Autocar July 04, 2018

KUDOS TO BMW UK’s special advisor, Ian Robertson, for breaking ranks with so many senior spokespeople in the car industry and saying what we all really thought: fully ‘braino €’ autonomous cars are unlikely to ever happen (p17). It’s refreshing to hear such an influential industry executive speak in such a frank way. As Robertson says, the denial of full autonomy won’t be due to technical limitations from the car makers’ side, but more because of legal and moral arguments. How can a machine ever decide who lives or who dies? That simply cannot be answered. So where does that leave the fully autonomous car? Not going around the M25 with a ‘driver’ reading a newspaper, that’s for sure. Instead, the braino € autonomous car won’t even be a car at all,…

The next-generation Range Rover, due next year, is intended to eclipse a new era of rivals in the fast-growing super-luxury SUV segment. With competition from the Bentley Bentayga and Rolls-Royce Cullinan as well as upcoming, more mainstream models such as the BMW X8 and Audi Q9, Land Rover’s task with the fifth-generation Range Rover is to create a vehicle that surpasses all of these rivals. It will attempt do so using not only its unique heritage but also technological advancements in powertrains, autonomous driving systems and infotainment. It will be revealed and on sale as soon as late next year as Land Rover celebrates 50 years since the launch of the original Range Rover. Land Rover recently confirmed that the upcoming Range Rover, alongside the next Range Rover Sport, will use an all-new…

Designing an icon gets ever tougher, especially if you’ve done a few before, as I strongly suspect Land Rover design boss Gerry McGovern would agree. The next Range Rover faces many constraints that none of its predecessors ever did: an immediate example is that the battery needed for its hybrid powertrain can’t be allowed to limit cabin or boot space but must impact one or the other. What’s more, battery weight will require the new Range Rover’s surrounding structure to be lighter than ever, making life harder for engineers tasked with delivering great NVH (noise, vibration and harshness) performance and great structural rigidity. And everything in the vehicle must function not just at the levels of the existing Range Rover, but much better. It’s what the market demands. In styling terms, the…

Range Rover Evoque 2019 Set for an LA motor show reveal in November before a UK launch early next year, the second-gen Evoque will be the first transverse-engined Jaguar Land Rover model to get the firm’s new mild-hybrid technology. Range Rover estate 2020 A more car-like Land Rover will wear a Range Rover badge in production and also be the firm’s first battery-electric vehicle. It will have an allroad-style estate body and deliver a capable, rather than outstanding, off-road performance. Range Rover EV 2022 The new MLA platform is ready to accommodate petrol, diesel, mild-hybrid, plug-in hybrid and all-electric powertrains, meaning a fully electric Range Rover will eventually be part of the fifth-generation line-up. Range Rover 2019 Fifth-generation Range Rover will arrive in the 50th anniversary year since the original was launched. It…

Volkswagen is evaluating a high-performance electric R model based on one of the forthcoming ID range – but will commit to producing it only once it can live up to the badge. VW recently broke the outright record at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb with the ID R Pikes Peak (see p60), described as “an ambassador” for the range. So far, four ID models have been announced and the first, the ID hatch, is due in 2020. Jost Capito, the boss of the R division, told Autocar: “If we do an R electric car, then it will be a proper R, or else it wouldn’t make sense.” Asked when an ID R might arrive, Capito said: “We have an idea, based on what’s going on on the racing and production side, but…

The success of the Volkswagen ID R Pikes Peak proves that electric cars can match combustion-engined ones for performance, according to the firm’s motorsport boss, Sven Smeets (inset). The 671bhp EV set an outright record at Pikes Peak last month, with Romain Dumas’s time of 7min 57.148sec on the 12.42-mile Colorado course eclipsing the previous mark set in 2013 by Sébastien Loeb in a Peugeot 208 T16. Dumas averaged 90.538mph. “This project was a demonstration of what the ID family will be, and what R will be in an electric future,” said Smeets. “Our idea was to convince people that electric cars are not boring. They can be very emotional – and we’ve proven that.” »PIKES PEAK REVIEW P60…