Rover 45 Tourer
Richard Woolley spoke of there being an HH-R 400 Tourer concept, but sadly, this did not leave the drawing board.
However, at least two have been made up. Here are pictures of one of them...
45 Tourer
This is one extremely well-executed conversion, and as can be seen, the car is fitted with an appropriate number plate.
SMALL estate cars have never been particularly big seller, unless a "premium" badge resides on the boot lid. The success of the earlier R8 400 Tourer was down, in part, to this. The Rover badge carried kudos at the time, and thanks to its compact packaging, Gerry McGovern styling and "nichey" attributes, customers took it to their hearts.
According to Richard Woolley, a Tourer version of the 400 was "talked about", although he has no knowledge of any being built. Therefore, it never came to pass, and a small but important market niche was surrendered when the R8 version went out of production.
However, that has not stopped other people from creating their own. As can be seen below, a 45 Tourer exists and can be seen on the streets of the Midlands. In fact, at least two are known to exist by austin-rover.co.uk. The car pictured here (and snapped by prolific Rover/Land-Rover writer James Taylor) was based on a Honda Aerodeck, with Rover 45 trim and detailing added. It is an extremely professionally executed conversion, and is currently owned by the Rev Colin Corke, vicar of Longbridge, and hardened BL/Rover fan...
We say 'was' because following a bit of a shunt earlier this year, the car was rebuilt using 2004 Model Year parts. Sadly, the original HH-R dashboard remains, and there is an old-style Rover badge on the bootlid, but otherwise, it's a profoundly impressive conversion. As you can see, the suspension has been lowered, and what you can't see in the picture is that the car is Turbodiesel powered...
Colin Corke's freshly facelifted Tourer pictured at the Austin Centenary event...
Pictures kindly supplied by James Taylor.