TECH ROVER
All-new platform, whole new box of engineering tricks
The new Range Rover, codenamed L461, is Jaguar Land Rover’s first car on the new electrified MLA platform. This is important: the last two generations were on sale for a full decade each, and this Range Rover must see out the transition period to electric drive.
‘This car has to be able to do everything brilliantly – there can be no excuses with the Range Rover,’ says Nick Collins, JLR’s executive director of vehicle programmes and this car’s engineering lead. ‘The new model is more refined, quieter and more comfortable. You will feel the difference: it’s better to drive and far sharper. It feels a lot more modern.’
Bold claims. It starts with MLA, the platform designed from the ground up to offer combustion or electric drive, and which carries its batteries low down and within the wheelbase. Toughness is baked into its DNA, with a body claimed to be 50 per cent stiffer than before for greater safety and to improve refinement, ride and handling.
Key to the more dynamic driving experience are 48-volt electric anti-roll control (the Range Rover previously used a less ecient hydraulic system), a new five-link rear suspension system, rear-wheel steering (a Rangie first) and air suspension. Pairing air chambers with Bilstein active dampers, the latter works to soak up bumps, drop the ride height by 16mm at speeds over 65mph and, when you park, drop 50mm to make access easier.
But it’s the new suspension and chassis tech Collins is really excited about. ‘The [standard-fit] rear-wheel steering makes a huge difference at all speeds. The turning circle’s drastically reduced – you can get out of tight spots in half the space [the turning circle is less than 11 metres]. And out on the road it brings another dimension. Range Rover’s never really been about agility – it’s about refinement and a magic-carpet ride – but this one’s agile, crisp and precise. You almost feel like you’re in a hot hatch.’
The new rear suspension contributes to this new-found agility while also future-proofing the car. ‘The five-link
set-up gives us finer control while also making it easier to install the electric drive units [on the rear axle] in the future,’ says Collins. ‘In this application you’ve got the diff, the fourwheel steering, the active roll control… There’s a lot going on there, all of which needs to weave its way around each other. And then when you go BEV you’ve got to put an electric drive unit in there as well… This flexibility has been built into this architecture. You have to take a view on where things are heading, and work and plan for that.’
This is a Range Rover, so being brilliant off-road is not optional. It’s a key differentiator. All engines drive via the familiar eight-speed ZF auto transmission and dual-range transfer box to all four wheels, with low-range ratios for when the going gets tough.
Terrain Response 2 tech lets you optimise the car for the landscape you find yourself in, and all new Range Rovers can climb a 45° incline, clear boulders thanks to 295mm of ground clearance and wade through nearly 900mm of post-apocalyptic flooding… Truly this is a Range Rover for the next 50 years.