Around the World

After Etsong gave up on the slow-selling Maestro-based Lubao, First Auto Works (FAW) took over the production rights, and gave the car a bit of a spruce-up. The FAW Lubao […]

There was an operation to build Austin Maestros in Bulgaria, and we have the full and exclusive story of how it came together. Meet the Rodacar Maestro – which we […]

A couple of years after production had ceased in the UK, the Rover version of the Austin Montego was re-introduced in the Indian subcontinent in order to compete in the […]

Michael James tells the brief story of BMC in Rhodesia. It’s the first time this forgotten outpost of British Motor Corporation has been highlighted on AROnline. British Motor Corporation: car […]

Craig Cheetham introduces the curious hybrid Rover-Hondas sold in Australia in the 1980s. Meet the Rover Quintet and 416 – and the R8 that was never sold by JRA. Rondas […]

The first Honda to wear a Rover badge wasn’t the 213… but the Rover Quintet, an intriguing Far Eastern offering. Paul Guinness tells us what he knows. Rover Quintet: the […]

Forty years ago, the world’s car markets looked a very different place – nowhere is this more the case than in South Africa, which managed to create a number of strange and interesting hybrids. Keith Adams leads you through some of the more interesting ones. […]

Phil Rixon takes a rare opportunity to compare the Morris Nomad with an Austin Countryman and an Austin Maxi to see how closely BMC’s tailgated trio are related. […]

Malta – that beautiful enclave in the Mediterranean is a favourite for tourists all over Europe. However, unbeknown to many, it was also host to an assembly operation which was home to […]

Keith Adams A rare, South African-specification, CKD-built Rover 2600 SDX has been offered on eBay. The car, which was built in Leyland South Africa‘s Blackheath plant, is freshly imported and […]

A little-known incursion by BMC under the marque Austin into the South American continent was the assembly of Austin commercial vehicles and Gipsy off road cars in a factory near […]

Chile’s BMC operation remained a specialist small-scale facility throughout its lifetime. However, what marked out Chilean Minis and ADO16s from their counterparts from across the globe was that they were […]

Final assembly of CKD Austin 1300s began at a plant in Novo Mesto during 1969, with the cars arriving from Longbridge almost complete; indeed, the chassis plates of these models […]

The Netherlands saw CKD production of BMC cars, alongside the usual versions imported from the UK and Belgium… Roderik Tonen tells the story. IN 1949 the Dutch Morris importer, J.J. […]

Ireland was an interesting market for BMC>Rover as, for a short while, not only were they importers, but they were a CKD assembly operation. Andrew Ryan takes up the story… […]

As was the case in the UK, many export markets suffered badly during the 1960s and 1970s. Denmark is a case in point, where the growth and success of the […]

The Chilean BL operation was the first attempt to produce the Mini in South America, but by no means was it the last… Story told by Rodrigo Toledo. The ‘Brick’ […]

Prompted by Spanish Government initiatives to promote industrialisation, Rover and BMC independently embarked on Spanish ventures. Authi A couple of years before the merger that would bring Rover and BMH […]

Like Sipani in India, Autocars Co Ltd was set up with the help of Reliant, built a range of fibreglass-bodied cars of dubious quality, and would later become involved with […]

The history of BMC>Rover is certainly not limited to the UK and, at the height of the post-war years of the ‘Empire’, there were production facilities all over the world. […]