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Would you buy this car?

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M

MGZT260

Jedi Hopeful
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Okay, try 2. And bear with me as I am sure this has been touched on before:

https://www.mgmotor.co.uk/
Would anyone else consider, or have you considered and given up all hope for an opportunity to purchse a brand new MG TF? Pricewise the sticker of around 16,000 GBP works out to about $26,5000 just about the price of a Solstice or Miata and less than a S2000 or Boxter.
250px-MG_TF_2002.jpg

Sure MG is Chinese-owned (SAIC) but Jaguar and Land Rover are foreign-owned as well (Tata), yet all have maintained, or in case of MG, reopened traditional manufacturing in UK.

MG had a pretty full plate to offer before bankruptcy, including the Rover-based saloons, sporty hatchbacks that infested the islands (Bahamas, Bermuda)as well as a carbon-fiber bodied supercar the SV and SVR. If tehy brought them all back they would have a well-rouned (to my thinking) offering to re-enter North America. The Oklahoma factory plans seem to have all but gone away and time will tell if Alfa and Fiat actually produce anything here, but other makes still maintain overseas production and ship here.

So, raise your hands, wave those spanners, say yes, I want my MG TF (or other yet to be introduced model) or say no, I'm content working on one MG at a time.

For refernce, what is currently in production in Shanghai
250px-MG_7_black_2008.jpg

250px-Mg3wet.JPG.jpeg
 
However, there's no hope in getting one into the US so it's a moot point.
 
Ever thought about bring in an MGF into NA from Japan? I have, but my wife thinks they are as ugly as sin. So no, it is not quite a moot point. Well, I guess it actually is at MY house.
 
I've thought it through & asked lots of questions....even if you could get one into the country, you couldn't insure it because there's no "line" for it.
 
I'm sure some insurance company would cover it. Look at the ones specializing in collectibles with declared value, such as Haggerty.

There is supposedly a loophole that will allow importation of a vehicle that is 25 years old without the gazillion dollar bond posting requirements associated with importing brand new non-USA vehicles.

Another option, if they are game, since much of the new TF is produced in China and shipped knocked down to Longbridge for final assembly - what if SAIC sold the cars to us in kit form. And if they sold only a handful they might (or a newly created subsidiary) qualify as a limited production manufacturer, subject to less stringent regs. Then the matter of title and insurance is (relatively) simple as doing the same for a Cobra replica. Ooh, ooh (as Tootsie used to say in Car 54) what if they sold us just the body tubs as a new replacement (like the Heritage body shells) and we transfer our 40-year old components and data plates. (so a B engine and tranny won't fit as is behind the seat, wouldn't be the first time a different engine and transmission were installed in a MG)
 
Although it wears an MG badge, it is in my opinion, certainly not an MG. This brand was miserably handled by the Brits in every possible way during the seventies and eighties, much to the anguish of its managing director John Thornley, leading finally to its demise in 1980. No amount of badge engineering will resurrect this bloodline, and certainly not an effort spearheaded by a Chinese manufacturing plant. The new product called an "MG TF" may very well be an excellent car, but has no MG DNA.

Jim D
 
Sure, the B died in '80, and without the US market the parents of MG didn't know what to do. They found a market elsewhere in Metros and Maestros to keep the name alive and in 1985 when the Montego Turbo 4 door saloon was introduced it laid claim as the fastest 4-door sedan in the world, quitre a heady accomplishment. A three year limited run of RV8's based on the B kept hope alive in the early '90s leading up to the introduction of the mid transverse engined F, which was produced from 95-02, replaced by the TF, running til 2005 bankruptcy. To some purists, the engine is in the wrong place, the parent company is in the wrong place as well. But in original design and development (due to lead times) the TF hails from the pevious century. Maybe it is not unbroken Morris Garages DNA, but surely Riley and Rover must account for something.

Would you not consider a new Jaguar or Range Rover because Tata owns them? What about when they were owned by Ford?
 
I agree with Jim. The name died in 1980 and was resurrected with badge engineering. Anything after that time is not an M.G. in the purist sense, meaning designed and manufactured by the original bloodline of The M.G. Car Company. Yes, they are MGs because that's the name of the company that built them. It's just a different company.
 
Steve_S said:
I agree with Jim. The name died in 1980 and was resurrected with badge engineering. Anything after that time is not an M.G. in the purist sense, meaning designed and manufactured by the original bloodline of The M.G. Car Company. Yes, they are MGs because that's the name of the company that built them. It's just a different company.
Click to expand...

I don't agree with that. The MG "bloodline", whatever that was, had been subsumed by the Nuffield, BMC and Leyland contortions long before 1980, and the MGF of 1995 was every bit a much an MG as the sawn-off Morris Oxford that was the MGB (ducking rapidly!).

Seriously though, even back in the Kimber days MGs were sports versions of Nuffield small saloon and touring cars, with quite a bit of interchangeability to boot. There never was any original design concept as the purist might know it.

The "essence" of MG was to take the mundane base components and fashion from them some enjoyable sports cars, and the MGF did just that. The TF is only a development of the MGF.

And if anyone doubts what I say about MG, remember that the Midget may have died an MG, but it was born an Austin-Healey with absolutely no MG antecedent.

It's called Badge Engineering!
 
The MGF of 1995 had nothing to do with Abingdon built MG's. The "Leyland contortions" are responsible for the demise of MG. In fact there was quite a bit of original design concept in the pre-1935 MG's, specifically the J2, K3, Q, R, and C Types. Kim took pride in design and their build. Kim and MG developed the small sports car as we know it. MG was the most successful sports car manufacturer and competitor of the 1930's not only from the standpoint of road racing, but outright land speed records.
This is originality of design as any purist would know it.

Jim D.
 
The Chinese are capable of making stuff as good if not better than the Brits or us, they for sure have the latest, most modern equipment, but at the end of the day, it doesn't look like any MG I ever had. If the Chinese were samrt, they bring a plant to the US, like they originally planned, build MGB and Midget replicas, maybe even a Magnette 4 door replica, they would be employing Americans, and we'd all be drooling to get one, standing in line and paying over sticker, but as it now, might as well just buy a Kia, and put a MG badge on it.
 
THe issue of BMC and BL always comes up but I don't see how it's related. The M.G. Car Company existed continually and without interruption as itself until 1980 when it was officially closed. That ended the original company. Yes they had a couple foster parents along the way but that does not change the company's identity, only who is overlooking operations from some office.

Now you have some new people move in, buy the rights to use the name on cars designed by someone other than the M.G. Car Company, and built somewhere other than the previous M.G. facilities. This is not the same company nor the same bloodline. It is something new, using the same name as a since defunct car manufacturer.

I think the reason that people say it's the same company is because the name was put into immediate use, as if production never ceased. Maybach is once again building cars after being closed for decades, and they (like Roger feels the TF is) are building them with the same principles as the original company. But, it is not the same company by a long shot. It's a new group of people and a new car, using the same name as the old.

Regarding comparing the MGF to the original M.G. cars of the 20's, I don't feel that it's the same thing at all. The original M.G.s were chassis purchased from another company, modified and fitted with custom bodywork and competition parts. Soon after, as Jim notes, the competition cars became fully M.G. designs although many of the road-going saloons used components from the various parts bins of British manufacturers just as they did through the end of production in 1980. The MGF was an entirely new car, designed from the ground up by the new MG company. It wasn't a re-skinned and modified car from another manufacturer.
 
If any one of you diehard MG purists can point me to any MG-designed engine or gearbox then I'll say there's a bloodline.
But frankly,JIm D, I think Austin with their Seven started the small sports car before Kimber, like 5 years before. I'll grant that with its sidevalve engine it was not really competitive once MG came along, and I'm full of admiration for what MG did. And the only really original chassis among the cars you mention was the single-seater, backbone-chassised R-type. Sorry, Steve, but "fully MG designs", the R-type apart? Not really.
 
Roger, I think you're missing the point that is attempting to be made here. No one is saying that every nut and bolt was designed by M.G., but rather that the car as a whole was designed by them rather than using rolling chassis from other car manufacturers and simply dropping bodies on them with some performance tweaks.

Saying that M.G. has no bloodline makes no sense to me. There are very few, if any major car manufacturers who have designed and manufactured every nut and bolt on a car. That isn't how the auto industry works because it isn't really feasible to do so. However that doesn't mean that a company can't have its own identity. The company and how they do business as a manufacturer are completely separate IMHO.

On another note, I'm sure that I would call a stock Austin Seven a sports car, nor would I call it the first small car since there were dozens of them already in existence when the Austin Seven was first released. I've seen plenty of performance modified A7 specials that I would consider sports cars however.
 
I only brought up the Austin to point out that production sports versions of the Seven predated MG small sports cars. I'm not talking about specials, either.
It was the success of the Seven that prompted Morris to build the Minor, with its OHC engine etc., which with very little modification became the first Midget....truly a case of dropping a body on a tweaked production chassis, and MG wasn't a serious manufacturer before the M-type.

Now, my argument is that it wasn't really from "another manufacturer" - it came from Morris, just down the road in Cowley. MG was owned by Sir William, and though he gave Kimber a lot of leeway, I think it naive to suppose he had total freedom to design cars "as a whole". Well, not series production cars, anyway. Sure the racing cars and specials - C-type Monthlery, J3 and J4, K3, Q & R, and the EX record breakers were all purpose built, but in handsfull, not masses.

So MG was the sporting product line of Sir William Morris and later of his empire Nuffield and successively BMC, BLMC, BL, etc. As such, when the parent produced another sports car, it was called an MG. It was produced in various forms in England from 1995 until 2005 when MG-Rover collapsed. I suspect that if it had been exported to the US at that you'd probably be more accepting of it today. It certainly handsomely outsold its competitors in the UK, and in my opinion, having driven one, it's a nice little car that handles and goes well.
Now, I think it has as much right to be called an MG as many others, and more than Montegos, Maestros, etc., and arguably more than Sprite-descended Midgets.

Now, as for the other cars in today's MG lineup, or any forthcoming Modern Gentleman designs, I'm in full agreement. But the MGF and its successors is an MG. Honest!
 
I see what you're saying about Austins, and it makes sense. They certainly could have influenced Morris and others to build small cars.

I still maintain that a company which continues business uninterrupted is still, technically, the same company that it started out as. Once the business is discontinued for bankruptcy or any other reason, then that is the end. If a new party decides to resurrect the name then it is a different company, although the products will have the same name placed upon them.

It doesn't make one bit of difference whether the new owners are British or Chinese. Sure we all prefer British because that retains some of the lineage of the marque, but it has no bearing on whether or not this is a new company or the original. And just because a famous name is resurrected, that doesn't make their products bad or unworthy of carrying the name, nor do I believe anyone ever said the MGF isn't a good car!
 
Up until 2005 there was only a 1 year gap (1981) when no car with an octagon badge was produced. The Brits accept and embrace the notion that the F and then TF are blue blood MG.

A domestic comparison. GM's Camaro is arguably a popular vehicle ever since its introduction in 1967. Yet production ceased in 2002/ Now there is a new 2010 Camaro, however it is built and sold by "New GM" , 61% or so taxpayer ownership. Does the GM bankruptcy mean that the new Camaro is not kin of the old?
 
GM never closed its doors as a company. They simply restructured. That's what bankruptcy is typically used for... <span style="font-style: italic">not</span> going out of business.

The reason there were no M.G.s being built in 1981 is because the company didn't exist. The name brand was owned but there was no car company building cars. In the next year or two a new company was created to use the name with. That company was MG. Different company, same name.

The Camaro is simply a model of car, not a company. Models come and go all the time, but that isn't really the issue here. But for giggles.... no, in my opinion it is not an evolution of the original Camaro. It is a new car in the style of the original.
 
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