Jaguar Land Rover’s show floor at the ongoing Paris Motor Show is all about the much-awaited fifth generation Discovery. Following months of spy shots and speculations, the luxurious 7-seater SUV has finally being unveiled in all its glory.
Land Rover has made it official that the new Discovery will go on sale in the UK early next year, followed by other markets including India.
Dimension-wise, the new Discovery is nearly 5m long and around 14 centimetres longer than the earlier car. Interestingly, it sits slightly lower at 1.8m compared to the outgoing model (1.9m). Thanks to Land Rover’s new aluminium platform, the new Disco incredibly has managed to shed nearly 480kg of weight.
The new Discovery is powered by Jaguar Land Rover’s range of four and six cylinder petrol and diesel engines, all paired with a ZF eight-speed automatic gearbox. Leading the way is the 2-litre Ingenium diesel power plant which makes 237bhp and 500Nm of torque. As for the rest of the line-up, there’s a pair of 3-litre V6s - a 255bhp diesel and a 335bhp supercharged petrol.
In terms of off-road capability, this latest model has a ground clearance of 283mm, combined with an approach angle of up to 34 degrees, a break-over angle of 27.5 degrees and departure angle of 30 degrees. A wading depth of 900mm ranks it at the top of the segment. As expected, the Discovery also gets full-time four-wheel drive with two-speed transfer box. The latter provides selectable high and low range gears for optimum off-road performance. The system provides a standard 50/50 torque split between front and rear wheels, but uses a range of sensors to distribute torque between the wheels depending on the conditions.
The new Discovery range will be available in a total of five variants from launch – S, SE, HSE, HSE Luxury and First Edition (limited to 600 units in the UK). Prices, meanwhile, range between £43,495 (Rs 37.60 lakh) and £68,295 (Rs 59.2 lakh) depending on the variant.
