"not for canada - australian in disguise" (for-canada)
06/12/2020 at 19:51 • Filed to: None
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"not for canada - australian in disguise" (for-canada)
06/12/2020 at 19:51 • Filed to: None | 3
| 9 |
The International Harvester Scout is an iconic North American SUV, and what made it weird was that International weren’t exactly known for their civilian vehicles, instead mostly making farm equipment and heavy-duty trucks. Iveco, similar to IH, are almost entirely known for their range of trucks and vans, but in the mid-2000s they gave making an SUV a go.
Despite Iveco’s Italian ownership, the Massif is Spanish. This is because the Massif’s story starts with the Santana company, who built Land Rovers under licence for quite some time, and are well known to LR enthusiasts.
Santana and Land Rover parted ways in 1983, but Santana kept developing vehicles based on the Land Rover platform, even when Santana started producing Suzuki-based offroaders. Santana’s last Land Rover-based vehicle would be the PS10, launched in 1999 as a concept and entering production in 2002. Santana had entered another joint venture with Iveco to provide the powertrain for the PS10, which was essentially a Fiat Multijet 4-cylinder diesel unit.
Iveco took over the project completely in 2006, rebading the PS10 to the Iveco Massif. Giugiaro redesigned the front end and a shiny new Iveco badge was slapped on in place of the old Santana badge.
While a truck manufacturer like Iveco suddenly getting into the car business sounds weird, a vehicle like the Massif is a logical way to go about it. The Massif was aimed squarely at farmers and commercial users in rural areas, similar in scope to things like the Defender on which it’s based, or the Toyota 70 Series Land Cruiser.
Alongside the four-door station wagon model, a two door pickup was also available, playing even more into it’s agricultural and industrial leanings.
Despite Iveco’s big plans for the Massif launching them into the stratosphere as the world’s leading brand of offroad vehicles or whatever they thought it would make them, the Massif never really caught on. It was rather ugly, incredibly underpowered, and people who wanted a Defender, just bought a Defender. Slow sales resulted in it’s discontinuation in 2011 happening without much fanfare. The discontinuation of the Massif would also result in Santana’s closure as well, as they had been the ones building the Massif and had terminated their other joint venture with Suzuki in 2009, leaving Santana with no future without the Massif or Suzuki and forcing them to close in 2011.
But, who knows, maybe another truck or tractor manufacturer will give making an SUV or pickup truck a shot again. Navistar International (the successor to International Harvester) do make a Chevy Silverado-based truck imaginatively called the CV.
M aybe we’ll see a Suburban with an International badge called the Travelall someday. It’s unlikely, but one can dream.
RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars
> not for canada - australian in disguise
06/12/2020 at 20:43 |
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Am I terrible for actually liking the way the last-gen Massif looks....I actually like it more than the Defender, to be honest! I’m clearly broken :P
Thanks for reminding me of these! I had COMPLETELY forgotten about them!
Svend
> not for canada - australian in disguise
06/12/2020 at 20:46 |
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The Santana PS10 was fitted with a 3.0TD 4 cylinder Iveco engine and had Parabolic leaf springs front and rear.
Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available
> not for canada - australian in disguise
06/12/2020 at 22:21 |
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Interesting. The design feels almost Ssangyong to me, but less ugly. Reminds me of those Sterling branded F250s.
MultiplaOrgasms
> not for canada - australian in disguise
06/13/2020 at 00:02 |
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So what we have here is in essence a Series 3 Land Rover, fitted with a 3.0L IVECO Diesel (which is a considerable upgrade over the 2.2L Ford Transit engine used in the 2007- Defender)
Chinny Raccoon
> MultiplaOrgasms
06/13/2020 at 00:49 |
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A better engine, but worse build quality.
boredalways
> not for canada - australian in disguise
06/13/2020 at 01:22 |
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How is this work truck road legal with those bald tires?
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not for canada - australian in disguise
> boredalways
06/13/2020 at 01:27 |
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Probably isn’t. Looks like it’s been parked for a while.
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MultiplaOrgasms
> Chinny Raccoon
06/13/2020 at 04:17 |
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As long as the chassis holds up built quality is negligible for the type of abuse these things are inevitably subjected to. Our Daily workvan has survived more than four years of continous non-maintenance and hard driving and refuses to die even after the recent explosion of the Turbo.
Meanwhile in the shop there i s a new Daily which had shred its rear axle in less than 50, 000 kms.
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MultiplaOrgasms
> boredalways
06/13/2020 at 04:19 |
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Because nobody bothered to inspect it.