Land Rovers

Series I, Series II, Series III, Ninety & One Ten Defender, Lightweight, Land Rover Discovery, Freelander, Forward Control

 

Land Rover 101 Forward Control


Land Rover 101 Forward ControlThe vehicle was primarily produced to meet the Army's requirement for a gun tractor, and was designed to tow a field gun (the L118 Light Gun) with a ton of ammunition and other equipment in the rear load space, giving it the alternative name of the Land Rover One Tonne. The vehicle was designed to be easily transported by air; the positioning of the 3.5 litre Rover V8 engine beneath and to the rear of the cab eliminating the bonnet at the front, making the vehicle more or less cuboid, eliminating unused space in transport aircraft.

The official name of 101 Forward Control is derived from the vehicle's 101-inch (2,565 mm) wheelbase, and the position of the driver, above and slightly in front of the front wheels which used a fairly large 9.00 inch × 16 inch tyre. To cope with the extra height above the ground, the wheels feature an unusual feature for a Land Rover (but used for many years on the much older and similar Mercedes Unimog S404); a flange around the centre of the wheel has an embossed tread pattern to allow the crew to use it as a step to enter the cab, otherwise known as a wheel-step.

Development of the 101FC started in 1967, with a design team lead by Norman Busby (14 October 1931 – 30 June 2005). Production took place between 1972 and 1978. As is common practice in the armed forces, many vehicles were not used for some years and it is not unheard of for military vehicle enthusiasts to pick up these vehicles after only a few thousand miles service. All the vehicles produced at the Land Rover factory at Lode Lane, Solihull were soft top ("rag top") General Service (GS) gun tractors, although later on many were rebuilt with hard-top ambulance bodies and as radio communication trucks. A rare variant is the electronic warfare Vampire body. It is thought that only 21 of these were produced and less than half of these survive today with one being rumoured to have been destroyed in the Buncefield Oil Terminal Fire.

The 101FC was manufactured in both left and right hand drive with either 12 or 24 volt electrical systems.

Some Land Rover 101s were produced with a PTO powered Nokken capstan winch mounted on the chassis at the centre of the vehicle, allowing winching from either the front or rear. Another variation on a small number of pre-production vehicles was the addition of a trailer with an axle driven from the PTO, creating a 6x6 vehicle, this adaptation was abandoned before full production when it was discovered that the trailer had a propensity to push the vehicle onto its side when driven over rough terrain.

 

Land Rover TimeLine

* 1948: Land Rover is designed by the Wilks Brothers and is manufactured by the Rover Car Company
* 1958: Series II launched
* 1961: Series IIA began production
* 1967: Rover becomes part of Leyland Motors Ltd, later British Leyland (BL) as Rover Triumph.
* 1970: Introduction of the Range Rover
* 1971: Series III launched.
* 1975: BL collapses and is nationalised, publication of the Ryder Report recommends that Land Rover be split from Rover and be treated as a separate company within BL and becomes part of the new commercial vehicle division called the Land Rover Leyland Group
* 1976: One millionth Land Rover leaves the production line.
* 1978: Land Rover Limited formed as a separate subsidiary of British Leyland[14]
* 1980: Rover car production ends at Solihull with the transfer of SD1 production to Cowley, Oxford; Solihull is now exclusively for Land Rover manufacture. 5-door Range Rover introduced.
* 1983: Land Rover 90 (Ninety)/110 (One-Ten)/127 (renamed Defender in 1990) introduced.
* 1986: BL plc becomes Rover Group plc; Project Llama started.
* 1988: Rover Group is privatised and becomes part of British Aerospace, and is now known simply as Rover.
* 1987: Range Rover is introduced to the U.S market March 16.
* 1989: Introduction of the Discovery
* 1994: Rover Group is taken over by BMW. Introduction of second-generation Range Rover. (The original Range Rover was continued under the name 'Range Rover Classic' until 1995)
* 1997: Land Rover introduces the Special Edition Discovery XD with AA Yellow paint, subdued wheels, SD type roof racks, and a few other off-road upgrades directly from the factory. Produced only for the North American market, the Special Vehicles Division of Land Rover created only 250 of these bright yellow SUV's. Official formation of the Camel Trophy Owners Club by co-founders Neill Browne, Pantelis Giamarellos and Peter Sweetser.
* 1997: Introduction of the Freelander
* 1998: Introduction of the second generation of Discovery
* 2000: BMW breaks up the Rover Group and sells Land Rover to Ford for £1.8 billion
* 2002: Introduction of third-generation Range Rover
* 2005: Land Rover 'founder' Rover, collapses under the ownership of MG Rover Group.
* 2004: Introduction of the third-generation Discovery/LR3
* 2005: Introduction of Range Rover Sport
* 2005: Adoption of the Jaguar AJ-V8 engine to replace the BMW M62 V8 in the Range Rover
* 2006: Announcement of a new 2.4 litre diesel engine, 6-speed gearbox, dash and forward facing rear seats for Defender. Introduction of second generation of Freelander (Freelander 2). Ford acquires the Rover trademark from BMW, who previously licensed its use to MG Rover Group.
* 8 May 2007: 4,000,000th Land Rover rolls off the production line, a Discovery 3 (LR3), donated to The Born Free Foundation.
* 12 June 2007: Announcement from the Ford Motor Company that it plans to sell Land Rover and also Jaguar Cars.
* August 2007: India's Tata Motors and Mahindra and Mahindra as well as financial sponsors Cerberus Capital Management, TPG Capital and Apollo Management expressed their interest in purchasing Jaguar Cars and Land Rover from the Ford Motor Company.
* 26 March 2008: Ford agreed to sell their Jaguar Land Rover operations to Tata Motors.
* 2 June 2008:Tata Motors finalised their purchase of Jaguar and Land Rover from Ford.

Land Rover Clubs (UK)

Range Rover Register Ltd
Membership Secretary: Claudia Siemons, 138H Kenley Road, London, SW19 3DW. Tel: 0870 729 7406
membership.secretary@rangerover-register.co.uk
Club Secretary: Vivien Blackmore, 54 Coleridge Close, Wootton Bassett, Swindon, Wilts, SN4 8LD. Tel: 01793 632274
secretary@rrr.co.uk
www.rrr.co.uk