Ineos Grenadier won’t have five-star safety

The Ineos Grenadier heavy-duty four-wheel-drive will not come with a five-star safety rating when it goes on sale next year – ruling it out for many government fleets and mining contractors, though unlikely to dent its appeal with hardcore off-road enthusiasts.

The Ineos Grenadier – a rival for the classic Land Rover Defender, Mercedes G-Class and Jeep Wrangler – will protect occupants in a crash, but will fall short of a five-star result due to a lack of advanced safety aids and a focus on heavy-duty hardware, the company says.

Ineos commercial director Mark Tennant said the Grenadier four-wheel-drive wagon and ute will meet US, European and Australian regulations. However, those standards are easier to meet than European and Australasian five-star crash rating criteria.

The heavy duty off-roaders will have "the alphabet soup of all safety features you can imagine" and won't "(scrimp) on safety systems," said Mr Tennant.

However, the boss of Ineos, Dirk Heilmann, has conceded the as yet undisclosed safety aids will not be enough to achieve a five-star score.

As CarAdvice's four-wheel-drive editor Sam Purcell has reported previously, the Ineos Grenadier is a new, ground-up off-roader engineered by Magna-Steyr in Austria, which also builds the Mercedes G Class, and assembled in Wales.

Ineos is primarily a chemical company, and the Grenadier is its first foray into vehicle development and manufacture.

"Projekt Grenadier" comes from Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who also happens to be the founder and CEO of the $6.85 billion chemical and gas giant Ineos.

The story goes that Ratcliffe was discussing the demise of Land Rover's original 4X4 with mates at a country pub named The Grenadier. Soon, a gap in the market was identified.

The vehicles are set for Australian delivery in late 2021 or early 2022 and will be available in four-door wagon and double-cab ute body styles, with long and short wheelbase options.

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