Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Classic Morgans (pre-CX) Morgan Development

Modenising a Morgan could be a away to attract new buyers.
Morgans ate pricey for "old school" mechanical design and the age of Morgan owners is fairly high. There could be scope for cars with modern suspension and some of the other suggestions mentioned here. An option for modern or trad versions could work.
Eventually electric will come in......
Many younger people love the look of a Morgan borne out by comments made.
I think it is price and the thoughts of antiquated mechanics deter them.

I think Morgan would need to tread carefully in changing the spec and design of the trad Morgan. Buyers of other sports cars expect year on year updates and the value of three year old pre facelift cars plummet.
Buyers motivated by this would likely expect continual development until the model is dropped. Look at MG and Triumph, even modern sports cars like the Honda s2000 - all gone by the wayside.
Morgan sells on tradition and nostalgia. To attempt to update the car to a modern performance sports will spell the end of this car and put Morgan in a perilous position of having to continually expanding its development budget. Just my opinion.

I'd swap any future chassis, suspension or performance upgrades for a little more ground clearance!

That can be done with a change of wheels and 70 profile tyres.

If you have the standard Plus 4 tyres of 195/60 R15 you can gain 1cm by fitting 195/65 R15 tyres.1cm may not seem like much but it will take the total ground clearance on a Plus 4 to over 10cm which will get you over most speed humps without touching.

Excellent, Thanks. Sounds like my first upgrade! Need to get out and wear my tyres out first though.

I followed Gambalunga's suggestion for my Plus4. I have not had a problem with speed humps or low clearance since.

and the look of the car benefits from larger diameter tyres. There is a huge offer of very good tyres in 195/65/15. I have good experiences with a Dunlop bluresponse on my 1973 Porsche.

Back to the topic, this Q is difficult, in the worst case, a too much modern approach could take the soul of her away, making the ride "too good" and consequently boring, as many modern sports cars behave when not driven at race tracks. I appreciate the way Morgan has improved the ride quality over the decades without losing the link to the core value.

I'm not sure if the Trad range would reach a younger audience by just "improving" materials (like carbon or alloy frames) and suspension. Perhaps the task to match future (or even present) legislation standards is not easy as well as the whole balance of the evolution of the further car development process is not easy.

Morgan treads a very fine line I think.

There will always be a number of nostalgia freaks (I'm one), who want the trad shape, engineering, lack of technology etc etc etc.

I'm sure Morgan need to try and develop cars along the aero line to try and bring new money in. There will always be those who like the thought of a Morgan but with a few modern comforts.

The problem will be if they try and blur the lines between the 2. Personaly, I'm not sure about the new +8, perhaps it's just for buyers who can't make their mind up what they want!

As long as Morgan don't get delusions of grandeur and convince themselves they are a big time motor manufacturer, they'll be ok. The problem is, I think they might be heading that way.

Now theres a proper 'design' studio with people who want to make a statement, use mood boards, who use the word "lifestyle" and want to release a new special edition every other month.
Stick to what you know!!!!

Hugh I think ( hope!) that you are wrong.

I do believe that the new Management team have re-focuused MMC.

I also think that targeting low volume specialist models such as the Aero8 is a good marketing strategy.

What do others feel/think?