(music) The Rover 75 is a car with an identity crisis. Is it the laid-back, easy listening, pipe
and slippers Rover 75, the hard-driving, death-metal, V8 monster that is the MG ZT, Or is it the
wannabe Chinese Bentley sold as the MG7? Personality disorder or not, why was a car
that received more investment than any Rover before it dropped like a hot brick by its
parent company barely twelve months after it was launched, while it was receiving glowing
reviews? This is the Rover 75 story! (music) For Rover, BMW’s purchase in 1994 was like
a gift from God. Instead of scrimping and scraping to get by
on a meagre budget, Rover suddenly found they had BMW’s open wallet to create the cars
they knew they could. BMW made it clear that they trusted Rover
and provided the money to make it happen. So, what should Rover work on first? As new Rover 200 & 400’s were about to be
launched, the cars they focused on were the Mini, Rover 600 & the ageing Rover 800. Both the 600 and 800 were deeply reliant on
Honda technology, something BMW were understandably keen to move away from. Rover kicked off three projects to replace
both cars. The first was called “Flagship”, which
in the great British tradition was comically nicknamed “Flashpig”. It would be an 800 replacement. “Eric” would be the new 800 coupé, with
“Core” replacing the 600. But soon Rover realised that not even BMW’s
deep pockets could finance three cars, so this was paired down to just the “Core”
project which was in hindsight awkwardly named “Isis”, not after the Islamic terror organisation
but after the Egyptian god. As for engines, Rover had a new V6 in the
works, the 2.0L and 2.5L KV6. The 1.8L K-series workhorse, and BMW’s 2.0L
diesel would round out the range. Rover created a rough design for the new car
that played up the retro modern styling that Rover thought would sell well. Rover shouldn’t just be a copy of BMW; they
needed their own identity. Both companies believed that Rover should
lean on their historic past, taking inspiration from cars like the Rover P5, something you
could argue they’d already been doing with the Rover 800 restyle. But the new car would turn retro up to the
max, like they were also doing already with the new Mini. So, a concept car was created along with clay
models, and these were green-lit with little to no alterations by management or BMW. The styling department loved the faith that
was placed in them. Rover was becoming a happier place to work. The “Isis” project was renamed again to
“RD1” and moved into development. With the styling retro yet modern, the interior
stylists got to work using styling cues from old Rovers. They were also looking to Jaguar, who’s
long-running XJ saloon had long been selling on walnut-veneered olde-worlde English charm. The Rover’s interior would make heavy use
of wood, and instead of veneer it would be solid wood that would be a part of the dashboard
structure. But maybe Rover was going a little overboard
with the retro theming, producing what some thought was an old-fashioned gentlemen’s
club on wheels. This was confirmed with the suspension that
was to be set up to be very soft and forgiving. Unshackled from Honda’s wishbone suspension,
Rover could finally choose their own setup. But they dithered on a choice, which let to
delays in the production date. BMW management eventually had to step in and
pick a solution for them – the Z-axle arrangement used on the then-current BMW 3-series. It was around this time cracks started to
show in the BMW / Rover relationship. BMW was getting concerned that Rover couldn’t
deliver an excellent vehicle on time. This soft, supple ride made Rover’s body
design an odd decision. They went out of their way to make the 75’s
body much stiffer than previous Rover cars to reduce body roll. This was a technique employed by BMW to great
effect with their driver-orientated cars. Confusingly Rover included a transmission
tunnel. This is normally used for rear-wheel drive
cars to hold the drivetrain, but the 75 was front-wheel drive! Rover insisted it was used to stiffen the
body, but surely there were cheaper ways to do it than this? It led to rumours the Rover was using a cast-off
BMW rear-wheel drive 5-series body. Although Rover had evaluated using the tooling
from an old BMW 5-series plant in South Africa, these had amounted to nothing. As the car got closer to release BMW and Rover
started quibbling over more and more things. BMW were insistent on getting the details
right, whereas Rover were less concerned and saw the changes as wasted money. But BMW’s attention to detail had stood
it in good stead in generating a reputation for bullet-proof cars. Rover had had years of cost-cutting and getting
out of that mindset would take it time. However, it would amount to delays in the
release and angst between the English and German teams. BMW pushed the Rover 75 unveil forward at
short notice, and although it went off well it created rumours in the press that the car
had been delayed because of quality issues, when there were no such problems. But all positive work Rover and BMW had done
to promote the car was torpedoed by the BMW CEO, Bernd Pischetsrieder. He was unhappy the British Government was
dragging their heels on funding for Longbridge renovation, and gave the press his full frustration. “Short-term actions are required for the
long-term future of the Rover Group,” he said. “Talks are taking place with the British
Government about the whole problem.”. Implying the new Rover 75 may not be around
much longer was the kiss of death even before the car had been launched! The words hit the Rover staff hard, and morale
sank. As one employee said, “The reaction inside
the company was simple, gobsmacked amazement, followed rapidly by panic.”. Bernd, a first cousin once removed from Mini
creator Sir Alec Issigonis, was instrumental in buying Rover in 1994, and helped kill the
deal in 1999. He wouldn’t see out the year as BMW CEO,
clearing the way for a swift change of heart about BMW’s investment in Rover. After the press had printed their “Rover
in crisis” stories, they reviewed the new car, giving it high marks. The quiet cabin and smooth suspension in particular
were praised. But fleet managers didn’t know what to do
with it. It was smaller than the
BMW 5-series and its competitors, but larger than cars in the 3-series category. This was intentional - it was after all a
replacement for both the Rover 600 and 800. Like it or not cars were grouped together
by size, and this odd-duck wasn’t easy to categorise. The Rover 75 style was “retro / modern”,
but to customers it came off as just old-fashioned. Rover wanted to establish a brand of traditional,
comfortable cars, like the Jaguar, but it came off as “pipe and slippers” boring. The British car buying public weren’t looking
for this. They were watching Top Gear, and aspirational
cars of this size were the BMW M5 and Audi RS6. Not a gentlemen’s club on wheels with squishy
suspension, harking back to cars they’d never even heard of. It’s easy to dismiss Rover’s “retro”
styling move as misguided, but it wasn’t an altogether bad idea. The company’s update of the Mini was proving that a retro styled car could be a runaway hit. Customer sales were hard to find, and soon
aerial photos of unsold cars reached the press. Rover tried to change tack by showing a prototype
of the Rover 75 Sport, a sort-of gentlemen’s club on wheels that sold Jaegerbombs, but
by now BMW’s patience with Rover was wearing thin. Rover continued to lose money, and the 75
hadn’t been the hit they’d hoped it would be. In May 2000 BMW sold Rover for the nominal,
but insulting price of just £10. And for that BMW agreed to GIVE the new holding
company Phoenix £500M to keep Rover ticking over. BMW kept the Mini brand which would go on
to great things. Phoenix, now renamed MG Rover – had to decide
how it would make the company profitable with the cars it had. But before all of that, BMW wanted the Cowley
factory where the Rover 75 was produced. Production was delayed while the line was
moved up to Longbridge, and to the credit of Rover it was done in record time. Production quality at Longbridge would be
end up being superior than the already high quality at Cowley. Although sales hadn’t met BMW’s expectations,
the 75 was now the jewel in MG Rover’s crown and was selling respectably. So as the estate version had already been
developed, it seemed natural to put this into production first. The car was launched in 2001 as the 75 Tourer. In 2002 a long-wheelbase version was sold,
producing a car more similar in length to the Rover 800. The next move was to go all-in on the faster
75 Sport concept. In fact MG Rover was trying to turn all of
its existing models into “hotter” versions. The 25 became the ZR, the 45 the ZS and the
MG F the MG TF. Suddenly the “pipe and slippers” Rover
75 had to become a BMW M5 competitor. The suspension was reworked to give a sporty
ride, the exterior was tweaked, and the interior was updated from its retro wooden styling
to something more mean and sporty. Oddly enough, despite the brakes being uprated
the engines weren’t any faster. These new models - the ZT and ZT-T - would
be released in 2003 and would be sold alongside the existing, more pedestrian Rover 75. To add more power, a Ford 4.6L V8 petrol model
was added, making the car rear-wheel drive for the first time. That overengineered transmission tunnel came
in handy after all! This beast of an engine, seen in the US in
the F-150 and many other cars, took the car from 0-60 in 6.2 seconds and on to 155mph. At the same time MG Rover looked to expand
sales into new countries like Mexico. In 2004 the cars got a light restyling to
make them look more “modern”. But the changes weren’t a hit with customers. MG Rover needed more funds to continue, so
reached out to the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation, or SAIC to create a joint venture. A tentative agreement was made for SAIC to
take a 70% stake in the company for a £1B investment. To showcase what could be produced with such
a deal, MG Rover released a Rover 75-based coupé design, but with no money left this
was little more than a fibreglass mock-up. The agreement wasn’t ratified by the Chinese
Government which left MG Rover with nowhere to go. All they got from SAIC was a licensing deal
to build Rover 25 and 75’s in China, but this wasn’t enough to save the company and
MG Rover went into administration in April 2005 with a loss of 6,000 jobs. The assets of the company were purchased by
Chinese Nanjing Automobile Group for £53M. So SAIC had the rights to create the 75, but
Nanjing had also bought the 75. What followed was a “75 face off” between
the two Chinese companies to see who could launch their car first. SAIC was out the gates first in 2006 with
their “Roewe 750” with the same 1.8L and 2.5L petrol engines from the 75. Nanjing’s “MG7” followed in 2007. So, two car companies sold essentially the
same car in China, probably confusing a lot of Chinese customers. Thankfully SAIC purchased Nanjing Automotive
in 2007, meaning the car was sold by only one company. Production continued until 2016 where it was
replaced with the Roewe i6. Between the UK and China, over 300,000 Rover
75’s were sold over 17 years, quite an achievement when the car was essentially hung out to dry
just after it was launched. Nanjing still owns the MG name and still sells
cars around the world with the MG badge on them. If you like these videos and want to get early
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75 in the comments below. Thanks for watching and see you in the next
video!
