Tata Motors’ luxury car unit Jaguar Land Rover has built its millionth vehicle at Halewood, north west England. The milestone Range Rover Evoque was donated to the charity Cancer Research UK.
JLR, when still part of Ford, in 2001 took over Halewood, built in the early 1960s initially to make the Anglia (as part of a government strategy of establishing new factories in regions where unemployment was high).
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The 1m vehicles built since include the Jaguar X-Type, Land Rover Freelander 2 and Range Rover Evoque.
JLR said the 220,000 Evoques built in just two years was a record and saw the plant reach the 1m milestone ahead of forecast.
The Cancer Research UK car – Dynamic trim level – was painted in a special one-off colour combination of ‘Fuji’ white with ebony-black alloy wheels and ‘Firenze-Red’ contrast roof with red mirror scalps and red/black sports seats and interior door panels.
JLR held 18,000 advance orders for the Evoque before Job One on 4 July 2011. Production volume has increased significantly over the past 12 months due to 24 hour working.
Between 2001 and 2009, 363,603 Jaguar X-Type and X-Type Estates [wagons] were manufactured at Halewood.
Tooling up for the Freelander 2 began in 2005 – the model was previously made at Land Rover’s original Solihull manufacturing base in the West Midlands – and Job One came off the line on 25 October 2006. So far, 381,211 have been built.
Evoque demand saw Halewood move to 24 hour production for the first time in its 50 year history in 2012. The plant has made 255,186 to date.
Jaguar cars are all now made at Castle Bromwich near Birmingham. Land Rovers and all other Range Rovers are built in Solihull. JLR’s head office and R&D centre and test track are in Gaydon in Warwickshire.
August 2012: HLR starts Halewood Evoque night shift
