- Hurrah! They're finally going to replace it!
Yes, after 67 years of soldiering in the dirt, Land Rover has announced a contemporary replacement for the Defender for 2015.
The DC100 concept car you see here in official photographs will make its world debut at the Frankfurt motor show next week, although Land Rover admits that it's really still far from the real thing.
In the meantime, the Brits will be gauging opinion from existing and potential buyers about what the next Defender should look like in four years time.
- It appears that retro vehicles are still in vogue...
Land Rover says that it wants to maintain the traditional values of the Defender, while also attempting to make it relevant to the modern world.
Note how the DC100 tends to emulate some design cues from the Freelander and Discovery such as the slanted grille and side louvres. The circular headlamps are testament to the Defender's tradition.
- Is Land Rover talking about tech yet?
Nope, as the body language must be settled first. But it's not difficult to guess what kind of technologies will be appearing in the new Defender.
The four-cylinder diesel abundantly used by Land Rover, Jaguar, Ford and PSA (Peugeot/Citroen) could easily form the basis of the new Defender.
And if Land Rover really wants to go green in 2015, it could even hook up some batteries and electric motors to effectively yield a hybrid or plug-in hybrid (the Brits are already preparing them for future models in the Land Rover and Range Rover model ranges).
But please, oh please, don't beg Land Rover for a 2WD-only version for the new Defender _ it simply kills the 4x4 spirit. But look at what has happened to the Freelander and Evoque _ they've lost their rear drive shafts on some versions!
However, it would really be nice for the Defender to have an automatic gearbox option which it never had. Even the Jeep Wrangler in its raw-bodied iteration of the '90s had a two-pedal setup to choose from.
- Will it have a unibody chassis?
No info yet on this, too. True, unibody (aka monocoque) helps out on on-road driving dynamics with a sturdier chassis, while the traditional chassis-on-frame (like today's pickups) offer more body flex for the rough.
So like design and drivetrain aspects of the Defender, Land Rover needs to do little thorough research about how customers would react to whichever floorplan would be used (expect a flurry of debates from off-road aficionados and town-dwelling fashionistas).
Credit: Bangkok Post (www.bangkokpost.com)
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