NB MG R.I.P

[jfm]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Um, not sure Skoda have conquered the hill yet. Skoda is still very much a non premium brand. Not commenting at all on engineering, just the brand and image.

 

[britemp]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

You're right, they're not a premium brand but I think VAG have always intended them to be their budget brand. Even so they have gone from laughing stock to respected in a short time. With some decent funding and support, Rovers job should be easier.

 

[[2068]]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Last time around I did look at an MG ZT190 and loved the sound of the V6, the performance, and the looks, only problem that being 6'3", I couldn't get really comfy in the car. More normal sized people should be fine.

Ended up with a Volvo S60 2.0T. (A Jag X-Type came second, mainly because I couldn't afford the engine I wanted).

dv.

 

[Lakesailor]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

[ QUOTE ]
You're right, they're not a premium brand but I think VAG have always intended them to be their budget brand. Even so they have gone from laughing stock to respected in a short time. With some decent funding and support, Rovers job should be easier.

[/ QUOTE ]
So the answer would be for some company with well-regarded and well-engineered products to buy Rover.
Why hasn't that been thought of before?

 

[Planty]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

LakeSailor if I pick up on the irony correctly, what you say has actually not happened before if you elude to the BMW debacle. It nearly did with Honda but certainly not with BMW.

For me the truth has never been given about why Honda who were investing heavily in Rover, (Accord /214, Swindon factory etc.) were told virtually overnight that Rover had been sold to BMW. Indeed I believe this soured relations for Anglo Japanese commercial relationships for a good while. However BMW only ever came in for an asset strip, what did they get? 4x4 technology as Landrover was still there then, now in X5, total New Mini design, engine plant, production facility all financed by Rover.

Don't get me wrong I bought Rovers, MG's Austin, Triumphs for years and indeed it was a Discovery that was the last straw a year ago, so I have experienced the good and the bad, and as a brummie do understand taht sometimes the workers have acted ridiculously in the distant past. But with the right management, and investment my feeling is the designers, production could get a product to market that would rival their competitirs. Who are now in truth, SEAT, Ford, Opel, Fiat all IMHO of course. Paul

 

[oldgit]

the reason the toyota is used in the US is emmisions.

 

[oldgit]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Now that really would be telling. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

 

[NorthernWave]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Wonder were MGR would be now if they still had the Mini? The costs of developing the mini may have been a nail in the cofin for MGR as they obviously didn't see the money for the sales.

Chris

 

[britemp]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Hmmmm. . . . . just as I thought - is it the 1275 or 1500 Allegro you have? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[britemp]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Nearly - it needs a company that is well-regarded with well-engineered products to buy Rover, who also have the faintest understanding of the brands and market sector of Rover. BMW had the first bit but were clueless on the second!

 

[Lakesailor]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Oh, I was going back as far as BLMC.
Now they appear to have sold intelectual property to the Chinese with no deal on the table. These people are supposed to be professional business managers?

 

[Planty]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Couldn't agree more, Chinese seem to have played cards well when faced with desperate and possibly "wanting" management. Lets see what happens, hope it all ends well as our local economy will be seriously afffected, if it ain't already.

 

[TrueBlue]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Firstly, I want to weep for all those good souls in the West Midlands who will lose their jobs - to a large extent undeservedly, but given the inexorable decline of the wholly British motor industry, the writing has been on the wall for some time. There have been so many attempts of rescue over my lifetime, but they all missed the essential points, those of investment and innovation. Instead the managements concentrated on "sectarianism".

For example Triumph had a winner in its Stag - but rather than fitting the Rover's V8 engine (which in retrospect has powered many UK cars for for 40+ years), they took the incredible decision to bolt two indifferent Triumph V4's together....

Result an ordurous engine. It killed the car.

And so on and so forth.


Much of what little remains of what used to be Great British industry is desperately undercapitalised, using equipment which should have been retired in the 1930's. I'm shortly going to watch tonight's episode in the late lamented Fred Dibna's peregrinations in his lovely traction engine. Doubtless he will show some dedicated folk wresting magnificent precision out of some nineteenth century equipment. All credit to the craftsmen - but you can't do mass production on that basis.

I have seen (some at first hand) Company Doctors in my time. They are hailed as the saviours of the target companies.

But all they do is strip out all the saleable assets. Mr. Towers and his cohorts (were they as many as a cohort??) have done precisely that. To be fair he (they) could not have done much else.

What is wanted is a massive injection of resources - and we have none left. Our design initiatives have been emasculated, our Universities are dumping engineering courses like there's no tomorrow,

We've lost it, there's nothing left.

Doom, Doom, Doom

 

[penfold]

Re:Will this company please lie down.

Dons parallel universe hat....

The Lotus Elite should have been sold with MGA(B series) power for those who found Coventry Climax fire pumps too temperamental. Would have made it a lot cheaper an' all, just like TReVor's cars.....

And in a parallel universe Mr. Chapman would have used a Rover V8 in the DMC12, rather than that flabby garlic burning Douvrin V6. This of course would have been amazingly sensible as it would actually have gone round corners, not being burdened with an enormous excess of weight in its arse.

The Trumpet V8 was a masterpiece of production engineering, it's just they only had tuppence to pay for the development; consequently it suffered from being (badly)assembled and maintained by prehensile troglodites more used to cast iron straight sixes. All insults involving the words 'Bacofoil' and 'chocolate' have been patented, and unauthorised use will be pursued by venal money grubbing lawyers.

I seem to remember reading that BLMC internal politics decided that the trumpet V8, which was originally intended to go into the 2000/2.5PI saloon and estate, would only go into the Stag, as a 2000 with a V8 would be to much of a competitor of the Jag XJ6 and/or Rover 3500. So, only needing ~10,000 Trumpet V8s per annum rather than 50,000+, Triumph weren't allowed to spend money getting it right. The rest is history, as they say.....

Who in BLMC thought at that time that it was a good idea to have the XJ6, Rover P6 & P5, Truimph 2000, Wolseley Six and Austin 3litre all pitching for the same market, the senior executive/company director, and all made by the same company?????? ditto in most other market sectors.

The whole BLMC amalgamation thing was a bizarre accident waiting to happen; politicians trying to use industry as a means of employment rather than wealth creation, rubbish management and bonkers trade unionists dreaming of a socialist workers paradise combining in one enormous industrial and social trainwreck, of which the final piece of debris appears to be about to land in Longbridge Brummieland.

Ah, what might have been......all that wasted engineering talent and ideas.....
RIP Rover BS coupe.

Er, rant over, I think....unless MGR get themselves a fairy godmother.

Cheers,
David