Daily News: Tuesday 1/16/18

Land Rover Celebrates 70th Anniversary with V8 Defender

Land Rover is celebrating the 70th anniversary of its iconic Defender off-road box in the best way possible: by making up to 150 special-edition ’70th’-Edition V8 Defenders. Land Rover has made V8 Defenders in the past, starting with their Series III Stage I from 1979 and continuing for a few years.

It is these heritage Defenders that Land Rover is using, having sought out and specially selected the 150 examples to be re-worked by the gentleman at Land Rover Classic. Each of the 150 vehicles will be available in one of eight colors, and in either 90 or 110 wheelbase, and be powered by a 5.0L V8 making over 400hp. This power is sent to all of the wheels via a new ZF-8speed automatic.

Pricing will start well over $150,000USD, and many will likely top $200,000. No release date has been announced and the new Defender is subject to further announcements.

Jeep Announces 2019 Jeep Cherokee: New Engines, Same Old Formula

Jeep has redesigned their baby-SUV, the Cherokee, for 2019, refining the formula and introducing a new engine choice to the family. As the picture above shows, the formula remains the same: take the Grand Cherokee, and give it about 60% of the size and capability, creating the Cherokee.

Visually, the new Cherokee has a new hood, front fascia, front lighting, and a new hands-free rear liftgate. There are also five new wheel designs for the Cherokee, yet beyond those small changes the vehicle will remain familiar to current owners.

The real news comes from under that new hood, where a new 2.0L turbo engine provides 270hp and 295lb-ft of torque. the 2.4L Tigershark motor is still on offer, as is the 271hp and 239lb-ft of torque, producing 3.2L Pentastar V6. Despite having less torque than the new turbo motor, and only 1 more horsepower, the V6 still retains the highest towing rating of the powertrains.

The 2019 Jeep Cherokee goes on sale later this year.

Infiniti to Become Nissan’s Electric Brand; Future of High-Tech Engines Unknown

Hiroto Saikawa, CEO of Nissan Motor Company, dropped a bombshell during an automotive press conference in Detroit: All Infiniti models after 2021 will be electrified in some way, excluding the company’s range of large SUV’s. Doing so will differentiate Infiniti more from Nissan, and set it apart as a luxury brand, Saikawa hopes.

All vehicles will be either fully electric, or powered by an “e-power” unit. Infiniti says that in “e-power” equipped cars, a combustion engine will exist, but will not power the wheels at all. Instead, this engine will generate electricity, feeding it into the generator and electric motors, which will do all of the propulsion duties.

Infiniti has also made headlines recently by developing the first variable-compression engine, which gives a gasoline engine the torque and efficiency of a hybrid or a diesel. This VC Turbo engine will likely be used to power the large SUV’s the automaker makes, a guess backed up by the introduction vehicle: the 2019 QX50 SUV.

Nissan is in year two of their six year business plan, which concludes in 2022. Considering they have developed a worlds-first engine in that time, I expect we will here more news resulting from this plan in the future.

Ford Considering Naming 2020 EV Crossover ‘Mach 1’; Won’t be Related to Mustang 

Ford has capped off their week of Mustang news by disappointing muscle car fans everywhere and announcing that they are considering using the famed Mach 1 name on a car not related to a Mustang. To make matters worse, the proposed vehicle is a affordable, crossover, electric vehicle due in 2020.

The future EV, designed by a small team within Ford dubbed ‘Team Edison’, is going to be built on an all-new platform with unique architecture. This will allow the fitting of a large-capacity battery pack without packaging sacrifices.

These batteries are not going to be solid-state, although Ford is developing these for future applications. Instead, Ford aims for a 300-mile range using liquid-cooling for its more mainstream battery pack.

Ford says that they are merely ‘testing’ the name and added that they were using it as inspiration for design, performance, and the like.

It doesn’t get a vote from me.