Around the Industry 177 - Part 2
GREENSPEED RESEARCH CREATE BIODIESEL TROPHY TRUCK
Greenspeed Research (GsR) is getting into off-road racing by building the first Trophy Truck to be biodiesel powered. The Convergence TT is spec'd for 'SCORE-International' and 'Best In The Desert' races and is designed not to sacrifice fuel economy for extreme power. Like GsR's World Land Speed record holding race truck, Convergence TT is being built to showcase and bring game changing, renewable energy technology to the forefront of public discussion and prove STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) is a crucial component in making a better world.
GsR Co-founder Dave Schenker states, "Motorsports are an exciting arena and an excellent platform for demonstrating the core aspects of STEM, the importance and possibilities of clean biodiesel, and the positive global impact these things have." Schenker expects the Convergence TT to get three-times the fuel efficiency of the gasoline power Trophy Trucks, giving the team the advantage when others need to pit. We will go a little more in-depth with Convergence when we get an up close look just before the Baja 1000 later this year.
WILL NEXT DEFENDER BE BUILT IN THE SAME PLANT AS G-WAGON?
Land Rover quietly put out a press release that had some eyebrows rising around the office recently. In the press release, Land Rover announced that it has signed a manufacturing agreement with Austrian company, Magna-Steyr. For those of you don’t know Magna-Steyr, they are well known for building the Mercedes G-Wagon and Pinzgauer all-terrain vehicles as well as some spectacular weaponry.
While Land Rover will not say which vehicle will be built by Magna-Steyr, we can’t help but connect a few dots, unofficially of course. It is no secret that the last Land Rover Defender will roll off the Solihull line in December. An ever-increasing range of Disco’s and Range Rovers as well as the introduction of the Jaguar XE have filled space at the plant, while the other two plants are also at full capacity. If Land Rover decide to bring back a next generation Defender, there isn’t much room left in the U.K. While the Land Rover purists cry bloody murder for the return of the Defender and for it to be a proper off-road vehicle, it only makes sense that it be built in a factory that already builds military grade vehicles. Is this a sign that the Defender is still alive on Land Rovers drawing board? The thought of a Magna-Steyr built Defender is getting us all hot under the collar; we’ll be following these developments particularly closely.
IS THE RANGER ON THE COMEBACK?
There has been a lot of talk of old vehicles making a triumphant return to the North American market with the shifting of production at several plants. Yet another move by Ford, who announced that it was moving Focus and C-Max production out of the Michigan Assembly Plant after 2018, has brought talk of a return of an old workhorse. According to a report in The Detroit News, one of those vehicles could be a new Ford Ranger mid-size pickup. We're a long way out from a decision being made, but the report says the Ranger is well and truly on Fords radar.
Another report, this one from Bloomberg, indicates that the Wayne plant would likely need more than just the Ranger to keep it afloat; which they pegged could also mean the possible return of the Bronco. If the Ranger does become a reality, the good news is Ford already has a head start as the Ranger has continued to be developed in several other parts of the world, along side its Mazda BT50 sibling (another vehicle that could fill production lines at Wayne).
Regardless, we know the idea has been on Ford's mind for at least a couple years. In 2014 a company exec told USA Today, "We think we could sell a compact truck that's more like the size of the old Ranger, that gets six or eight more miles per gallon [than a full-size truck], is $5,000 or $6,000 less, and that we could build in the U.S. to avoid the tariff on imported trucks."