Metro
ADO 88 - LC 8 - R6
With
the Allegro been launched and the Mini still selling well, it was
decided in around 1973 to look at a model that would slot in
between. So the first concept car styled by Harris Mann was called
the ADO74, two versions were look at, with the larger of the two
finding favor. it was designed round the following dimensions,
wheelbase of 7ft 6ins (90 ins), it was 5ft 1.5ins wide and 11ft
6ins long. The suspension would have probable been the conventional
MacPherson struts at the front with torsion bars at the rear.
Wheels and tyres would have used the 12ins from the Mini or the
13ins from the Allegro.
In
1973 with Lord Stokes at the helm, he made a statement that British
Leyland would be spending £500 million on producing new models and
new engines, to raise production from 1.1 million to 1.5 million
vehicles per year. At the same time he announced that he would be
standing down from been chairman, and the post would be taken up by
John Barber was the finance man. So the first thing he decided to
axe was the ADO 74, as he thought it was too large and at a
projected cost of £130 million could not be justified, so it was
scraped.
With the ADO 74 killed off, it was now time to start with a clean
sheet, so the new car was born. The car would now become a
replacement for the Mini, although slightly larger with a wheel
base of 7 ft 4 ins (88 ins) hence it was called ADO 88, its strange
that they were still using the Austin code system.
As can be seen from the pictures below it went through various
stages of styling. But was now starting to look like the car that
was launched.
Spen
King who was put in charge of product development for British
Leyland and the man chosen to oversee the product development at
Longbridge was Charles Griffin, who had a wealth of experience
working on designs from the 1960s.
The funding for the project would come from the government, with a
estimates of £30 million for the development.
So with the funding in place, work started. Because of the cost
restraints it was necessary to raid the “parts bin”. So many parts
as possible would be carried over from the Mini. It was thought at
the time that the car could be out at the latest by the early part
of 1978.
The same A-Series engine and gearbox-in sump of the Mini would be
used. Various upgrades were looked at, even OHV version. In the end
small changes were made and it became the A-Plus, which powered the
Metro up to 1991. On the suspension side the Hydragas units as used
in the Allegro, but they would be interconnected side to side and
not as in the Allegro front to rear. This arrangement of the
suspension gives the body designers more freedom which results in a
remarkable spacious and airy interior in such a short boy
length.
With the package all-but finalized, David Bache who had stylized
Rover SD-1 was brought in to oversee the final styling and
production engineering of ADO88: the Metro was now entering the
latter and drastically vital stages of development. A final
full-size clay models were prepared for viewing in October 1975.
After various small changes taking place, by April 1976 the final
approval was given.
While all this tweaking on the body was taking place, the engine
and chassis departments needed to do development work. There are
two main stages in the course of producing a new car. The first
stage is called Semi-Engineered Prototypes (SEP), these have hand
built bodies and have mechanical components either off the shelf or
custom made. By November 1975 the first SEP was ready for track
testing etc. The wheelbase had now grown to 88.6 ins from the
original 87 ins, with the extra at the front end, this allowed a
little more room under the bonnet, it also gave more body at the
front end that would allow it to comply with the stiffer legal
requirements for crash testing. By the middle of 1976 ten SEP had
been built, all of these would have specific tasks to complete in
the testing programme.
With the development in full swing, it was now time to prepare all
the tooling etc for the manufacture, it was decided that it could
be ready to launch in October 1979.
The project now moved into the Fully-Engineered Prototype (FEP)
stage, this time a total of seventeen would be built, these having
body panels pressed from soft tooling. By the summer of 1977 the
first one was ready for testing and evaluation.
FEP
Mock-up
It
was around this time that doubts were been raised, was this car
right for the market place. The problem is that the major body
press tooling along with plastic tooling have to be started about
two and a half years before the cars
launch.
Although
various options were looked at, the decision was made to completely
re-skin the body. So in a time scale of just five weeks a very
short time scale in which to carry out a restyle. In the end two
full scale clay models were ready for trying in another public
clinic. This time the feedback was positive, so the management gave
the go ahead on 11th January 1978. The new version was given the
code name LC 8 standing for Leyland Cars 8, so the Austin Drawing
Office (ADO) reference was now dead.
LC
8 Styling Studio Longbridge
Of
cause this restyle had put the programme back by about one year, so
the launch was now scheduled for October 1980. It was also decided
that it in its new form it could slot in between the Mini and the
Allegro. So what were the main changes, the front end nose was
improved along with a front spoiler. The shape of the doors changed
and now had proper door handles, with the tailgate angled forward.
Interior changes were made to make it look more spacious and airy,
along with better quality trim. One of the main improvements came
with the rear seats which would fold down to give an estate car
position. but in stead of splitting 50/50, they split 66/33 there
by giving the option of having one, two or three people on the rear
seat, with the increase of luggage space if needed. Yet another
idea from Longbridge that was soon adopted the world over.
There were no changes made to the mechanical side but further
testing was carried out to see if the body changes would affect the
aerodynamics and handling. Testing had to be carried out on the ADO
88 FEPs either on the public roads or at the MIRA proving ground
near Nuneaton. At the end of 1978 ten FEPs LC 8 arrived, so that
the real testing could be carried out on what was now the
production form.
Dust
Tunnel MIRA
Because
they had to use other testing facilities, a decision was taken for
BL cars to have its own test track, which was constructed at Gaydon
in Warwickshire which had been a base for the American Air Force V
bombers. With it two mile long runway it was ideal as a test
track.
Now what shall we call this new car, a company that specialising in
coming up with names for new products was contacted. They came up
with no less that thirty eight names, in the end this was reduced
to just three, Metro, Maestro or Match. The whole workforce had the
opportunity to vote for the new name, with the result very close at
Metro - 8,599, Maestro - 8,332 and the Match at only 2,793. So
Metro it would be, but there was one obstacle to over come, as in
Birmingham a company called Metro-Cammell who built Tube trains
were contacted for permission to use the name Metro on the car,
they had no objections so long as it was prefaced with the word
'Mini'. so hence the Mini Metro was born.
This
View clearly shows the immense size
of the Metro Shop
A new (BIW) Body in White factory (standing for a body that is
complete but is unpainted) was built behind the Old West Works on
land bought from the Hollymoor hospital, a total of 33 acres of
which the main building would occupy nearly 18 acres. The work on
preparing the site and putting up the new build was awarded to
McAlpine at a cost of £15.5 million.
The new building was give two names, New Metro Shop or New West
Works. The completed bodies needed to be transferred to South Works
for painting and final assemble, so another contract was given to
Wimpy to construct a conveyer that would connect with the conveyor
system in Old West Works at a cost of £6 million.
The
Robotic Welding Line
So
after less than three years development and £275 million the Metro
(LC8) was launched on Friday 8th October 1980 at the Birmingham NEC
Motor Show and called the Austin Mini Metro.
It
was powered by the new 'A' series Plus. and was available in 998cc
and 1275cc engines. On version which was become popular with car
manufactures, was to have a version which gave very good economy.
This was called 1,0 HLE, and claimed that it was the most us
economical car in Europe. In 1983 the 1300 cc was fitted along with
a higher final drive. With a few tweaks this version was more
economical even though it had a large engine.
Metro's
in the trim shop
Running
improvements were carried out. The next major launch was in 1982
when a 1300 cc MG version came out which was available in two forms
normal aspirated and Turbo. Around the same time it was possible to
buy a Vanden Plas with the luxury of velour or leather trim along
with the wood capping and Wilton carpet.
For me the next change, really increased the appeal of the Metro
when in 1984 a facelift was announced and it was now possible to
buy a 5 door version, but the basic mechanical components were
unchanged. Just three years later the Austin name was dropped and
it was just called Metro. Then in 1990 it was renamed Rover
Metro.
Buck
Shop Longbridge with the R6
(This
shop was the old Styling Studio)
But
it was in 1990 that a major update took place under the Code Name
R6. This was when the 'K' series engine with various specifications
was fitted to an end-on Peugeot design called R65, which was
machined and assembled at Longbridge. This time the Hydragas
suspension was changed from side to side, to interconnected front
to rear which gave a better overall ride. A diesel version became
available in 1993 using the Peugeot/Citroen 1,400 cc engine. It was
still called the Rover Metro although in Europe it was now called
the Rover 100. It wasn't till 1994 that it took the same name in
the UK.
Total Produced
at Longbridge was 2,078,218