The 2011 Range Rover 4.4 litre TDV8 - not going to the US
The new 4.4 litre TDV8 in the 2011 Range Rover is not homologated for the US, so American buyers can’t get it. But why would they care?
For some reason, although the Americans have not embraced the DERV culture in the way even petrolheads have been forced to in Europe, we did expect Land Rover to take the 2011 Range Rover 4.4 litre TDV8 to the Land of the Free. After all, the engine appears to be the same one Ford developed for the F-Series trucks but never used, so it would just be a homecoming.
But they’re not. The US will have to make do with just the 500bhp, 5.0 litre S/C V8. The reason is simple enough. The new 4.4 litre TDV8 is a Euro 5 compliant diesel engine, but Euro 5 emissions are not as strict as the current US emissions regulations, which are more akin to Euro 6 than Euro 5.
So even if Land Rover wanted to take the 4.4 litre TDV8 Stateside they couldn’t. It looks as if the US regulators care more about the stuff that really matters when it comes to emissions – such as NOx, CO and HC – than just the silly, and rather pointless, CO2 targets Europe obsesses over. With which we agree completely and is why we back Volvo’s campaign for Emissions Equality
So until the new LR 4.4 litre gets cleaned up to meet Euro 6 (which probably won’t be until the next generation Land Rovers arives in 2012/213), the US won’t get the new diesel. But will they care?
Diesels don’t rock the world for Americans, and who can blame them? If you could buy a Range Rover with the 5.0 litre S/C lump and pay around £50k plus a bit of local tax, would you bother with the diesel? And if you throw in to the equation the price of ‘Gas’ in the US you’d be getting the equivalent of 60mpg.
£50k, 500bhp and 60mpg. Who’d want the diesel?
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