Neil reviews the Ineos Grenadier

SERIOUSLY CAPABLE

By Neil Dowling

Creating a new car brand from scratch is an extremely daunting task. Creating a brand new 4WD from scratch is an even tougher prospect. We were lucky enough to get a ride in one of the prototypes while it was visiting WA. Here's Neil Dowling's take on the new Ineos Grenadier.

Surprise me. Tell me this doesn’t look like a Land Rover Defender. The old one. Unless you’ve been living under a rock or in a Toyota LandCruiser showroom, the Ineos Grenadier is a spitting image of the previous Defender, the agricultural Land Rover that is a bare-bones design update on the original 1948 Landie and which has kept its look since 1984 right up to its 2016 demise. History shows it was replaced in 2020 by a Defender that has nothing in common with the old model, bringing about much frothing at the mouth and gnashing of teeth by dyed-in-the-wool Landiphiles. Which is why you are looking at a vehicle that is, for all intents and purposes, a pre2016 Land Rover Defender, right down to the boxed front guards, angular bonnet, stick-on headlights and doors that look like they’re been borrowed from a Massey Ferguson. The crime has been committed by the big UK-based healthcare and chemical company Ineos, or more correctly by its owner, Sir Jim Ratcliffe. Mr Ratcliffe, by chance a multi-billionaire who had a fondness for the old Defender, was one of the loudest teeth gnashers when Land Rover decided to replace it with a vehicle that was nothing like its predecessor.

Mr Ratcliffe went to Land Rover and offered to buy the plans and license to build an ongoing version. Land Rover declined. So Ineos opened a new division to make a car. Its Defender lookalike actually shares no components with the old Landie other than a silhouette and, perhaps, some body panel shapes. Silly Land Rover. Now sections of the global 4WD market are itching to get into an Ineos Grenadier, so named not for the soldier regiment that among other things does a photo-opp for tourists around Buckingham Palace, but for the pub where Jim and his mates concocted the vehicle. It’s taken seven years but the Ineos Grenadier is now with us. This month Ineos Australia announced that orders are open and that its pricing starts at $84,500 plus on-road costs. This is a follow-up on the news of its national dealerships (although two for WA seems a bit thin!) and that it expects cars to dribble into showrooms by late this year with more volume promised for 2023. During its gestation, there were about 100 Grenadier pre-production vehicles running around various countries trying to break down. These vehicles, made by Magna Steyr in Austria, covered more than one-million kilometres with 300,000km of that spent off the road in places including Australia where it completed a series of tests and, earlier this year, a roadshow. So Ineos is showing that its new wagon has done the hard yards. Ineos makes its 4WD in the Hambach factory in France. The plant, which previously made the Smart models for Mercedes-Benz, is now owned by Ineos. The Grenadier is powered by a BMW turbodiesel or turbo-petrol engine and comes only with an eight-speed ZF automatic transmission. There is also no premium price for either engine, making the decision more of personal choice rather than watching the wallet.

The $84,500 (plus on-road costs) price of the workhorse-oriented entry-level (at the moment) two-seater Utility Wagon puts it head-to-head with the Toyota LandCruiser Workmate Troop Carrier that starts at $71,350 and climbs to $78,500 for the 70th Anniversary Edition. All Troopies have manual transmission and unlike the new LC300, retain the 4.5-litre V8 turbo-diesel. In its last year of sale in 2016, Land Rover sold its five-door Defender 110 for $47,500, along with two-door models and cabchassis and ute derivatives. All came with manual gearboxes and a 90kW/360Nm 2.2-litre four-cylinder turbo-diesel. The Grenadier appears to be sewn in the same cloth but the drivetrain is quite different. The BMW 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo-diesel - expected to be the most popular of the engine choices - has a substantially more powerful 183kW/550Nm. The 3.0-litre petrol has 210kW/450Nm. Incidentally, the Grenadier was originally planned to have four-cylinder engines from BMW but smoothness and the need to improve performance - including towing - made the company change to sixcylinder units. The bigger-capacity sixes also give the power needed to push a wagon that weighs about 2.7-tonne. But changes had to be made as the extra space needed to fit the six and its heavy-duty cooling system meant the air intake was moved to the front, with it now set alongside the headlights. The engines drive through a full-time 4WD system and Tremec two-speed transfer case with centre diff lock to independent front and rear suspended axles with optional front and/or rear diff locks that are actuated electronically. The solid axles are made by Italian tractor component manufacturer Carraro with brakes by Brembo and dampers from Bilstein. The chassis is a full-frame ladder layout (made in Germany by Gestamp) and most of the body panels are galvanised hightensile steel. The doors, bonnet and rear doors are aluminium. Clever stuff includes the liberal tow hooks and bash plates, roof rails and roof protection strips. The spare wheel has a lockable storage area. Chassis safety gear is minimal. In fact, the Grenadier skips a lot of the soon-tobe-mandatory SUV safety gear that will include autonomous emergency braking and blind-spot monitoring, effective from March 2023. Instead, the work-focused (but likely to be cult generating) import gets hill descent control as about the only visible in-cab

... and even a real key for the ignition. Which you have to turn to make the engine start.

nanny aid. It does get four-wheel Brembo disc brakes and airbags. It wears either 17-inch or 18-inch steel or alloy wheels, depending on the variant, with BF Goodrich All-Terrain tyres and a full-size spare is standard. Purists may see the entry-level Utility Wagon as the successor to the Land Rover Defender, mainly because it is stripped down with no fussy features. It gets a hose-out cabin with vinyl floors and Recaro seats with manual adjustment and a leather-wrap steering wheel and even a real key for the ignition. Which you have to turn to make the engine start. But it does get satellite navigation when connected to your smart phone and has a 12.3-inch touchscreen (like the engine, sourced from BMW) with access to the infotainment system. There is a rotary knob for accessing info from the centre touchscreen which BMW owners may recognise as BMW’s iDrive controller. Most of the switchgear is designed to be operated when wearing gloves. The main instruments are in the centre stack with the small panel ahead of the driver simply for warning lights. A roof panel bank has switches for the off-road functions, including diff locks, and switches for interior and exterior accessories. Defender fans may also note that the Grenadier may look like the old Landie but there are huge improvements in ergonomics, including the fact your right arm doesn’t rub against the door frame. The six models of the wagon include the Trialmaster and Fieldmaster editions. The names come from the Belstaff clothing company, renown in the past for its heavyduty waxed cotton motorcycle gear and now for fashion clothing, and is aimed at linking Belstaff’s durability with the new Ineos. No surprise with the tie-up with Belstaff when you know that it’s now owned by Ineos.

The Trialmaster adds front and rear diff locks, BF Goodrich KO2 off-road tyres, heated mirrors and windscreen washers, roof access ladder and internal utility rails, an auxiliary battery, raised intake snorkel, NAS tow hitch and electrics, and a compass with altimeter. It adds about $11,000 to the entry-level wagon price. There’s also the Fieldmaster which adds, over the base wagon, 17-inch alloy wheels with locking nuts, Safari top-side windows, access ladder, leather upholstery, heated front seats, carpets and the compass and tow hitch pack. There is a list of options for the owner who wants to personalise the wagon. These include the checker-plate on the front fenders ($460), rock sliders ($1630), roo bar ($1990), full-length roof rack ($2530), removable winch with tow kit ($4050) and even a heavy-duty spade for $60. Ineos has also been clever about mounting all the electronic items above the Grenadier’s maximum wading depth of 800mm. It also has pre-wired spare switches for accessories. The six models are all on the same platform, with a 2922mm wheelbase to make it 128mm longer between the wheels than the Defender 110.

It is 4927mm long (including the spare wheel on the rear door), 1930mm wide and 2033mm wide. This is bigger than the 110 by, respectively, 288mm, 140mm and 12mm. In comparison to the LandCruisers, it is 53mm shorter than the 300 and 17mm longer than the 76 Series; has a wheelbase that is 72mm longer than the 300 and 192mm longer than the 76; and its ground clearance of 264mm betters the 300 (235mm) and 76 (215mm). For off-roaders, the important stuff is the 36.2-degree approach angle, 36.1-degree departure and with a ramp-over of 28.2-degrees - all top notch figures to give the Ineos damn good off-road capability. On paper at least. On top of that, it has the impressive 264mm of ground clearance, the 800mm of wading and a minimum of 600mm of suspension travel thanks to the heavy-duty Eibach coil springs made specifically for the Grenadier. The suspension, with some components sourced from Dana, also has 9-degrees of front articulation and 12-degrees at the back. The Grenadier has a 3500kg tow rating when braked. It also has a high payload rating with a range of 810kg in the diesel five-seater, up to 906kg for the petrol twoseater. That doesn’t include the driver.

The two-seater can fit a Euro pallet, thanks to the 30:70 rear barn doors. It also has a total luggage space of 2088 litres. In its promotional material for the Grenadier, Ineos states that the rear can accommodate three sheep - a reference to the advertising of the original Defender 110. The five seater has 1152 litres with the split rear seats in the up location, and 2035 litres when the second row is folded down. Ineos has said that Australia rates fourth largest in the world (after Britain, the US and China) as its potential market. It expects global demand to be about 30,000 units but believes that it will replicate demand by increasing production. About 1000 units will be available from its mid-year launch with the company watching demand and prepared to increase stock. It will follow its wagon up with a dual-cab version on a stretched 3227mm wheelbase as early as next year, further boosting its potential audience. Also under consideration is a sevenseat version, using the dual-cab’s longer platform. Ineos is looking at about 34 national outlets by the end of 2023, with some being service-only facilities. But it has a deal with Bosch to service Grenadiers at any of its 120 national outlets. Ineos is aware of the user profile of the Grenadier and will also provide 3D manuals to allow customers - especially those in regional locations - to service their own vehicles. It also indicates that Ineos could allocate regional 4WD and mechanical specialists to act as agents for the brand. That aside, the Grenadier comes with a five year or unlimited distance warranty and roadside assistance program. It will also have a capped-price service plan for the warranty period. The service costs have yet to be announced. Buyers are asked to go to Ineos’ website and place a $5000 reservation online. Most of the Grenadier sales are expected to be made online, although the dealer network is available for more personal attention.

Ineos Automotive Grenadier Prices

Utility Wagon $84,500 Utility Wagon Trialmaster Edition $95,495 Utility Wagon Fieldmaster Edition $95,495 Station Wagon $85,500 Station Wagon Trialmaster Edition $96,495 Station Wagon Fieldmaster Edition $96,496