Yahoo Autos Land Rover Wants an Electric Luxury Sedan
At the moment, if you're looking for the most luxurious Land Rover product in the shire, SVO's Range Rover Autobiography is your ride. But while SUVs continue to rule the landscape, Autocar reports that Land Rover intends to launch an all-electric range-topping sedan in 2019, featuring Mercedes S-Class levels of luxury with all-wheel drive and variable ride height guaranteeing all-terrain capability.
(Pictured above: Long-wheelbase Range Rover Black Autobiography.)
This new line of vehicles, dubbed Road Rover, will share its components with the next Jaguar XJ, and is expected to pack enough batteries for a range of "at least 300 miles, " Autocar reports. Sounds good, right?
The funny thing is that Land Rover wanted to launch a more comfortable, road-focused estate car as early as the 1950s, using a shortened Rover chassis. Several running prototypes were made, the Road Rover name was born, but the project got shelved before it could evolve into the Range Rover, another hardcore off-roader in the late 1960s.
With Jaguar turning its first electric car into a racing machine with some help from Williams, JLR is clearly on the course of creating more and more high-performance electric vehicles. And as Autocar points out, Land Rover would be in a tough spot without the ambitious launch of a range-topping electric luxury car. There are numerous technical reasons why Range Rovers shouldn't be all-electric just yet, including the added weight, the cooling challenges and the waterproofing necessary to maintain the brand's off-road image. These would all compromise off-road capability, and that's something Land Rover just can't allow. Then again, having an EV in the lineup will also become a must in the very near future.
While the sedan is being developed next to the equally electric XJ, Land Rover can also build a hybrid bigger than the Range Rover, with the comfort level of the upcoming Road Ranger line, aimed at the Rolls-Royce SUV that will launch very soon.
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