Rover's Big Daddy (Rover 75)

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Product:	Rover 75
Date:	13/12/00 (1820 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Styling, price

Disadvantages: Styling

There's a personnel crisis going on at the Slough factory of a well-known paperclip manufacturer. The production manager has called head office. He needs an expert to solve the problem, and he'll need to arrive in the sort of car that makes the right impact of course.

It will have to be an executive charger; something smart, dynamic, thrusting. A car that says they're the sort of person who stays in the office late and doesn't run off home for their tea. The transport should be sufficiently suave and sophisticated to give our executive that polished look, be comfortable and relaxing and come with all mod cons.

Some might say that Rover's 75 is too small to be included in this sort of test. That's not how Rover sees it. When we asked if the company considers the 75 to be a rival to the Omega, the reply was "very much so". The front wheel drive 75 replaces both the Rover 600 and 800, so it straddles two sectors. So we interviewed the V6 for the job.

Exactly what the 75 says about its driver is quite hard to quantify. Turn up at a new place for the first time and your colleagues might assume you have come to deliver a reluctant calf, not placate a truculent work force.

But the 75's tweedy, retro, English countryside looks could be an asset, for that grille and twin front headlamps win most people over. By the time they have examined all the chrome and savoured the almost Rolls-Royce-like rear end, most folk are completely smitten. Most, but not all, because for some the 75 is just a bit too young-fogeyish, a bit too William Hague.

No sooner has the row in Slough been smoothed over than news comes through of trouble at a mill up north - time to dash for the motorway. Big cars with relatively small engines tend not to make happy dashing machines - and even the 1,465kg Rover, easily the lightest choice of the class, feels sluggish pulling away from a junction. But by the time its up in
to third gear with a few revs on the clock its begun to shake off its slothfulness.

There is little wrong with the Rover's gearshift, but the Rover has the most noticeable transmission shunt of its class. It's nowhere near the problem which effected the earlier models we tested, and only really happens under hard acceleration, but its still there.

There's a lot of grip from the 75's very safe front-wheel-drive chassis, but there's also too much body roll. Drive the Rover hard and it feels like you are taking part in a Dixon of Dock Green car chase as it wallows from corner to corner. The steering, although precise and accurate, is disappointing numb.

Although it provides a superbly comfortable ride on A-roads and around town, ultimately the 75 feels happiest on the motorway. There, it wafts its occupants along in supreme comfort with barely a whisper of engine noise. Only wind noise from the front pillars and annoyingly small door-mirrors blight the Rover's motorway repertoire.

The Rover's interior offers the peace and calm of a country house library, along with most of the period trimmings. The wood is real, but it's so shiny it looks plastic. Old fashioned chrome-ringed dials continue the classic theme set by the exterior, but they sit along side modern electronic readouts. Three headrests are provided in the back of the Rover, but that's a bit ambitious, at least where carrying adults is concerned. The front seats could do with more support too.

The Rover has a low price tag, and a relatively low insurance group of 11 for the V6. It is also a reasonably well kitted-out car, even though it does lack cruise control as standard equipment. the 75 has also improved dramatically since those first models we drove and found lacking, although some glitches remain. But for anyone who loves the styling and it prepared to put up with the lack of interior space, it makes good sense - and tha
t's financially too.

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