The secret product plans
Product planning documents are a unique snapshot of the forward plans for any company with its eye on the future.
Back in the Seventies, the political and economic climate within BL changed almost on a weekly basis, depending on the current government's attitude to funding the giant car company. KEITH ADAMS reveals some of the more sensitive plans from the Seventies and Eighties, which showed that even within the darkest of times with the tightest of resources, there was still optimism for the future...
In part one of a series, we concentrate on Rover-Triumph, and what lay up its sleeve.
A Planned future...
E receive lots of historical titbits and recollections here at austin-rover.co.uk, and just about all of them are invaluable aids to building up a true sense of historical perspective. However, nothing beats documentary evidence of forthcoming model plans, be that styling sketches or internal documents. If you're not familiar with product planning documents, then you're in for a treat if you ever come across one - because the lay-out in black and white just what engines, gearboxes and body styling future models are going to use...
Product Planning must have been a nightmare within BL, though - what with the ever-changing management structure, and the shifting sands of government funding...
Rewind to 1978, and following the appointment of Sir Michael Edwardes to the post of Chairman and Chief Executive of British Leyland, the company's car divisions were split into two. Hastily welded into one unwieldy organisation (called Leyland Cars) after the Ryder reorganisation of 1975, BL's manufacturing divisions were once again given a measure of autonomy. Austin and Morris were separated from the 'premium' brands, leaving Austin-Morris (AM) and Jaguar-Rover-Triumph (JRT). It wasn't perfect (for a start, MG nestled with Austin-Morris, when most of its adherents felt its future lay within JRT), but it was a whole lot better than the catch-all Leyland Cars.
These reorganisations were a regular part of life within BL after the Ryder years, and as a result, future model planning and strategy was a wholly unstable affair, which meant that many of the agreeable economies of scale, associated with large multi-marque carmakers today - such as platform and engine sharing - were simply not on the agenda.
Rewind further, and the story is similarly confused following the formation of BL in 1968. The post-Edwardes break-up of 'premium' and 'bread-and-butter' marques closely mirrored what Lord Stokes had already done. The knock-on effect of this was product planners for Austin-Morris or Specialist Division (as JRT was known as in the Stokes era) tended to stick to their own platforms/engines/factories, even when further rationalisation could be made - with no policy within the company to push forwards with serious rationalisation. Harry Webster saw the potential, dipping into the Triumph parts bin when devising the Marina - but that was an act of desperation, borne out of the urgent need to get a new product on the market as quickly as possible.
Other cars conceived within that fertile era were either Austin-Morris products (Allegro, Princess) or Specialist Division (SD1), with cross-fertilisation.
With the Stokes-era management running BL effectively like two separate car companies, product planners from one division tended not to look 'over the wall' at what the other was doing... Decisions such as pursuing the slant-four Dolomite engine in the TR7 (instead of going with the O-Series), and the OHC Triumph/Rover straight-six (Instead of the E6-series engine) in the SD1, came as the direct result of running BL as two distinct 'car' divisions - harking back to a bygone age.
When the company hit the rocks in 1974, and Ryder made his recommendations the following year, the divisions were broken down, and all marques (apart from Jaguar) were forced to work together. In hindsight, it was probably the correct policy to follow but, ironically, turned out to be the one that caused the most antagonism within the company. However, this period between 1975 and 1978 did result in the best talent BL had to offer combining and working together. An early result of this thinking was the merging of the rival Rover/Triumph SD2 and Austin/Morris ADO77 projects to create the TM1 project - a good idea in theory, but one which time overtook...
Beyond that, both the LC8 and LC10 were conceived in these troubled times - and saw Rover-Triumph designers working closer to their counterparts at Austin-Morris in Longbridge...
However, in 1978, Edwardes decided to splinter the company again, and that meant a whole host of new Product Plans needed devising.
Rover-Triumph 1979-1987 Product Planning
Broadside was to be produced in Coupe and convertible form, and would form the basis of the replacement for the MGB...
In 1978, Rover-Triumph still produced far too many product lines, but all that was about to change. The Dolomite, Spitfire and MG Midget were going to be left unreplaced (the BL-Honda deal had yet to be finalised when the JRT was formed), and the MGB would disappear, to be replaced by the TR7 offshoot, Broadside.
Before the collaborative deal with Honda had been crystallised, the long term future of the Rover SD1 posed many problems. Without much in the way of resources, its replacement would end up being heavily SD1-based, and as that car's roots lay in the early Seventies, its performance in the late-Eighties would probably end up being called into question.
The good news was that Rover-Triumph would end up with a slimmed-down two model line - Bravo and Broadside, and that much needed rationalisation would result in agreeable economies of scale.
Of course, events unfolded in a much different way - Honda came to the rescue, allowing BL to produce the Rover 800, the Acclaim came in to replace the Dolomite (before becoming a Rover), and the TR7 line (Broadside) died with the closure of the Solihull car plant in 1982 - taking with it, all of BL's sports car sales for more than a decade.
What becomes patently clear from reading these plans, is that Rover-Triumph were clutching at straws, and did not appear to have much in the way of new hardware for the upcoming decade, apart from the O-Series turbo engine. Plans to fit the 16V Dolomite Sprint engine were finally laid to rest in 1978, just after the publication of JRT's first product strategy document.
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