The MGF - the No.1 UK roadster that suddenly disappeared!

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A roadster is all about fun. Sunny, carefree Sunday’s driving somewhere, anywhere, just for the sheer pleasure of driving. Cars like the MGB provided that fun, when you weren’t sitting at the side of the road trying to work out why it wouldn’t start. The MGF was an attempt to recreate that MG roadster passion with a mid-engined, nimble sports car. So why did the dream end after 10 years in production when the car was still the number one selling UK roadster? This is the MGF Story. (music) The last in a long line of mass-produced MG roadsters, the MGB and MG Midget, rolled off the production line at the Abingdon factory in Oxfordshire in 1980. Its death was the result of British Leyland’s empty coffers, and a driving desire to save its mass-market passenger car division at all costs, so anything that wasn’t mainstream had to go. British Leyland, always looking to use any advantage it could to help sell its new breed of 1980s motors, used the MG brand for sports models of their mainstream cars. Peugeot and VW got the GTI name, so the Austin Metro became the MG Metro, red seat belts and all. With the octagonal badge on the steering wheel, BL hoped the motoring public would warm to their warmed-up hatchbacks and saloons. But Austin Rover, as BL were now called, were still hopeful that success in the mass market could allow them to make a new MG. They teased a possible car at the 1985 Frankfurt Motor Show as the MG EX-E. Inspired by the Ferrari 308, the car was mid-engined using the 3.0L V6 6R4 engine from the rally-going Austin Metro. This wasn’t your father’s MGB, and it was intended to be a technological leap forward, showing that Austin Rover hadn’t forgotten how to make class-leading cars. The 2-seater had a drag factor of just 0.24, using a bonded aluminium body with plastic panels, producing a light but fast car. And a futuristic car needs a suitably futuristic digital dashboard. It featured a heads up display that changed to show only the most relevant information, which Austin Rover dubbed a “Reflex information monitor”. But would the EX-E go into production? Austin Rover’s marketing team at the show hinted it would see the light of day, but it was a forlorn hope. That aluminium frame and plastic body would be heinously expensive to produce, and with Austin Rover sales cratering with the failure of the Maestro and Montego, new money wasn’t going to be available for exotic sports cars any time soon. However, the EX-E’s 6R4 engine would eventually see the light of day in Jaguar’s XJ220. So, if the EX-E wasn’t going to be the next MG, what would? While the EX-E was being prepared for its big Motor Show debut, Austin Rover was designing the next Austin Metro, codenamed AR6. One variant was an open top that Austin Rover hoped to make the new MG Midget. But the £300M AR6 funding failed to appear, and this dream died. But work carried on in the background to try to find a compelling, but cost-effective way of making a new MG roadster. The Austin Rover development team built the front engined, front wheel drive MF F-16 prototype to give a sense of what a late 1980s MG might look like. Austin Rover was owned by the Government after BL went bankrupt in 1975 and the Government bailed them out. But in the 1980s the ruling Conservatives were privatising publicly held assets left, right and centre, and they were keen to be shot of a company that was still losing money. They made overtures to Ford, but the opposition Labour party got wind of the deal and forced the Government to back down. So, the Government wasn’t keen on investing more money, but anything that made Austin Rover look more attractive to a potential suitor was alright in their book. So, investing in high profile sporty prototypes like the F-16 might might be seen as a good strategy. By 1988 they’d found their suitor – British Aerospace, the defence contractor who’d themselves been privatised beginning in 1981. With this new ownership Rover, the new name for Austin Rover, were hopeful their new MG open top could be brought to market. But Rover’s new owner proved almost as miserly as their former owner, and funding was refused. What would make them change their mind was a modern reimagining of the classic MGB. The Mazda MX-5 was launched in 1989 and immediately took the world by storm. This was everything drivers had enjoyed from Triumph’s, Alfa Romeo Spider’s, and yes, even MG’s, but wasn’t plagued by dodgy electrics or a plethora of mechanical issues that 1960s and 70’s British sports car drivers just accepted as a matter of course. Companies that had inspired the MX-5 looked on and wondered what they could do. Rover of course had their F-16 up their sleeve, but they also investigated another prototype – the DR2. This was would be a more luxurious open top grand tourer that would be either MG or Austin-Healey branded, and would be firmly aimed at the US market. The prototype was built on a TVR chassis, with a TVR interior although that would of course be changed in the final version. However, this wasn’t approved, and Rover put development of the F-16 into high gear. The job to make the MGF a reality fell to the newly formed Rover Special Products team. This team worked on vehicles that weren’t part of Rover’s mainstream line of family hatchbacks and saloons, and as such they could be laser focused on a car that was purely an open top, rather than a car that was merely derived from an existing vehicle. The car project was known as “Phoenix Revival” signifying how MG and indeed Rover would rise from the ashes by finally making their own cars without help from Honda. Three directions were studied, all from outside companies. Each was given an F-16 body and design sketches from Steve Harper, who’d designed the Ford Escort RS Cosworth. This would ensure all the designs would be roughly in line with the size and style Rover was looking for. The first, PR1, was designed by a company called “Motor Panels”. It was front engined and front wheel drive and was based on the Maestro chassis but using a 2.0L M-series engine from the Rover 800. It was clearly a design looking to reuse as many Rover parts as possible to keep costs down. PR2 was an offering from Reliant and was based on the Scimitar chassis. The engine was up front, but it was rear wheel drive, using a 3.9L version of the Rover V8 engine that was used in the Triumph TR8 and Rover SD1. The last design, PR3 was created by ADC and was a mid-engine rear wheel drive design, attempting to make a car with ideal weight distribution and great handling. To pick the best of these three models, the Rover team drove each of them in turn to evaluate handling, acceleration and ride. Although each of them had their merits, the first to be discounted was PR1. It was based on the Maestro platform, and by 1991 it was clear the Maestro wasn’t long for this world so building a car around parts that soon wouldn’t be available, didn’t really seem to make a lot of sense. It was harder to decide between the 3.9L V8 PR2 and the mid-engined PR3, but in the end the superior handling of the PR3 won out. So, Rover’s future was set – the new MG would be their first production mid-engined car. Hoping to cash in on the resurgence in open tops, Rover introduced the MG RV8 in 1992. If you think it looks like an updated MGB, then you’re not far off! British Motor Heritage had restarted limited production of the MGB bodyshell. Rover still had a slew of old MGB parts sitting in a warehouse gathering dust. Could they use them to make new MGBs? The team responsible was given £5M to find out. The first choice they had to make was the engine. The old MGB had on occasion used the Rover 3.5L V8, so the new car would use the larger 3.9L version that had been tried in the PR2 prototype. New panels were built to give the car an updated shape and to make the wider tyres look like they fitted on the old body. The car launched at the International Motor Show in October 1992. Despite a limited slip diff, reviewers weren’t impressed. The car was quick, with a spirited 0-60 time of under 6 seconds, but with ancient leaf springs and drum brakes on the back, handling made it feel like the old technology that it was. And to pay back that £5M investment, the car wasn’t cheap. But it proved to be popular in Japan, and almost 80% of the nearly 2,000 cars produced went there, although over time many of them have been imported to the Australia or even back again to the UK. Meanwhile, Rover was focusing on MG’s future by refining the PR3 design. While the mid-engined, rear wheel drive layout might seem exotic and difficult to engineer for a company used to front engined, front wheel drive cars, it was actually simpler than making a front engined car, rear wheel drive. All they had to do was take the Rover Metro subframe, engine and transmission and move it to the rear of the car. It was an elegant solution, but one with drawbacks they’d only discover after the MGF had been released. The natural choice to power the MGF was the current wunderkind engine within Rover, the K-series which they’d used in several cars, from the Metro to the Rover 400. It was light, compact and powerful – just what they needed for their new nimble roadster. But it needed more power, so Rover took a page out of Honda’s book and added variable valve timing, giving more power at high revs and more torque at low revs. The engine would also be expanded to 1.8L, giving the car a lively 143hp. The next step was the car’s styling. Again, Rover had three outside firms compete to produce the best design. The brief was to make a car that was clearly an MG while showing some of the forward thinking from the EX-E prototype. The design from a company called MGA was chosen, and it clearly had influences from the recently released Lotus Elan S2. The front of the car wasn’t to Rover’s liking. It didn’t show the MG’s heritage, so it was handed off to Rover’s internal styling team who gave it some design cues from the 1975 MGB. The suspension setup was an odd choice. Where manufacturers were running away from hydropneumatic suspension that had its heyday in the 60s and 70s, Rover rolled out their old Hydragas system. It had its roots as the Hydrolastic system used by BMC’s Morris 1100 in 1963. Instead of regular springs and dampers, this system used a rubber spring with dampening being achieved by passing fluid through rubber valves. The front and rear units are connected, so a bump felt by the front wheel pumps fluid to help stabilise the rear of the car. Or at least that’s the theory. On early cars it didn’t give customers much more than they got on cars with regular suspension. It evolved into the Hydragas system in the mid-70’s that was first tried out on the Austin Allegro, and famously used by the Austin Metro. The system worked well and provided smooth but effective suspension. But in the early 1990s the only car using Hydragas, the Rover Metro was looking long in the tooth. With the biggest proponents of hydro pneumatic suspension, Citroën starting to turn their backs on it, why use it? Well the fact was the recently updated 1990 Rover Metro still got high marks for its suspension which showed there was life in the old system yet! Shorter cars can get unsettled easily with conventional suspension, and Rover found the Hydragas system worked well on the MGF. It was highly tuneable to ensure it felt good not only on the twisties but also on the supermarket shopping run. (music) The car was launched in 1995 as the MGF. Why did they use the letter “F”? Well the thinking was the MGA, B and C had already been in production. The MGD was an abortive replacement in the late 1960’s, and the MG-E had been the 1984 EX-E prototype. It was the first all-new roadster from Rover since the Triumph TR7 20 years earlier, and the first all-new MG since the 1962 MGB! It was a hit with journalists, who loved the stunning looks and good handling. Autocar called it “the most complete and affordable open two-seater”. The interior parts were mostly taken from the new Rover 200, like switchgear and the steering wheel, but in the MGF it worked perfectly. Like Toyota’s MR-2 reboot in 1999, it wasn’t the largest car in the world. You’d have problems fitting into it if you were over 6’, it had a boot that would have problems getting a suitcase home from the airport, and the front only had room for a spare tyre and the battery. But let’s face it, it’s a roadster. If you were expecting bags of room then you’re looking at the wrong car! The public loved the MGF, and it was soon seen the length and breadth of the UK. To get a bit of publicity for the new car, Rover took it to the Bonneville salt flats in Utah as the EXF. The 1.4L K-Series engine managed a top speed of 217mph in 1997. Unlike many Rover cars of this period, this one didn’t share any components with partner Honda. And that was useful, as by the time the MGF had launched in 1995, Honda had exited stage left to be replaced by new partner BMW. The new owners would nix any plans Rover had for exporting the MGF to North America, as they worried the car would threaten sales of their Z3. They also took a dim view of making the car more powerful. Prototypes such as the 200hp SuperSports in 1998 and 2000 were shown publicly, but none were put into production. Contrast this to Volkswagen’s takeover of Škoda, where VW were happy to encourage Škoda sales anywhere in the world as a Škoda sale was a VW group sale. They even improved cars they inherited such as the Favorit, with VW components. British Leyland and Austin Rover had been synonymous with build quality issues, but by the late 1980’s these issues seemed to be behind it, using Honda bodies and components. The MGF was all Rover, and it was their first chance to show they’d finally shaken that build quality monkey off their back. But that monkey was still firmly attached. There were body panel gaps that shouldn’t be there on 1990s cars, but the main problem came with the engine. The K-series was generally a reliable beast, but only when it had enough airflow. Rover hadn’t done enough testing to realise their mid-engine layout didn’t work well for this engine, or more specifically the positioning of the engine’s thermostat. This led to head gasket failure amongst other problems. The MGB just about got away with dodgy reliability in the 1960s, but this wouldn’t cut it in the 1990s. The UK JD Power report put the MGF in the bottom 20 of the 120 cars it surveyed. The car got a mid-cycle spruce up in 1999. The interior was updated, with an alum key design around the gearstick, speakers and fuel filler that looked suspiciously like the Audi TT design from a year earlier. The BMW Rover marriage was annulled in 2000, leaving Rover to go it alone. But they were now finally able to give the MGF a little more power. This came in 2001 with the Trophy 160, with 160hp and a 6.9s 0-60 time. The car also got an automatic gearbox for the first time. In 2002 MG Rover as the new company was known, produced a refresh of the car as the MG TF. The TF badge came from the 1953 T-Type variant, again trading on MG’s history. Outwardly the car’s styling had been updated, and power on the entry level engine got a mild boost, but the suspension was the biggest change. MG Rover had had a change of heart and had fitted conventional suspension instead of the clever Hydragas setup, maybe because the only other car using it, the Rover Metro had ended production. However, reviewers were happy with the new setup, and with a stiffer car it handled better than ever. Had conventional suspension improved over the past 7 years, or was the Hydragas suspension the wrong move in the first place? The company celebrated the milestone of producing 1.5M MGs in 2002 with a special gold version that also commemorated the Queen’s 50th jubilee. A blue and silver MGB GT had been made for the Queen’s silver jubilee in 1977. The company tried a hybrid performance version in 2003 as the MG TF 200 HPD. As the name suggested the car produced almost 200hp. Drag was reduced, and a generator was attached to the 1.8L engine to charge a battery pack that would drive the front wheels. It was claimed the 0-60 time was reduced from 6.9s to under 6 seconds. This ended up little more than a design exercise and didn’t go into production. Another special edition appeared in 2004 marking the 80th anniversary of MG. Rover MG were trying to find more and more creative ways of shifting their cars to stay in business, like slapping the MG badge on every car in their range like they had in the 1980s. But the MG TF was a bright spot on MG Rover’s balance sheet as it was the top selling UK roadster. The independent MG Rover tried to make a go of it, but they weren’t selling enough of their aging cars and couldn’t do a deal with another car company to stay afloat. The receivers arrived in 2005 and MG TF production ended. MG Rover’s assets were purchased by Nanjing Automobile in China who restarted production of MG TF components in China in 2007. Before we get to what happened to the MGF in China, here’s a quick review from TopCars TV on how the MGF compares to other cut price mid-engined roadsters. And don’t forget to subscribe to the channel if you like it. The MGF was the first mid-engined car from MG, but the idea of an affordable car with an engine that vibrates the back of your seat isn’t anything new! There were loads of little blue-collar Ferraris dating way back to the Porsche 914, that was half Porsche, half Volkswagen and all soulless thanks to its dry design. More interesting is the Fiat X1/9 from around the same time that was a passionate little lady killer who owed its good looks to Bertone, the same guy who actually styled the Countach. But as with any Italian car it was breaking down, constantly! Maybe the smarter choice then is the Toyota MR2. Simple, honest and bullet-proof! And if we’re talking about the second generation car, insanely fast too. On a drag strip it would beat the NSX, Supra and even the Ferrari 348! But the closely rival to the MGF has to be the car that brought it to life, Mazda’s MX-5. The best-selling sports car of all time which also happens to be mid-engined. It may have the engine up front, but as long as it’s inbetween the axles it counts. Then there’s a four-seater mid-engine, another with 500hp, and other mid-engined cars made for the masses. Links in the description! Nanjing Automobile had hopes they could sell existing MG Rover cars in the UK, China and around the world. Knock-down kits arrived from China to MG Rover’s old Longbridge factory in Birmingham for final assembly, a reversal of the British motor industries hey day when they would ship knock-down kits around the world. The first roadster would be the MG TF LE500, as the name suggested a limited edition run of just 500, but the car was little changed from the 2005 car. They also had plans to sell the car in the USA in a new coupé guise that had been designed in the dying days of MG Rover, as an homage to the MGB GT. Work began on a factory in Ardmore, Oklahoma in 2007 and production would begin by 2008. However, the American backers could never agree on the details and the deal fell through. Not even a desperate 85th anniversary model in 2009 could boost sales. I mean who celebrates an 85th anniversary? With the 2009 global recession production was suspended at Longbridge once again. The car could never compete with newer, cheaper and quite frankly better cars like the MX-5, and it could no longer get a sales boost by claiming to be an entirely British sports car. Production ended for good in 2011 after almost 120,000 MGF and MG TF sales with the official replacement being the 5-door MG6 fastback that wasn’t fooling anyone it was in any way a suitable replacement. Austin Rover started the MGF project as a way to continue the tradition of the MG roadster. The MG name today is synonymous with cheap Chinese econoboxes. But Nanjing Automobile is growing and maybe one day will return with something truly worthy of the MG name. The MGF was, and still is a fun roadster that puts a smile on your face. And at the end of the day, isn’t that all you want from a roadster? A big thank you to all my Patrons for supporting me as always! To get early advert free access to new videos, or to appear in the credits, please consider supporting me using the Patreon link below from just $1 or 80p a month and hit that subscribe button to get notified of new videos. Thanks for watching and see you in the next video!
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Channel: Big Car
Views: 437,398
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Keywords: mgf, mg mgf, mg mgf story, mgf story
Id: VjjGF_AsLnM
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Length: 23min 41sec (1421 seconds)
Published: Sat May 30 2020
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