Range Rover Reborn, Down Under

By: James Robinson, Unique Cars magazine

Date: 27.07.2017

Factory build capturing Aussies’ imaginations

In February this year, Range Rover unveiled their ‘Reborn’ program, an initiative undertaken by Land Rover Classic that sees old Land Rovers and Range Rovers painstakingly restored to factory original condition and specification by a team of Land Rover specialists.

Range Rover’s first offering from their Reborn program was a 1978 Bahama Gold two-door, which was sourced by Land Rover themselves, who then performed a complete bare-bones, nut and bolt resto of the two-door using only Land Rover Classic Parts.

When the Reborn program was launched, the manufacturer stated that they would build 10 examples of the two-door, and prices would start at a whopping £135,000, or roughly $220,000 Australian Dollars.

That’s a lot of money and, according to Mark Haybittle of Range Rover Works in NSW, it’s captured the imagination of owners and speculators alike here in Australia.

"We’ve seen massive levels of interest as a result of cars like the Bahama Gold Reborn Range Rover,"

"Our Shop currently has 22 two-doors that we’re working on, nine of which are ground-up rebuilds."

And when Haybittle says ground-up, he means it, as he estimates that each two-door takes between 1500 and 2000 man hours to complete.

What’s more, every single part and every single piece used in the rebuild, down to the nuts and bolts, is all original componentry.

According to Haybittle however, these Range Rovers are worth the rebuild, as he has seen prices soar over the last couple of years in the UK for mint examples, and now the same thing is starting to happen locally.

"There’s been a massive rush and prices are rising very, very quickly,"

"All of the owners of the cars we’re looking after know which way the wind is blowing with these things, they’re only going one way – up" Haybittle adds.

The rising value of these aluminium-bodied beauties  is little surprise to those who remember the stir the Range Rover ‘Classic’ caused when it was first unveiled in 1970 however, as it was and still is a truly unique design. 

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