british layland cars
Discussion
negative creep said:
He might be from Cornwall , morris itals and austin princess'es roam free down there , ive seen the buggers
DennisTheMenace said:
negative creep said:
He might be from Cornwall , morris itals and austin princess'es roam free down there , ive seen the buggers
'Ere we can't all afford they new fangled motors - some of us down 'ere still 'ave to make do wiv or tractors!
Leyland was composed of many car companies.
The theory was that joining together would make them stronger as they could share parts and ideas. In reality the individual companies spent a lot of time trying to protect "their bit" of Leyland. The result was that the big Rovers competed with the small Jaguars, the triumph sportscars competed with the MG's and so on. They wasted time and effort competing with themselves.
They also didn't notice what their competitors were doing. The Germans and Japanese offered fewer models and fewer options but their cars worked. Leyland thought the customers would never buy such inferior cars. But then the Japanese started making bigger and faster cars that still worked. Never mind thought Leyland, they'll never beat our top stuff. But they did. And the Germans just kept getting better. By the time they woke up the customers thought that all Leyland stuff was unreliable rubbish.
Then there were the Unions. Some of the stuff they did was just insane. They'd argue for weeks about who would be allowed to drill holes (I'm not making that up, it was known as "the hole boring dispute"
and the hostility between the workforce and the managers became immense. Office staff at Ford used to use special bridges over the shop floor to avoid meeting union members as this would cause trouble. Leyland, being state owned at the time, got this worse than other companies. The workers were the voters so the company didn't want to upset them as they were controlled by those who the workers voted for!
The company changed it's name several times and in the process got taken over by British Aerospace and then by BMW before finally being independent again. From here on I'll call it Rover.
The BMW ownership was controversial. Some accounts state that BMW were horrified by the costs of keeping Rover going and disapointed at the designs they came up with, sometimes having to help them along, the 75 and the mini needing BMW help. In these accounts the 75 is a BMW design (the old 5 series or a modified 3 series) with some Rover bits. Other accounts claim that BMW took the design for the next Rover and used some of it to make the 1 Series, they took the new Mini and claimed it as their own, forced Rover to buy loads of expensive stuff to make BMW look good at Rover's expense and dumped what was left. In these accounts the 75 is a Rover design that uses some BMW bits.
When independent they introduced a new version of the MG F, the TF, which was a much better car. They improved and modified the Rover 45 until the MG versions became known as fun cars to drive. They introduced the V8 version of the 75 which had rear wheel drive. In fact, just before everything finally went wrong, they actually looked as if they'd finally got it right. Customers were starting to forget about the hopless cars they used to make and the newer cars included models that were as reliable as the competition and fun to drive.
But it was too late. The money ran out.
The theory was that joining together would make them stronger as they could share parts and ideas. In reality the individual companies spent a lot of time trying to protect "their bit" of Leyland. The result was that the big Rovers competed with the small Jaguars, the triumph sportscars competed with the MG's and so on. They wasted time and effort competing with themselves.
They also didn't notice what their competitors were doing. The Germans and Japanese offered fewer models and fewer options but their cars worked. Leyland thought the customers would never buy such inferior cars. But then the Japanese started making bigger and faster cars that still worked. Never mind thought Leyland, they'll never beat our top stuff. But they did. And the Germans just kept getting better. By the time they woke up the customers thought that all Leyland stuff was unreliable rubbish.
Then there were the Unions. Some of the stuff they did was just insane. They'd argue for weeks about who would be allowed to drill holes (I'm not making that up, it was known as "the hole boring dispute"
and the hostility between the workforce and the managers became immense. Office staff at Ford used to use special bridges over the shop floor to avoid meeting union members as this would cause trouble. Leyland, being state owned at the time, got this worse than other companies. The workers were the voters so the company didn't want to upset them as they were controlled by those who the workers voted for! The company changed it's name several times and in the process got taken over by British Aerospace and then by BMW before finally being independent again. From here on I'll call it Rover.
The BMW ownership was controversial. Some accounts state that BMW were horrified by the costs of keeping Rover going and disapointed at the designs they came up with, sometimes having to help them along, the 75 and the mini needing BMW help. In these accounts the 75 is a BMW design (the old 5 series or a modified 3 series) with some Rover bits. Other accounts claim that BMW took the design for the next Rover and used some of it to make the 1 Series, they took the new Mini and claimed it as their own, forced Rover to buy loads of expensive stuff to make BMW look good at Rover's expense and dumped what was left. In these accounts the 75 is a Rover design that uses some BMW bits.
When independent they introduced a new version of the MG F, the TF, which was a much better car. They improved and modified the Rover 45 until the MG versions became known as fun cars to drive. They introduced the V8 version of the 75 which had rear wheel drive. In fact, just before everything finally went wrong, they actually looked as if they'd finally got it right. Customers were starting to forget about the hopless cars they used to make and the newer cars included models that were as reliable as the competition and fun to drive.
But it was too late. The money ran out.
what happened to british leyland ???? want me to tell you ?
a friend of mine had the (mis)fortune to find a job in Triumphs in Speke making the last of the tr6/7's his job was to drill the holes in the body underneath to mount the tank, he thought as did ALL his collegues on the shop floor ESPECIALLY the convenors that it was hilarious to drill one tiny little eighth inch hole in the tank oh what larks ! he could never understand how as a motoring enthusiast (and apprentice mechanic)why i was disgusted by what he told me.
want to hear a good one............they had walk outs EVERY single week in the seventies and as gods my judge one of em was about......wait for it...... cat shit on the shop floor ! a (previous) walk out had been about rat shit being found in the place so the management got........... (at the insistance of the unions !!!!) you guessed it CATS in to combat the rodents that is the gods honest truth at this point the (then) conservative government was pumping millions and millions of pounds into leylands every week to keep it afloat when the plug was finally pulled these same arseoles staged demonstrations up and down the country DEMANDING their jobs be ring fenced and made sacrosanct blaming the tory government for putting THEM on the dole. combine all that with the knowledge that the management couldnt even consider introducing new models till they had been approved by red robbo and his pals the rest as they say is history
a friend of mine had the (mis)fortune to find a job in Triumphs in Speke making the last of the tr6/7's his job was to drill the holes in the body underneath to mount the tank, he thought as did ALL his collegues on the shop floor ESPECIALLY the convenors that it was hilarious to drill one tiny little eighth inch hole in the tank oh what larks ! he could never understand how as a motoring enthusiast (and apprentice mechanic)why i was disgusted by what he told me.
want to hear a good one............they had walk outs EVERY single week in the seventies and as gods my judge one of em was about......wait for it...... cat shit on the shop floor ! a (previous) walk out had been about rat shit being found in the place so the management got........... (at the insistance of the unions !!!!) you guessed it CATS in to combat the rodents that is the gods honest truth at this point the (then) conservative government was pumping millions and millions of pounds into leylands every week to keep it afloat when the plug was finally pulled these same arseoles staged demonstrations up and down the country DEMANDING their jobs be ring fenced and made sacrosanct blaming the tory government for putting THEM on the dole. combine all that with the knowledge that the management couldnt even consider introducing new models till they had been approved by red robbo and his pals the rest as they say is history
Balmoral Green said:
Quite an amazing level of ignorance displayed there, but I just cant be arsed to set the record straight, it would be like wrestling with fog. Plenty of books on the subject, go read some of them.
Would Mr. Green please remove his head from the sand! The Wiz said:
They were scupperd by two things - firstly the workforce was a bunch of Commmie shits and second the cars were, for the most part, terrible and badly built.
Well said that man!
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