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00:00It all began as a quest for survival in those first tough years post-war.
00:12The pressing need to develop an export track record to qualify for government-controlled supplies of steel.
00:19The need to generate rapid cash flow to fund new car development.
00:24Most vital of all, the need to support a huge factory and workforce at Solihull.
00:33Whether by good luck or good timing, Morris Wilkes, chief engineer at Rover, and his brother Spencer, the chairman, hit on the idea of a civilian, peacetime, go-anywhere vehicle.
00:48A concept to replace the army surplus Willis and Ford jeeps put to use worldwide to help rebuild the agriculture and industry of war-ravaged countries.
01:00In just five months, the first prototypes of the projects known from the start as the Land Rover are ready.
01:07There's urgency in the air. The Land Rover has to be shown internationally and quickly.
01:18The Amsterdam Motor Show, the 30th of April, 1948.
01:24Innovation takes the world stage.
01:28The Land Rover is starkly practical in appearance, yet with distinctively purposeful good looks.
01:34Amidst motor industry talk of a people's car, the Land Rover is acclaimed for delivering all-purpose utility with efficient comfort and value.
01:44The Land Rover breaks the mode of conventional thinking, setting forever a benchmark in authentic four-wheel drive design and engineering.
01:52It has permanent four-wheel drive, enabling engine braking for serious off-road work and giving maximum grip in bad conditions.
02:03With two ranges of gears, four high, four low, using a transfer box for maximum torque and traction.
02:10The backbone of the vehicle is an immensely strong box-section steel chassis.
02:17With non-corroding hard aluminium alloy body panels and flooring.
02:22Waterproofed wiring.
02:24And all-weather finishes inside and out.
02:27It's a vehicle that is extraordinarily fit for purpose because of the attention to detail of its engineers.
02:34Including features like an oil bath air filter to keep out fine dust and sand.
02:39Pressure water cooling to ensure the engine can run at full output over long periods.
02:44And a handbrake acting directly on the transmission to hold the vehicle securely on the steepest of inclines.
02:55The Land Rover's scene too is a breakthrough in accessibility and ease of maintenance.
03:01Just 15 minutes to remove the front, middle or rear body parts.
03:06From day one, the Land Rover has been designed as a multi-purpose vehicle system.
03:14With a winch.
03:20Power takeoffs, center and rear.
03:30And the class-leading ability to tow loads of up to 800 kilograms, 1800 pounds.
03:36Even now, it seems astonishing that so many new ideas were to be found in one vehicle concept.
03:53Ideas which have been crucial in shaping the future direction of all four-wheel drive design and engineering.
03:59Even as the Wilkes Brothers were blazing a trail in technology, the world's adventurers and explorers were blazing new trails in Land Rovers through uncharted territory.
04:10As early as 1949, Colonel LeBlanc drove from Britain to Abyssinia.
04:21And in the fifties, men like Lorenz van der Post pioneered the use of Land Rovers for expeditions.
04:26As he set out in search of Bushmen and the lost world of the Kanahari.
04:30The company showed flair and foresight.
04:35Expeditions reached inhospitable regions of the world and demonstrated the guts and capability of the product to potential customers.
04:42So, judicious support was given to professional explorations under the aegis of the Royal Geographical Society for whom Land Rover remains a sponsor to this day.
04:53Promoted as the most versatile vehicle in the world, the Land Rover achieves global success.
05:14Because the company listens to its customers in developing the performance and capability of the product.
05:19With short and long wheelbase platforms.
05:27A half-ton lightweight designed for air transport and used by forces in 140 countries.
05:34And the Radical Forward Control.
05:40An innovative approach to customer needs for more load space and increased payload.
05:44To prove the worth of the prototype, the army tackled the breadth of the Sahara.
05:52Making the west to east crossing from Dakar to the Red Sea a distance of seven and a half thousand miles in just 100 days.
05:59Land Rovers have been built under license in over 30 countries from Belgium to Peru.
06:07And exported to every single nation around the globe.
06:11Helping to create the legend that for much of the world's population, the first vehicle they'd ever seen was a Land Rover.
06:16It's a vehicle which has become the servant of the world.
06:24Most companies would count themselves fortunate to have created one defining moment of automotive history.
06:32But Land Rover, now a separate company in all but ownership, is to repeat this feat in 1970.
06:37Not by luck, but by judgment.
06:44Project Oyster, the 100-inch station wagon, was again the result of innovation.
06:49This time the first ever proper market research study undertaken in the USA.
06:54This predicted that the real potential for sales growth lay in the use of four-wheel drive vehicles for leisure and recreation.
07:00An emerging market, tapped by functional estates like the Ford Bronco and Jeep Wagoneer.
07:07And by Toyota with the utility Land Cruiser.
07:12Back at Solihull, Gordon Bashford and Spen King grasp the potential of this insight.
07:18Seizing the opportunity to create an entirely new vehicle concept,
07:21which will combine the excellent off-road performance of the Land Rover with genuine on-road comfort and drivability.
07:30Progress is rapid from concept approval in January 68.
07:35Undertaken in great secrecy and with fanatical commitment.
07:41It creates an engineering package of world-class supremacy.
07:45A new long-travel suspension with low-rate coil springs and a self-leveling strut at the rear.
07:54Exhilarating power from the new lightweight 3.5-litre aluminium V8,
08:00delivering excellent on-road speed and acceleration, as well as torque at low revs for off-roading.
08:06Permanent four-wheel drive with a vacuum-controlled center differential for awesome grip.
08:12And disc brakes all-round to give saloon-like stopping power.
08:17David Bache's masterful styling of the original Blashford King design
08:23creates these classic Range Rover lines,
08:27which win a Design Council award and see Land Rover's flagship exhibited in the Louvre as an example of modern sculpture.
08:33At launch on the 17th of June 1970, Range Rover is a revolution in vehicle design and technology.
08:45Its breathtaking performance astonishes the world.
08:49Precise manners on-road, with exceptional ride comfort and effortless motorway cruising at up to 90 miles an hour, 140 kilometers per hour.
08:57Seemingly limitless potential off-road, exceeding even the ability of a Land Rover, still the world's benchmark in four-wheel drive.
09:08And progress on tarmac or cross-country enjoyed from a commanding position in the driving seat,
09:13affording 360 degrees of airy visibility above the traffic and hedgerows.
09:20For a decade, Land Rover simply couldn't keep pace with demand.
09:25100,000 Range Rovers were built, three-quarters of them going to customers outside the UK.
09:31Land Rover had achieved a double world first.
09:34Throughout the 80s, customer needs drive an accelerating program of development.
09:43Range Rover becomes an icon of British taste.
09:46An expression of intrinsic class, understated, yet full of character.
09:51And a realistic alternative to the traditional luxury saloon.
09:54No competitor comes close to Range Rover supremacy off-road, which is demonstrated time and again in challenges of arduous endeavor.
10:051987 marks the return of Land Rover to the United States,
10:17and renewed commitment to maintaining the company's leadership in four-wheel drive technology.
10:25The introduction of the viscous coupling unit is a world first for Land Rover.
10:30This senses automatically when a wheel is losing traction,
10:34and progressively locks the center differential to distribute torque equally to front and rear axles.
10:39A year later, the new 3.9 V8 engine is accompanied by another world first.
10:48A sophisticated four-channel ABS system, operational at all speeds on and off-road.
10:55In 1993, with the launch of the 4.2-litre Vogue LSE,
11:01Land Rover introduced electronic traction control and the revolutionary electronic air suspension,
11:06both world firsts in four-wheel drive.
11:10And in 1994, Range Rover is the first four-wheel drive to feature driver and passenger airbags as standard,
11:20having carried out a brutal test regime to ensure that the bags are not accidentally deployed in violent off-road maneuvers.
11:26But between the two poles of Land Rover's world, the indomitable champion of all-terrain utility and the flagship of ultimate capability,
11:38the four-wheel drive market is changing yet again.
11:42And for the first time, it's owned by the Japanese.
11:46Manufacturers with enormous resources and sales muscle,
11:50producing vehicles like the Shogun, Trooper and Patrol.
11:53These four-wheel drives are bought for the family as an essential part of their lifestyle, in image as much as function.
12:03Time is of the essence. This new market is growing fast.
12:08Land Rover established Project J, with a brief to deliver a new leisure vehicle that will define the standards of an entire sector.
12:18A vehicle designed without compromise for the lives customers choose to lead in the 90s.
12:29A breakthrough multifunctional team approach is adopted, with designers and engineers alongside manufacturing and service people.
12:36By working on the project simultaneously instead of consecutively, Project J is taken from concept to launch in just 30 months.
12:47Faster than any other European vehicle at the time.
12:49In parallel, a new diesel engine is developed, the 200TDI, a high-speed direct-injection turbo-diesel with intercooler.
13:02At the heart of the program, it's the needs of future customers which determine the shape, styling and specification of Project J.
13:12A multi-purpose leisure vehicle for activities, sports and adventure.
13:19On the 9th of September 1989, Discovery is unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show and receives acclaim for the innovation of its interior, earning Land Rover another Design Council award.
13:35And when the world's press drive Discovery at Plymouth in October, the 200TDI engine is a revelation.
13:44Best in class for top speed, torque, towing and fuel economy.
13:49In its first year of sales, Discovery outsells its nearest Japanese competitor by 3 to 1 in the UK, becoming the top-selling four-wheel-drive leisure vehicle in Europe.
14:09The rapidity of Discovery's success transforms the Land Rover business.
14:14From a plant built to deliver 300 vehicles a week, Land Rover are shipping 1,800 a week by 1994.
14:23As the rollout of the product worldwide climaxes with Discovery's powerful debut on the USA market.
14:29It's already known for surviving virtually every form of driving torture known to man, except one.
14:44Are we there yet?
14:47Between 1990 and 1994, Land Rover's total production doubles from 60,000 units to 120,000 units a year.
14:57Behind the scenes, however, the leaders of the business are tackling a challenge never before encountered at Land Rover.
15:07It's a challenge of unprecedented sensitivity, which demands extraordinary skills.
15:13It's the challenge of replacing a classic, the classic, the Range Rover.
15:18The original Land Rover, now called Defender, has been continuously evolved over 40 years.
15:32There's not one component on the vehicle unchanged, yet its shape is as distinctive as ever.
15:36Range Rover is loved by its loyalists, but the original design is now over 20 years old.
15:46To meet customer expectations of a luxury four-wheel drive in the 90s, the classic has to be replaced.
15:52But not so much replaced, as recreated, through evolution rather than revolution.
16:02New chassis, new engines, new steering, new axles front and rear, new suspensions.
16:09Underneath the skin of Range Rover, the designers and engineers adopt a radical approach.
16:13It's signaled to the customer in the revolutionary new H-Gate control on the automatic transmission.
16:22A symbol of Land Rover's pre-eminence in four-wheel drive innovation.
16:26The new Range Rover will carry the crown of off-road supremacy, with a total redefinition of on-road refinement and handling.
16:43But in updating Range Rover's classic lines, the design team take a more conservative approach, respecting the loyalty of owners.
16:50During August 1994, the first all-new Range Rover for a quarter of a century is unveiled to the world's press at Cliveden, to 800 key journalists from 45 countries.
17:14And in September, Land Rover stage one of the most innovative customer introductions ever for a new vehicle.
17:21Launching simultaneously with owners worldwide in 57 markets during one 48-hour period.
17:28Live coverage of the new Range Rover in action is relayed by satellite to the UK from Patagonia,
17:35Vermont,
17:37Botswana,
17:39and Tokyo, as well as locations in Europe.
17:42It is estimated that over 50,000 people took part in this global celebration.
17:46Owners and prospects.
17:47Owners and prospects.
17:48Dealers and staff.
17:50Land Rover people worldwide.
17:53And even more owners of Discovery, Defender, and Range Rover are able to see the new flagship before its public reveal in Paris on October the 4th, 1994.
18:03The story of Land Rover is a story of innovation.
18:04The brilliance of its engineers,
18:05The brilliance of its engineers,
18:07The brilliance of its engineers,
18:09We'll be at the power of the machine from a newcapades station,
18:11It's more of a new
18:27The story of Land Rover is a story of innovation, the brilliance of its engineers, the insight of its designers, the flair and foresight in marketing and communications, the understanding of customer needs for the future.
18:44It's a story that's even now entering a new and exciting period, with the launch of Freelander, the new Land Rover for the fast-growing small and medium sectors of the four-wheel drive leisure market.
18:59Highly volatile, highly competitive, it's a market without a leader, crowded with products from manufacturers who don't have Land Rover's credentials in four-wheel drive.
19:08It's an emerging market, in which young families and the young at heart are looking for the spirit of adventure, the thrill of driving a vehicle that has presence and relevance in the city, and real ability to escape from it.
19:21Freelander is the result of Land Rover's imagination and innovation, a design which takes the architecture of Land Rover forward for the future, with the chassis actually integrated within the Bollercock body for high rigidity and torsional stiffness.
19:41Styling that draws on traditional Land Rover queues, but uses new materials for long-lasting durability.
19:47Styling that draws on traditional Mercedes-Benz, with the launch of two distinctively different vehicles off one platform, the three-door multi-purpose champion with a striking softback, and the five-door station wagon design, something new that could only be a Land Rover.
20:17Yet Freelander itself is just the first of a whole new generation of Land Rovers, as the story of innovation begun 50 years ago continues for the next century.
20:47Cycle
21:02You
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