1998 Rover 75 – Driven To Write

Rover 75: Long(ish) Term Test

Almost a year with a Rover 75 2.5 litre V6.

I have, on a number of previous occasions, regaled readers of with tales of my odd obsession with Rover’s last (chance) saloon and a number of you were kind enough to express interest in an update regarding my second example of the breed; a 2002-registered (though built in 2001) 2.5 V6 Sterling, known as Connoisseur in the UK market. This car was purchased almost a year ago and has been in regular use as my sole form of motorised transport since then.

My beautifully blue Rover was blessed with two apparently-careful previous owners, who had not neglected its maintenance, and had, for its very nearly 20 years of age, a low kilometerage, to which I have added a good eleven thousand or so. Said car is also one of the most over-specified conveyances I have ever encountered – its original owner having ordered the topmost trim level, added a dark blue personal line leather interior (a lovely thing to have on the 75) and then ticked every other cost-option box on the order form for good measure. Continue reading “Rover 75: Long(ish) Term Test”

Summer Reissue : 75 into 190

Reflecting upon the 75’s younger, leerier brother.

The Rover 75 is one of those cars which will probably form the basis of reflection and examination for decades to come. On paper at least, perhaps the most comprehensively realised Rover Group product of all, yet it proved to be a flawed product, courtesy of its problematic K-Series power units and what transpired to be a somewhat quixotic marketing proposition.

But I have not gathered you together today in order to Continue reading “Summer Reissue : 75 into 190”

Anniversary Waltz 1998 – In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

As we complete our retrospective of 1998, we ponder air and water.

Not simply one the World’s busiest airports, but amongst the most challenging from a pilot’s perspective, Hong Kong’s Kai Tak airport had by the 1990s become something of a liability. Situated in the heavily built-up Kowloon district, the technically difficult approach over mountains and city skyscrapers not only looked and felt alarming, but the abrupt banked descent to the single runway in Victoria Harbour required both nerve and experience.

The World’s largest airport terminal building when it officially opened in 1998, the newly built Hong Kong International airport at Chek Lap Kok put paid to the hair-raising sight of 747’s skirting the tips of the Hong Kong skyline. Built on a reclaimed island in the South China Sea, flights into the Kowloon Peninsula became a good deal less dramatic and a whole lot more frequent.

A consequence of its lengthy connection with Mazda, Ford had for some time been attempting to Continue reading “Anniversary Waltz 1998 – In the Aeroplane Over the Sea”

Retro: Yes or No?

During the last decade of the 20^th century a wave of retro cars were shown as concept cars or sold as production cars.

These vehicles re-used details and characteristics of designs from the 1950s and 1960s or perhaps ideas of these times. I will not discuss the reasons for this trend but rather retro design itself, and the two alternatives, modernism and classicism. I take the view that the best industrial design is impersonal. Continue reading “Retro: Yes or No?”