Just before the company went bankrupt MG Rover decided to produce one of the craziest cars ever built. The family saloon force fed a V8 and rear wheel drive. Don’t let looks deceive you..Today I drive the Humble Family Saloon That Became A Hot Rod. The Most Outrageous Car Britain Has Ever Built, the MG ZT V8
From Shopping Trolley To Rear Drive V8 Monster!
Support NR27 And Get:
1. Members Only Monthly Live Chats 2. Priority Replies To Comments 3. Loyalty Badges
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCErr8b5Sc1owxI31N6WZmIA/join
Tayna Car Batteries are fantastic and supply all my car batteries! Use the code NUMBER27YT for a further 5% off! – https://www.tayna.co.uk
source
1:51 The VW Passat W8 was launched in 2001, the MG ZT V8 in October 2003.
That exhaust is absolutely glorious. I forgive it being a little slow for the engine/fuel economy! I think it just needs a supercharger kit and it's a top tier car.
its not lunacy the modular 4.6 260 bhp is a bullet proof engine that will outlast any v8 bmw
Tunable?
Hi torque low power just like my modern classic Triumph Bonneville.
The MG ZT 260 V8 is in the same league of bonkers as VW's Passat W8, which had a W8 engine with similar levels of power.
Didn't Prodrive do some of the engineering work on these?
Drove a few, really good car and chassis, felt like a 4dr TVR. But this engine, what a piece of shit… all show no go. You are at the mercy of 2010+ 320d in regular traffic it is appalling and the fuel consumption is 3 times more. Not comparing both obviously but just the fact that a 55hp per liter engine will be lazy and slow.
I'm tempted to speculate the ride and handling infelicities might be eased by going down a size on the wheels, with correspondingly taller tyres. Obviously this would soften the overall handling a smidge, but millimetre-accurate cornering isn't really the mission. This would be the perfect car for someone with a lot of regular cross-country miles to do, and an unimpeachable fuel budget…
My Lexus sc430 made 282 hp and returned 25 mpg, close to 30 on a run apparently. Beautiful engine. They suffered from steering vibration in old age, something I couldn't resolve which unfortunately ruined the enjoyment. I wasn't prepared to put anymore money into it. Ah well. Autobox was good too, solidly made cars. Pity.
"Its death". No apostrophe. You got the other one right!
I love when things go crazy.
5:51 you trying to put a happy face on a dead rat you need more rouge and lipstick
More British v8s from the time which was always compared to the rover was the s type.
At the time or in 2002 – you had the 4.2 v8 s type jaguar with 295bhp. Also the supercharged s type R v8 with 400 admittedly both with automatic gears. Prior to that was the 4.0 from 98 when the rover 75 launched.
0:18 I like the comparison with washing the camel.
Can you guess what the manager said when he decided to produce the V8? "Now we're taking back control!" 😂
😏,The first Audi RS4,was a 4.2 (V8),and NOT a twin turbo (V6)…🤷♂️
A quick chip tune to adjust the fuel map would make this a better drive. A few hundred quid well spend.
Shocking that it only makes 256 bhp
SHOULD HAVE HAD SAY 360 HORSEPOWER TGEN BE BETTER ALL OF THE MG MODELS NEEDED MORE POWER
Errr, the MG ZT/Rover 75 is based on an E46. It even had a transmission tunnel despite being FWD, so it’s was actually a RWD chassis converted to FWD.
I remember these being released in Australia and I lusted after one. There has always been plenty of V8s on the market but this MG was something special.
Its*
The benefit of being "slow" is that you get to hear that engine noise for longer before having to lift off!
What a car sounds amazing as well. There are many supercharher kits available if you wanted more power. Also one thing to note size wise this closer to a e39 5 series or an M5 than an E46 3 series
I was involved with the transport packaging for the engine, gearbox & differential for this and the never to be released supercharged version. I went to Prodrive who were developing the car. there were big plans for this model, There was a crazy prototype there with huge arches and talk of 475bhp. Prodrive said their brief was simply "Build us a car to beat the M3"! Imagine what could have been!
Needs a chip 😊
Was taken out in one of those at Knockhill by a BTCC driver, never been so scared in my life, but what a drive….
Handicapping the engine was always a British leyland thing, everything they made performance wise they handicapped it down from what it should be and its the main reason they went bust.
I know someone with a supercharged one with over 400 bhp. It's…..quite fast 😁
Interesting you've compared this to an e46, when the 75 was more like an e39
When you compare this to an e39 m5 it's miles and miles behind
Love your water/camel analogy! Haha! The MG ZT260 is a most impressive, Bolero-esque, crescendoed fanfare of a finale by the condemned manufacturer. Big stones, no doubt! 🌑🌑
It sounds awesome, by the way! Great, insightful review, as ever. New knowledge, every time. 👍
The shareholders that run Rover stole hundreds of millions of pounds this is why it went bankrupt not because the cars were rubbish the cars were well built and reliable😢😢😢
If I recall they did produce a concept, in partnership with Prodrive, with the more powerful 4 valve engine, the XPower 385 ZT. Which as the name suggest produced 385 BHP. But it never reached the showroom floor. Shame this would have been a monster.
They should have used the bmw m60/62 V8 although I imagine bmw didn’t want them to have it
I test drove a ZT-190. Two things it desperately needed was more power and rwd. The -260 would have been perfect.
I'd have gone for the 75-260 for the wood trim instead of the grey plastic.
Sounds rather nice !
"Just Before It’s Death" -> "Just Before Its Death" (I am not a native English speaker, but I'm pretty sure your title is spelled incorrectly).
yep, British Bonkers but we're sooooooo good at it lol
idk, clio v6?
I love this crazy car, from FWD to RWD.
Prodrive enginereed this 75, it's true?
Those big American V8s are really something different, especially because of the torque. A friend of mine had a 1967 Pontiac GTO with a 6.6L V8 that only put out 335HP and 441 ft-lb of torque. It had a four-speed manual transmission, and you could smoothly accelerate from a stand still up a fairly steep grade in fourth.
If only the 75 was only released as rwd only may have sold better
When the chips were down, rover thought screw it….send it!
These cars were never 260bhp. They tested 20 engines on the beds. and they were 258 and 259 they came up with 260. Out of 20 engines tested all the others were 228 to 235bhp very very underpowered. Ive owned 3 of these and my mates rollers they were 232 237 233bhp. Never had 260bhp. I added inlet and filter. The front bumper had to be removed to get to the filter. Made a good difference in torque. I did love my zts but they are old hat. Ive now come away from them now owning a f type and a aston. Dont think ide go back but i do miss the sound and british heratidge..long live the mgrovers
I think you were probably thinking about the Audi S4, that's a V6 twin turbo.
I like the ZT V8. I had a ZT CDTi about 12 years ago. Good car until the abs pump failed. Sold it on, started to use my Vectra 3.2 again and then bought an E39 M5 to daily. Great days.
Apparently they had an axle tramp problem during development at prodrive.
Solution. Up in the air on a 4 post ramp, front wheels strapped down, chap in the car did a burnout while a couple of lads watched from underneath.
Tiny bilstein shocks fitted between body and diff. Problem solved.
(Credit- PPC mag.)
I worked at a car sales place in the early 2000's where we got a huge mixed bundle of rovers around the going bust era. 99% ordinary ones but we had a handful of nearly new V8's come through the workshop. MG badged saloons and also rover badged saloons and at least one rover estate.
Story I heard at the time, was they were going to factory fit roush supercharger kits as they wouldn't void the ford engine warranty and give 400 odd hp.
Wind deflectors on it? Really?