NEW 4X4S
Land Rover takes reductionist approach to new-look Velar THE RANGE ROVER VELAR IS HARDLY A MICROCAR, and Land Rover seem to have decided it’s time to make something of that fact. In fact to make rather less of it, at least in visual terms. Don’t worry, you’ll still be able to look down, in all senses, at the lumpen proletariat scavenging outside the WEF, WHO and so on, but the approach is viewed by Land Rover as ‘reductionist’.
The ’reductive presence’ is definitel relative b t the grille superslim Pixel LED headlights and a new lower rear bumper with dark accents make some efforts to fractionally reduce presence and possibly aerodynamic mass. This idea is mirrored slightly inside with now a single 11.4” curved glass touchscreen which is integrated into the centre console.
Electrogenic ramps up international suppliers for electric
F
irst we made the Land Rovers. Then we sold them to the Americans. Then, many decades later, we developed our own ‘drop-in’ electrification its for o r and overs
10 | MARCH 2023
5pp Scene News Mar 23.indd 10
And now we’re selling those to the Americans too. The ‘we’ in this case is Electrogenic, a company based in Oxford which has developed a drop-in kit for a variety of classic British metal.
The kit features everything you need, including high-density battery packs, compact reduction gearboxes digital dashboards fi ed ratio transmissions and a whole heap more, all designed and manufactured in-house. This is for Defender as well as Jaguar E-Type and Triumph Stag. While that’s all great, actually getting these its fitted to models the other side of the pond is far from straightforward. Which is why
it seems good news for British exports that Electrogenic has found two companies to partner with, who will do the work Stateside. TATC and Xerbera already both have experience of re-engineering, rebuilding and customising the Solihull products, so they’re the first two companies to partner with the British founding company. It’s expected that others will follow, including in other global markets. Converting classic vehicles to
4x4 13/02/2023 23:50
