is going back six years ago before that car was even a sketch!’ Certainly, there’s a resemblance around the headlamps and in the grille shape that’s hard to ignore, and according to Lee, it was rendered to full-size in clay, and it looked a real step forward.

A more radical idea by Lee for this facelift (below) was sadly overlooked, but elements of this more muscular style would go into the early renderings for this car’s planned 2010 replacement…

[url url=http://img205.imageshack.us/i/r40facelift01.jpg/][img width=650 height=346]http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/6747/r40facelift01.jpg[/url]

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[url url=http://img220.imageshack.us/i/r40facelift02.jpg/][img width=650 height=303]http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/5955/r40facelift02.jpg[/url]

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[url url=http://img19.imageshack.us/i/r40facelift03.jpg/][img width=650 height=399]http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/6332/r40facelift03.jpg[/url]

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  Reemplazo del 75

  Rover 75 2010 replacement

MG Rover’s future plans were inextricably linked with its prospects of finding a joint venture partner.

And had it managed to seal a deal with the Chinese, then round about now, we would be seeing productionised versions of this car.

Words: Keith Adams Pictures: Lee Mitchell

The 2010 Rover 3500

Any thoughts that the design team at Longbridge lacked an understanding of Rover’s rich history should be reassured – and saddened – by these images. Reassured because this imposing looking saloon oozed Rover from its every pore, and had it made production in a form resembling these images, it would have advanced the marque’s prospects globally. As for being saddened, well, it’s not hard to visualise these cars coming to market about now, backed by Chinese investment and ambition, underpinned by British skill.

These are images of Lee Mitchell’s proposal for his facelifted Rover 75. As can be seen, Lee wanted to reinstate some of Rover’s cast iron solidity that were an integrated part of the Rover P5’s DNA – although ironically, he’s been influenced by the car that clearly took its styling cues from the ministerial Rover. ‘There were three chosen scale models,’ he said. ‘One was more of a tradionally styled replacement in the vein of then then current 75; another was a lot more Japanese looking, looking rather like a Lexus; and then there was mine.

‘I was influenced at that stage by the Chrysler 300C, and that American Idea of a hot gangster style sedan. However, the P6 was also very much in my mind as an influence on a modern Rover saloon. I felt the new vehicle should be sporty, unique and tough looking, something that would banish any lingering olde worlde image that Rover had at that time. I did not personally feel that another retro styled vehicle was the way forward.’

Obviously, these cars had no chance of reaching production without a joint venture partner, hence the desperate need to tie-up with Shanghai Automotive. Lee makes it clear that they only made it as far as the clay model stage, and going from the nomenclature on the registration plates, there probably wasn’t even an engine package in place. But one does wonder what might have been with the Anglo-Chinese tie-up, because looking at the speed SAIC has developed Roewe and MG from a near standing start, and with much UK input, it’s easy to imagine how the team might have faired from a running start…

[url url=http://img168.imageshack.us/i/r40replacement01.jpg/][img width=650 height=355]http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/9886/r40replacement01.jpg[/url]

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[url url=http://img517.imageshack.us/i/r40replacement03.jpg/][img width=650 height=520]http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/6980/r40replacement03.jpg[/url]

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[url url=http://img80.imageshack.us/i/r40replacement04.jpg/][img width=650 height=264]http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/6071/r40replacement04.jpg[/url]

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  Un CLS de Rover…

  2010 P7B

More intriguing are these images, which detail another of Lee’s 75 replacement proposals. There’s a mix of influences here, from the P5 (in the grille), through the Mercedes-Benz CLS (in the overall four-door coupe concept) to the 2006 75 facelift (in the headlamp treatment of the final proposal, below). They all have their good points, and it’s clear that there’s genuine potential for a Rover revival had these cars been built…

…or even maybe revived via the Rover marque’s current owner, Tata-controlled Jaguar-Land Rover. It’s good to dream.

But these are just dream images. Lee stated: ‘here are some sketches of some alternative 75 replacements that I proposed that were different in theme and style to the black ones (top). There is also an image of a flagship coupe that was talked about but never even got into scale models!’

[url url=http://img62.imageshack.us/i/r40replacement05.jpg/][img width=650 height=428]http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/3817/r40replacement05.jpg[/url]

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[url url=http://img191.imageshack.us/i/r40replacement06.jpg/][img width=650 height=388]http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/3800/r40replacement06.jpg[/url]

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  http://austin-rover.co.uk/

  Rover RDX60

[url url=http://img156.imageshack.us/i/rdx60story02.jpg/][img width=600 height=450]http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/4750/rdx60story02.jpg[/url]

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  Una especie de Toledo…

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[quote quote=»Kenny13″]
Los faros del RDX60 son de un Vectra o me lo parece a mí?
[/quote]

Y la silueta parece la de un Signum ….

[quote quote=»Kenny13″]
[quote quote=»Fiorano»]
[quote quote=»Kenny13″]
Los faros del RDX60 son de un Vectra o me lo parece a mí?
[/quote]

Y la silueta parece la de un Signum ….
[/quote]

Significa eso que el proyecto se lo quedó Opel?
[/quote]

Pues a tanto no llego, creo que el RDX fue desarrollado, como diseño, entre 2000 y 2004, mientras que el Signum concept fue presentado como tal en Ginebra del 97 y como serie en 2003, es decir, ya estaba perfilado el diseño del Opel, si es verdad que el RDX60 es del 2000.

Estas imágenes muestran que, al menos, se construyó un prototipo del RDX60.

[img width=430 height=269]http://cochesfuturistas.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/rover-rdx60.jpg
[img width=430 height=245]http://cochesfuturistas.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/rover-rdx60-2.jpg

El concept de Signum que tu dices debe ser este, que no tiene nada que ver con el proyecto de Rover:

Signum1
[img width=650 height=299]http://wikicars.org/images/en/3/32/Signum_1.jpg

Pero el Signum2 Concept sí que llevaba el morro del Rover RDX60 que vemos en este hilo, y ese concept se presentó en el Salón de Frankfurt en 2001:

Signum2
[img width=650 height=466]http://www.km77.com/marcas/opel/signum2/gra/4.jpg

Alfa 147
[img width=223 height=200]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/15017922

Alfa 33 3doors
[img width=640 height=248]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/15017916

Fiat Coupè
[img width=425 height=241]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/12966208[img width=425 height=241]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/12966215

[img width=425 height=584]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/12966225[img width=425 height=572]http://cardesignclub.7x.cz/image/12966229
*Cardesignclub

Jokejoe

que chulo el dorado.

Smart For4 based on old Fiat Punto

http://put.edidomus.it/auto/mondoauto/attualita/foto/250317_8250_big_smart-0061.jpg

http://put.edidomus.it/auto/mondoauto/attualita/foto/250317_2621_big_smart-005.jpg

Info:
http://www.quattroruote.it/auto_novita/articolo.cfm?codice=250317

Jokejoe

La trasera parece una tele o de las que salían en Los Supersónicos. 🙁

Cómo?? Y esa delantera asimétrica? Para qué sirve una de las luces del lado que tiene dos? es para las largas?

qué guapo ese R12 trifaro!

  Si el 12 era feo, este lo es aún más…

Es una broma?