Though it has just launched a new consumer website that also offers engineering test facilities to outside companies, NAC MG UK was still unable to tell just-auto.com on Monday exactly when the first updated TF sportscar would be produced at the Longbridge plant for customer sale.
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A spokesman said UK production was still expected to begin before the end of the year but admitted it was likely to be later than the September or October Yu Jian Wei, CEO of Nanjing Automobile Corporation, eventually predicted after repeated questioning at a press conference at the plant last May.
The updated consumer website provides details of the updated LE500 version of the TF which, an NAC MG UK statement said, “is set to be one of the most significant new entrants into the UK sports car market for many years”.
This is a launch special edition, limited to 500 units in the UK, and each will be individually numbered and with “enhanced specification” including revised body styling, leather seats, standard air conditioning and body colour hardtop, anti-lock brakes with EBD (ABS is mandatory here in the EU), wind stop, a glass rear screen as standard front disc brakes with four-pot calipers painted in red, rear disc brakes, 16” 11-spoke alloy wheels with shadow chrome or black finish, a single slot CD player with media player control, and wireless device compatibility, piano black interior finish & revised instrumentation and unique ‘LE500’ badging, graphics & trim items.
NAC MG UK will later add an interactive colour selection tool for the LE500 and an e-store for MG products to its website and, by the end of the year, customers will be able to reserve a car on line.
The updated website on Monday listed 24 dealer groups handing the revised MGs in the UK, Northern Ireland and Guernsey in the Channel Islands.
In an unusual move, the automaker is also promoting its Longbridge engineering test facility to the likes of vehicle importers and component companies through the consumer website.
Facilities include engine test and validation test benches; performance and calibration test benches; and emissions chassis dynamometer, a cold chamber and a vehicle workshop.
