30 YEARS OF RANGE ROVER 1970-2000
The New Range Rover
Today's Range Rover started life as a project at the end of the 1980s. The brief for the engineers working on the Range Rover replacement was a tough one - it was to have all the off-road ability of the existing model, a much more car-like behaviour on the road, and better build quality.
The design team, drawn from both the car and Land Rover sides of the Rover Group, succeeded brilliantly and the new Range Rover was launched in September 1994, and since then its annual average sales have consistently outstripped the old Range Rover at its peak. Today, six years after its introduction, it remains unquestionably the most desirable luxury sport-utility vehicle on the planet. Key features of the current Range Rover include its sophisticated Body Electronic Control Module (BeCM), which monitors all major vehicle systems and can display visual messages to warn the driver of such things as low washer fluid level or a tailgate which has not been fully closed. Height-adjustable Electronic Air Suspension, now further developed from the system introduced in the earlier Range Rover, is a standard feature across the range. Ratio selection in the transfer gearbox is electronically controlled, and automatic models have a unique H-gate selector to simplify driver control both on and off the road. To the four-channel ABS system is added an Electronic Traction Control which distributes torque to the wheel or wheels with most grip if there is a loss of traction. Full-size driver's and passenger's airbags have been standard from the beginning, and are now supplemented by Thorax bags concealed in the sides of the front seats.
In 1994 the Second-Generation Range Rover was launched
As before, the Range Rover's core power units are developments of Land Rover's legendary V8 engine. Both the 4.0-litre and the 4.6-litre are fitted with exhaust catalysts as standard, and since 1999 they have incorporated a new Thor inlet manifold and Bosch management system to improve driveability even further. The flagship 4.6-litre V8 models, however, come exclusively with an uprated four-speed automatic gearbox.
30 YEARS OF RANGE ROVER 1970-2000
