What if British Leyland hadn't screwed it all up?

"Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen" (distraxi)
05/06/2014 at 18:19 • Filed to: None

In a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on what a stupid brilliant project sticking a Rover V8 in a Ford Ranchero would be, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! commented that " BL should be used in the dictionary to exemplify 'missed opportunities'. "

Which got me thinking, how could that have been avoided? Which in turn led to: and what if it had been?

Here's my theory. It all would have worked out fine if instead of merging BMH and Leyland in 1968 to stop BMH going bust, the UK government had instead broken up both BMH and Leyland, injected a bit of capital, and let the parts which could swim, swim and the rest sink.

This would have had two effects. Firstly, it would have got at least some of the brands out from under the atrocious senior management who hadn't quite figured out that the empire no longer existed. Secondly, a few salutary bankruptcies in the early 70s would have convinced the unionised and actively counterproductive workforce that in order to save their jobs they needed to try actually doing them.

Net result, the brands which survived would have saved about 10 years in realising they needed to compete with the Japanese and Europeans, and another 10 years in actually doing so. The Brits aren't inherently incapable of building good, reliable products (ask Rolls Royce Aero Engines, or any of the Japanese manufacturers who've set up there). And they're capable of phenomenal feats of engineering under pressure - if you're not convinced by the difference between the RAF of 1938 and that of 1941, ask yourself why better than half of the world's serious motorsport engineering happens within 100 miles of Milton Keynes. So I reckon (though I admit it's a rose-tinted view) that with the two major impediments out the way, at least some of the brands would have turned themselves around by the late 70s.

And if they had, where would we be today?

The Ultimate Driving Machine would be .... a Triumph. Extrapolate forward from the hairy chested TR6, the small fast luxury 2000 and 2500 saloons, and the 2002-beating Dolomite Sprint (while pretending the TR7 never existed), and what you get is a direct BMW competitor.

Rich orthodontists wouldn't be driving a Lexus, they'd be in a Rover - a P15 or thereabouts. And it would have a turbine-electric hybrid powertrain like the Jaguar C-X75. Rover were into gas turbines in the 60s - they raced one at Le Mans, and the P6 was designed to accept one. Given ongoing co-operation with one of the worlds top jet manufacturers in Rolls Royce Aero, and Europe's less aggressive legislation and liability laws relative to the US, they'd have cracked the vaguely-economical-and-non-pedestrian-frying turbine car by the late 70s. And anybody who's looked seriously at a ship or a train (both of which the Brits know a thing or two about) would eventually realise that the natural partner to a gas turbine in a car is a generator, a few batteries, and a motor: it fixes the gearing problem, the low rev torque problem, and the idle fuel consumption problem all in one go. And electric was perfectly viable powertrain technology in the 90s - the first gen Prius's powertrain is basically lifted from an electric forklift. And because Rover were always the boring but affluent man's car, turbine-electric wouldn't even be exciting. Till TVR got hold of it....

Miata wouldn't be the answer, MG-H would be. MG had the small fun roadster market sewn up in the 50s and 60s, all they needed to do was make a reliable one and bring the handling and powertrain up to date. The MG-F was a perfectly adequate solution, it was just 20 years too late. But there was nothing in it that couldn't have been done in the 70s. And if small, fun, roadster wasn't a totally empty niche, Mazda wouldn't have bothered. Which means MG would still own it. Unless Lotus had learned something from this hypothetical wave of reliability engineering sweeping across the UK....

Land Rover would have kept on doing what they were doing, except they'd have tried putting stuff together properly. And that would have been enough for them to own their niches - in the 70s and 80s the Land Rover and Range Rover were miles and away the best cars in their class, on the rare occasion when they worked. So the LandCruiser, Patrol, G-wagen, Escalade, etc would be just oddball niche vehicles. And they'd have done a proper job of invading the US, starting with giving all those Wrangler owners a proper, Lara Croft spec, auto V8 SWB Defender soft top.

Oh, and they'd have invented the cross-over. That practically happened anyway, the first-generation Freelander was designed and almost built in the early 90s, well before the RAV-4 or Forester came out. But it got mothballed due to lack of cash. And given how well the RAV-4 sold, a take on it with Land Rover brand strength and decent build quality would have been a huge seller if it'd been first to hit the market.

Meantime, Austin would have invented the modern minivan, and own the global soccer mum market as well as the third world taxi trade. By the late 60s they had pretty much mastered the art of the Tardis - the Mini, 1100, Maxi, and even the Princess were ridiculously spacous inside given their exterior dimensions, and hydrolastic suspension meant they could put a decent ride in something with no space for springs. It's not hard to imagine that continuing that trend leads to seating 9 comfortably in something the size and price of a Cortina by the early 80s.

Jaguar would be doing.....pretty much exactly what they are now! Except they wouldn't have subjected us to the X type along the way. And someone would have given Jim Randle a big pile of resources the day the Porsche 959 was launched, so the XJ220 would have turned up in time to sell some. And it would have had a proper, lightweight, 48 valve V12, because that would have been a stock item from the XJ12R by that stage - Randle's team would have just had to bolt some turbos on to get the power and the glory that that car truly deserved.

So by now, Britain would have The Ultimate Driving Machine, The Ultimate Midrange Luxury Appliance Machine, The Ultimate Fun Machine, The Ultimate Beige Machine, the Ultimate Only 4x4xFar, and the Ultimate Convincing Porsche Drivers to Get a Life Machine. Not a bad return on a few million 1960s government pounds.

Or alternatively, Brits being Brits, they'd have found some new and better way to fuck it all up, and we'd be pretty much where we are now, with the last independent British car manufacturer being Morgan.

DISCUSSION (13)

lone_liberal > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
05/06/2014 at 18:24

You are forgetting the political climate at the time. If the British government had allowed multiple companies to go under there would have been mass strikes and protests that could have paralyzed their economy and doomed more than just the brands that eventually went under. They would have had to negotiate some sort of agreement with the unions, and really getting management and labor (labour?) on the same page would have prevented a lot of the problems that happened. Neither side was totally to blame nor blameless.

offroadkarter > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
05/06/2014 at 18:28

leyland probably could have worked if the management didn't suck. Many car companies out there with multiple brands.

BL kind of reminds me of Conrail with the train situation in the US. Bunch of small failing companies put together into one, and eventually it got split between CSX and Norfolk Southern.

took this last month in CT on a mini

Kinja'd!!!

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
05/06/2014 at 18:33

sticking a Rover V8 in a Ford Ranchero would be

Progressing currently from would be toward is, slowly Most big-ticket items are already purchased and staring at me. Staring. Whether reality will make it more stupid brilliant will have to be found out.

ask yourself why better than half of the world's serious motorsport engineering happens within 100 miles of Milton Keynes.

Because that location is a nexus of human aberration: positive, negative, and confusing. Good Omens proved this.

The MG-F was a perfectly adequate solution, it was just 20 years too late. But there was nothing in it that couldn't have been done in the 70s.

By this I take you to mean that time travel would have been the best investment of putative Gov. funds in MG's hands. Which, I mean, stranger things have happened.

Land Rover...putting stuff together properly

Impossible. Not only due to iron-clad laws of physics, but would have led to an excuse not to be able to take everything on the vehicle apart, hence disaster.

Meantime, Austin would have invented the modern minivan,

And Ford would have responded by fine-tuning a fancy passenger variation of the already excellent Transit, causing Austin to say "oh bugger" and collapse in a whiff of self-loathing and angry misery - where vans are concerned, anyway.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > offroadkarter
05/06/2014 at 18:38

I like the Leyland sun logo thingy. For some reason, I've got one on the exhaust manifold (IIRC) of the pre-Leyland engine in my Land-Rover, which must mean it got replaced by one from a Series III at some point. I've also got the Leyland logo on the Jag IRS I've got, which as I'm pretty sure it was a post-privatization XJ-S I burgled, would imply old stock.

ly2v8-Brian > offroadkarter
05/06/2014 at 19:12

I'm not the only one that sees a swastika in the BL logo right?

offroadkarter > ly2v8-Brian
05/06/2014 at 19:13

its not a swastika its just some right angles

BiTurbo228 - Dr Frankenstein of Spitfires > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
05/06/2014 at 19:14

Neat :)

I've done a good deal of thinking about this as well. I think if the government hadn't forced the merger between the fleet-footed and successful Leyland with the ailing behemoth of BMC, Rover and Triumph would still be with us today. At that point, they were very dynamic and forward-thinking companies who together pretty much created the entry-level executive saloon market in the UK.

It was only when they were paired with the labyrinthine BMC that their profits were siphoned off elsewhere and development lagged (and pay-packets/manpower was reduced or frozen, resulting in fierce labour disputes).

So, Rover would have been a direct Mercedes competitor, and Triumph would have been a direct BMW competitor. They'd have met in the middle, but VAG group has proven that that's not necessarily as negative as people think.

Meanwhile, BMC would go under. It's at this point that Leyland could come in and poach the good out of the twisted mess. Jaguar, MG and maybe Austin just for the Mini, 1100 and Alec Issigonis' team. Hopefully, if they're free from governmental interfering, they could actually run the thing as a business rather than as a social concern and actually make some money.

The thing I both love and hate about BL is that they had all the ingredients there to make some utterly great cars. V8 MGBs, more powerful I6s to continue the TR evolution, fuel-injected Sprint I4s, world-beaters like the SD1, but for whatever reason they never managed to align the stars properly to make successes of them.

That's something that I can do in my own garage :) put together the various puzzle pieces to make something truly great.

ly2v8-Brian > offroadkarter
05/06/2014 at 19:16

Yes, and they are arranged in the same manner.

BiTurbo228 - Dr Frankenstein of Spitfires > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
05/06/2014 at 19:29

Recommended once for the main body of the comment. De-recommended and re-recommended again for the Good Omens reference :)

twochevrons > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
05/06/2014 at 22:43

I've always wondered the same thing. My first car was a hand-me-down 2500TC – they really were excellent cars. Well into the '90s, the Triumph 2000/2500 was one of the most commonly seen cars in New Zealand (they assembled them down there, and actually kept producing them for several years after production stopped in Coventry). With decent RWD road manners, a lovely six-cylinder engine and a bit of sporting appeal, I always thought of them like a 5-series. They even look a bit alike, with the full-width grill and twin headlights (Giovanni Michelotti, who did a lot of design work for Triumph, was also a consultant on BMW's Neue Klasse designs).

If that's the case, then the Triumph 2.5PI – the properly fast, hairy chested version of the 2500 – was an M5 before the M5 was a thing!

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
05/07/2014 at 03:04

"Because that location is a nexus of human aberration: positive, negative, and confusing. Good Omens proved this."

Having lived a few miles outside MK for a few years, I'm quite prepared to believe that the street layout was a prototype for Crawley's M25 glyph. And certainly F1 in general makes a lot more sense if you start with an assumption that Bernie is an agent of the AntiChrist. So you may have something there.

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > lone_liberal
05/07/2014 at 03:10

"Neither side was totally to blame nor blameless."

Absolutely true. Not sure that you're right about what would have happened though. The trick would have been to break it up into small enough chunks that none of them individually were too big to be politically allowable failures, and get them dissociated enough from government control that the gummint wasn't expected to pick up the pieces. Non-trivial trick, I concede, but probably more do-able in the 60s than the 70s.

Lets hop in RambinRover's MGF time machine and go back and try it.

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > twochevrons
05/07/2014 at 06:32

I always figured Jag invented the M5, with the MkII 3.8. Take mid size sedan, stick racecar engine in it, profit.