Land Rovers

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

The Land Rover Series IIA

The Land Rover Series IIA


The SII and the SIIA are very difficult to distinguish. There were some minor cosmetic changes, but the most significant change was under the bonnet in the guise of the new 2.25 litre Diesel engine. Body configurations available from the factory ranged from short wheelbase soft top to the top of the line five-door Station Wagon. Also the 2.6 litre straight six petrol engine was introduced for use in the long wheelbase models in 1967, the larger engine complemented by standard-fit servo-assisted brakes.

From February 1969 (home market) the headlamps moved into the wings on all models, and the sill panels were redesigned to be shallower a few months afterwards.

The Series IIA is considered by many the most hardy Series model constructed. It is also the type of classic Land Rover that features strongly in the general public's perception of the Land Rover, from its many appearances in popular films and television documentaries set in Africa throughout the 1960s, such as Born Free. Certainly it was whilst the Series IIA was in production that sales of utility Land Rovers reached their peak, in 1969-70, when sales of over 60,000 Land Rovers a year were recorded (for comparison, the sales of the Defender in recent years have been around the 25,000 level since the 1990s). As well as record sales, the Land Rover dominated many world markets- in Australia in the 1960s Land Rover held 90% of the 4x4 market. This figure was repeated in many countries in Africa and the Middle East.
 

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)

Pennine Land Rover Club
John Nelson, Swan House, 30-32 Chapels, Darwen, Lancs. BB3 0EE Tel: 01254 776065
www.penninelrc4x4.co.uk