Project Apollo

[Pete]

Here’s a short little tale for you, which in one way demonstrates how development of a car doesn’t stop when it has been launched, and in another shows just how easily a lot of people might have been driving rather different models than they actually own.

As many of you will already know, when MG Rover closed its doors six years ago the company was looking at replacing the BMW M47R engine with either a unit from FIAT or Perkins. The idea of course makes some sense, as the German manufacturer would no doubt be asking for a fair bit of money for their engine as well as Longbridge always on the lookout for a way to improve the 75 /ZT model. But this interest in ditching the Bavarian derv drinker had in fact been going on a lot longer than you may imagine......

Back in 2001, Longbridge were busy implementing Project Drive, which was a wide range of detail changes to various models in order to reduce costs. Now, these changes tended to be either deletion of the part, or a change of material to something cheaper, or an attempt to standardise specifications so that purchasing can be in greater volume, thus helping to shave off some pennies. All car companies do it, so it’s not really a ground-breaking revelation. But trimming a pound here and there can look a bit futile when the firm is buying in a big lump of metal – like an engine - and a BMW engine is not going to cost a bag of sweets. In addition, there was some debate about the long-term availability of the engine, as it would of course be only made for as long as it was viable for the manufacturer to do so and besides, BMW did have a bit of previous form for making life very difficult for people it didn’t really want to do business with, although this would have been counter-productive when they had given the Phoenix Consortium a large amount of money in the process of letting go of the Rover Group. So, Project P00272, AKA ‘Apollo’, was born.

The brief of course was deceptively simple; replace the current diesel unit with an alternative manufacturer. Deceptive because the process of changing engines is not exactly a day job; in effect the very heart of the car is being changed and this can impact on a multitude of other areas, from noise/vibration to crash safety, to the testing involved will be quite involved. However, the company was determined to look elsewhere for the diesel unit, and settled on two companies. The first was, rather predictably, Peugeot and its DW12 unit which had been launched in 2000. The second was perhaps a little more unlikely; Isuzu.

By late 2001 the project had got a structure. Development units would be delivered and installed into a number of the launch cars used in Spain three years previously, with crash testing undertaken on two of them. It’s interesting to note here that the company still owned some of the press cars and that they had not all been sold off - eight of them were to feature the French unit with one for slamming into a concrete block. Suppliers were being briefed by the end of the year and parts reviewed for re-use and MG Rover were waiting for delivery of the new engines.

So what happened? Well, by February 14th the option to use the Isuzu power plant had been suspended as the swap was already looking far more involved than at first envisaged, although certainly was far from impossible. But in March the company was forced to drop plans to use the Peugeot engine after being told by PSA that it could not supply any units until 2004. And so Project Apollo was shelved.

It’s curious to think that the BMW engine was very close to being ditched by MG Rover, and was only prevented by a combination of a possibly long development time (Isuzu) and no commitment to supply (Peugeot). But would the new engines have been as good? Peugeot have long been known for turning out very respectable diesels, but the M47R was lauded for its power and relative smoothness, and the move to another manufacturer would run the risk of offering models that were potentially not quite as good those respects. For MG Rover it was something else to take on board as it tried to grapple with making the company viable, and it would return to the project another time, sadly too late as we all now know.

[Roverowner]

Interesting. My pre prod was owned by MGR till 2003 when it was sold off via Hartwells. LHD but always british reg. Had spent it´s life in just Spain. Probably one of the press cars you mention. Wonder if it was destained to be slammed into a concrete pillar or have a Pug diesel fitted.

[Pete]

It's entirely possible, although as ever with MG Rover I would think there hadn't been a formal selection of which ones at that stage.

[Roverowner]

I spoke to a guy at Hartwells and he said that MGR recalled some 30 odd cars from the continent in 2003. These were press cars and demo cars. Presumed this was because the facelift was in the pipeline and these couldn´t be used any more. The lady who bought the car told me that the salesman had said that the car had spent it´s life in Spain. Maybe the reason for the recall was project Apollo instead Interesting

[muey]

Hi Pete. Interesting read. I am on my first ever diesel (2nd 75) and i can't fault it. It's a connie se but just a bog standard 116 bhp model. I have been lucky, no nightmares as such so far and the problems i have had have been sorted by consulting the wealth of kowledge on here ! I did know it was a BMW unit and chain driven etc, but what i didn't know was it was virtually a bullet proof engine till i joined here. If project Apollo had taken off, so to speak, i could well have had a fiat or peugeot rover 75 outside. the mind boggles !!!! As for the 116 bhp, at 49 my boy racer days are long gone and i am more than happy with it, got the slippers but not the pipe pretty much sums it up really and besides, its terrible factoring in an extra hour or so for the odd long jouney in my mobile armchair !
Regards, Mark