By the late 1970s the Land Rover was coming under pressure from Japanese rivals like the Toyota Land Cruiser and the Nissan Patrol which had more powerful six-cylinder engines than the four-cylinder Rover units that had powered the Solihull machines since 1948.

However, for six glorious years, between 1979 and 1985, the mother of all Land Rovers was bolted together using components from across the Solihull range.

The LT95 manual gearbox from the Range Rover Classic, the 3.5-litre V8 used in the military’s FC101 and chassis components from the globally respected Series III vehicles all contributed to a marvellous concoction of fuel-crisis defying pleasure.

Known variously as the Series III Stage 1 V8, the Land Rover Stage 1 V8 and more simply as the Land Rover V8, ‘Stage 1’ actually referred to the first stage of investment from Margaret Thatcher’s Government to improve Land Rover’s product range by pumping in £200 million of tax payer’s money.

This scheme eventually led to the deve...