The long and the short of it is this: Land Rover is going to make an all-new Defender-equivalent vehicle in 2015; so far it’s known only as the DC100 Concept, and Land Rover need the space to build it in one of their proper factories.
The good news, therefore, when the new vehicle arrives they aren’t going to build the ‘classic’ Defender anymore. Well, that’s what we’d all hoped the cause for celebration could be: no more Land Rover Defender! But, alas, it appears as though the Defender will still continue to be manufactured in a factory in Sri Lanka, CKD-style.
Some may rejoice at this news, though I suspect mostly owners who drive around waving at other owners still silly enough to have Defenders. I, however, do not rejoice. Amongst the Defender’s many foibles is the ability to see glimpses of the road through the passenger door welds (my first Beetle had a similar feature). The fact that ‘The Rock’ or Stone Cold Steve Austin, would find the clutch and gear change action rather taxing when used often.
Or how about the small issue of the rather large, 2.4-litre, turbo diesel motor only making 90 kW & 340 Nm of torque, an amount which is barely enough for the Defender’s top speed to reach 130 k/h? Or how about the 266 g/km of CO2; or noise levels which can set off avalanches in Chile; or the curb weight closing in on 3 000 kg?
Despite all these factors, the Land Rover Defender is to be built outside the U.K. in a new plant in Sri Lanka. Land Rover are assisting and training staff at a new assembly plant in Hambantota, Sri Lanka, run by Sathosa Motors PLC in a 50-50 deal with Land Rover distributors SML Frontier Automotive, with $1 million being invested to get the project up and running.
If this new assembly plant for the Defender in Sri Lanka is the precursor for a case for a ‘Classic Defender’ product run, it is reasonable to expect the kits to be assembled in Sri Lanka and in mainland India and perhaps in China too.
“Preliminary work of the project has already been completed and the project is expected to commence shortly. The proposed project would make Land Rover vehicles available and affordable to a wider spectrum of the market,” said Access Engineering Chairman, Sumal Perera.
So, as it turns out, the Land Rover Defender is not dead. It’s not even close to being dead. In fact it’s going to be made cheaply and sold cheaply and it’ll probably spread and mutate across the whole of the East like a wild fire, or a comic book villain.
