UK car production on the up

According to the SMMT, UK vehicle production was up 2.1% at the end of September on a year-to-date basis, at 1.29 million.

This means full year production is likely to be not far off the highs achieved in the early Seventies and then again in the first few years of this decade. Thats a remarkable achievement considering that the last few years have seen the closure of Peugeot's plant at Ryton, Vauxhall's Luton works, and the final car assembly end of Ford's Dagenham operation - not to mention the demise of MG Rover.

It is a little remarked upon fact that Britain has lost almost an entire car industry in the last twenty or so years but gained almost an entire new one as well. The old 'Big Four' volume manufacturers - Leyland, Ford, Chrysler/Rootes and Vauxhall, have with the exception of Vauxhall largely disappeared in terms of UK production. What we have in their place are new Japanese plants run by Honda, Toyota and Nissan, as well as revived, previously niche-bound but now massively expanded prestige operations such as Bentley, Aston, Rolls, Land Rover and MINI - only Jaguar isn't really living up to its potential, and even that may change once the new XF hits the market.

One by-product of this shift is that not only is the industry almost as big as it's ever been, but the average value of the cars being made is probably a lot higher. Notwithstanding the possible rationalisation of Land Rover's and Jaguar's production facilities after Ford has sold these off, I think we will now hold on to most of what is left of the British industry.

This one might make the Verdict - at a stretch

One final snippet from last week's SMMT test day - a chat with the people from the UK end of Binz, a coach-building company that works hand-in-glove with Mercedes. If, like me, you're old enough, you may remember the Matchbox model Binz/Mercedes ambulance based on the old Mercedes 'Heckflosse' ('fintail'), which used to be very popular in the late sixties.

We tend not to have car-based ambulances in the UK, so here, Binz focuses on hearses and lengthened Mercedes saloons like the extended E-class. Binz emphasises that the lengthened E-class cannot really be compared with those American stretch limos that are so popular for hen and stag nights as it is built to full Mercedes-Benz standards with a proper warranty and a proper spare parts supply set up and so on.


I was taken out in an extended E220 CDI for a couple of laps on the Millbrook high-speed bowl. A couple of observations. The smallish diesel engine does a great job of hauling this big car quietly; even when I was in the rear-most third row of seats (see photo below), normal conversation with the driver was perfectly possible at speeds approaching 100mph on a noisy concrete surface.


The ride from the Mercedes Airmatic suspension was excellent too, and this car had the very convincing artificial leather upholstery that is common on German taxis, which is almost indistinguishable from the real thing.

I'm told it's just possible we might be able to get this impressive machine on to the Verdict at some stage, so fingers crossed. This is one of those unusual cars that are as interesting from a passenger's as from a driver's perspective.

Vauxhall VXR8 - one I didn't drive!

The exciting new Vauxhall VXR8 at SMMT test day at Millbrook - unfortunately only as a static display. This is a Holden really, and the nearest thing there is to a successor to the marvellous Monaro.


The lady who does the press car bookings at Vauxhall is going to be very popular all summer as everyone tries to get their hands on this one. I'd better join the queue.

Gap-filling at the SMMT test day - two corkers

I've averaged about a test car a week from the various manufacturers for a number of years now, but there are still a few important mainstream models I've never driven. SMMT test day is a great opportunity to fill such gaps, though, and this year there were two particular highlights.

The first of these was the 2.7 litre diesel version of the Jaguar XJ, which goes, rides and handles like nothing else. On paper, the engine looks too small to haul an S-class competitor around, but that doesn't allow for the extensive use of aluminium in the Jag's structure, a measure that saves several hundred kg. Pity about the retro styling and interior - personally I quite like it (as I did the Rover 75) but I'd have to accept that I'm in a minority and that something more modern would sell better. We did have this model booked for the Verdict last year, but the test car that was due to come to us got pranged beforehand while it was in other hands and never turned up. One pretty much guaranteed rave review in a national newspaper lost , which was rather unfortunate for Jaguar given the desperate state it's in.


The second was the Mazda RX-8. We've had quite a few Mazdas on the Verdict in recent times - the latest MX-5, the 6 in standard form and most notably the 6 MPS, a very impressive machine indeed, if a little too understated for its own good. But until this week, the RX-8 had passed me by. And as I discovered once I got it out on the winding hill circuit at Millbrook, I've really been missing out. The suspension, which is admittedly uncomfortably hard over uneven surfaces, inspired real confidence on the hill course, while the rotary engine revs far beyond what anything with boring old pistons is capable of, and I didn't really notice the lack of mid-range torque for which this engine (like Wankels in general) is sometimes criticised during my admittedly rather short drive. Afterwards, I forgot to take a photo of the RX-8 in all the excitement, but I think most people know what one of these looks like by now.

Rather busy with the day job today, so the rest of the gap-filling will be covered in a later post.

Proton Gen-2 - beige banished

A long, full and very enjoyable visit to the SMMT test day at Millbrook. More to follow on that but I thought I'd quickly just get this photo up of the Proton Gen-2's new interior colours.


As this shot shows, the Gen-2's dash and interior trim now have a much more sober colour scheme using darkish grey shades that are more in tune with European tastes than the light colours Proton previously used.

The basic architecture of the interior, which I personally find quite attractive, especially the Lotus-style stacked dials ahead of the gear lever, seems to be unchanged. I'm not sure to what extent the textures or materials have been improved, but the change in colours alone gives the Gen-2 quite a lift, as does the free leather upholstery that is being fitted at the moment.

Also visible in this shot is Proton's sword-grip style handbrake handle, which I've always considered a bit naff, but today I drove the Mazda RX-8, which has something similar, and convinced myself that it looked pretty good. It just goes to show how our responses to features like this are conditioned by the badge a car carries. Put it this way; if BMW had been the first to do this with its handbrake handles, everyone else would have copied it by now.

Great spots 4 - Proton Gen-2

Spotted this one today in a McDonalds car park near Manchester.

You don't see many of these around but this example provides a reminder that the Gen-2 is a handsome car. Many of the fundamentals are pretty sound as well - there was a certain amount of input from Proton-owned Lotus after all.


Unfortunately, this model was let down at launch by its cabin trim, which was rather flimsy and a bit too beige for most tastes, although Proton has recently changed the Gen-2's interior colour scheme by introducing the sorts of dark grey shades that European buyers prefer - and is offering free leather upholstery at the same time. I haven't seen the revised Gen-2 cabin up close, an omission I am hoping to rectify at this year's SMMT test day on Tuesday, but Proton's recent work on the interiors of the Savvy and Satria Neo does provide a certain amount of encouragement.

While UK Gen-2 sightings are, and are likely to remain, fairly rare events, things could have been very different. It was widely reported a few years back that MG-Rover was considering a deal to use the Proton as the basis of a Rover 45 replacement. I think this might just about have worked if Rover had carried out a thorough revamp of the interior while preserving the Gen-2's basic strengths such as its smart exterior styling, eager (if rather noisy) engine and keen handling.

Unfortunately, the evidence suggests that such a happy outcome would have been unlikely. MG-Rover had already taken the approach of borrowing and then adapting another manufacturer's model to fill a gap in its own range by using the Tata Indica as the basis for a Rover 100/Metro replacement, the City Rover. It is now widely agreed, I think, that not enough was done to adapt the Indica to European standards; I suspect that MG-Rover would have been tempted - or forced for reasons of financial necessity - to take similar short-cuts with any adaptation of the Gen-2, with similarly disappointing results.

Anyway, I have to confess to having something of a soft spot for Proton and its quirky ways, so more on the cars and the company another time, I'm sure.