Who now owns these brand names, BMW or MG / Rover.
So sad that the new Mini is a BMW {however, possibly a better engineered car as a BMW than the now small car maker - MG Rover, could have produced?.
Any chance of seeing a new Stag, Spitfire or Healey 3000?
If so who will have the rights to the names?
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MG Rover own the MG, Austin and Wolsley brand names. The Healey family own the Healey name. BMW own the Rover name and MG Rover pay them a licence fee to use it. Don't know about Triumph.
Personally I think it's a shame most people (like yourself) have no idea just how much of the new Mini was engineered by ROVER engineers.
Rover Group had many very talented engineers, whose hands were tied by lack of funds and bad management.
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Very true.
The myopic comments about the Mini One is typical of many people nowadays.
As I have said before, if Mini One WAS a Rover product, many people wouldn't be buying it.
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Cyd,
re the Rover Engineers. Were many of the Mini engineers not transfered to BMW in the split?
I was not questioning the talet of Rover.
What I meant was, that now as a small co., they {MG / Rover}cannot spend £100s millons developing new models.
That's what I find so sad.
Did not know that BMW still owns the name{s}. Does this means that BMW can turn the screw when they want and demand more money for the use of the name{s]?
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Cyd,
re the Rover Engineers. Were many of the Mini engineers not transfered to BMW in the split?
I was not questioning the talet of Rover.
What I meant was, that now as a small co., they {MG / Rover}cannot spend £100s millons developing new models.
That's what I find so sad.
Did not know that BMW still owns the name{s}. Does this means that BMW can turn the screw when they want and demand more money for the use of the name{s]?
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Great article in yesterday's Motoring Telegraph, where the Ford engineers who were behind the Cortina gave their opinions on the original Mini and the new one. Not very flattering about either, and quite scathing about the original design.
One opinion ventured was that the Mini began the downfall of BMC. Ford got hold of one and after stripping it down and costing it they worked out that each one was being sold at a loss.
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My comments were meant as a compliment to Rover engineers, not a sideswipe at the car. I happen to like it and if it weren't for the fact I need something considerably larger I'd be in the queue for one. Certainly the guy at our place who's just chopped his ONE in for a Cooper S is very pleased.
Its true, the original sold at a loss for many years before anyone realised. That doesn't make it a bad car though. Surely a symptom of a badly run company?
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LOL Tom.
Would be interesting to let the original Mini engineers have a look at a Ford Cortina and let them give thier opinions !
How many Cortina's do you see on the road today compared to old Mini's ?
I think its a bit harsh to say the Mini started the downfall of BMC. There were so many factors unions/goverment/americans/poor management/no investment .....
Would be great to see a new Healey 3000, although TVR's Tamora is a good successor.
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Whatever the engineering merits of the Mini compared to the Cortina, the fact is that the latter was a huge success and the former was typical of British manufacturing during the sixties and seventies - loss making, poor build quality, failure to up-date both design and customer service as the competition drew further ahead.
Ford never intended to make the Cortina an engineering masterpiece, just a practical, reliable car that could sell at a profit and would appeal to the masses - and they got it right.
The number of mini's still on the road to-day is more down to the enthusiasts who cherish them than any stunning design quality. Faced with just routine maintanence they would all have succumbed to rust desise by now.
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Fair enough Tom
Comparing these two in commercial terms there is no question the Cortina comes out top.
But in design terms the Mini set the future for everyone with its clever FWD package.
Like many of BMC products there was huge potential but for so many reasons it all went wrong.
Like you said the competition drew further ahead, mainly copying BMC products and updating them.
Cortina vs Mini
or more precise..
rust bucket vs rust busket
Steve
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IIRC both Citroen and Saab arrived at FWD before Austin. In the case of Citroen, nearly thirty years before the Mini. What the Mini did have, however, was a funky shape and clever suspension. Not much new beyond that though.
Chris
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Ford never intended to make the Cortina an engineering masterpiece, just a practical, reliable car that could sell at a profit and would appeal to the masses - and they got it right.
Reliable? Tom, you obviously don't remember the Cortina 1200 with its awful three-bearing crankshaft that knocked out main bearings like shelling peas! (I exaggerate slightly as always!)
And what about the front suspension upper mountings collapsing when you went over a bump, resulting in the McPherson strut breaking out skywards and colliding with the bonnet?
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Good point Dizzy. I well remember the Mcpherson strut, the first thing you always checked when you went to look at used Cortina. But to be fair, there wern't many cars of that era that didn't have a serious weak point. Whereas Ford managed to design out those problems as they developed the models, the Brit industry tended to regard them as a feature rather than a problem, to their eventual demise.
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