Imagine being in the oil exploration business, and (of course) using tough long wheelbase 4WDs to get into and out of remote and inhospitable places as a matter of course.

Imagine owning a group of companies based on this work. Using big, gnarly Land Rover Defenders as a mainstay of the transport pool. Electronic gewgaws and lane-change/lane keep assists are less of a priority than a robust pair of live axles and a strong ladder chassis.

Imagine reading in Autocar that these tough trucks were to be replaced by the modern Defender.

Then imagine heading on over to Solihull to ask if you can buy the tooling to continue producing the old Defender.

Imagine being a Land Rover manager and telling one of the richest men in the world “sorry old chap, can’t do that, trying to rule a line under the old beastie”. Phew.

Jim Ratcliffe, the chief of Ineos, reckoned there was still a niche for a hardcore body-on-chassis 4WD.

Even better, the high-pressure development timing would enable the company to correct the many foibles that gave the old Defender its ‘character’. Developed from scratch and apparently sketched out in concept on a napkin or five at a London pub called the Grenadier, it would be a clean sheet development, retaining live axles and a tough body-on-frame chassis, rigid axles front and rear, and permanent four-wheel drive with a two-speed transfer case.

In December 2023, NZ4WD joined a well-planned launch event for the Ineos Grenadier that resulted. A seriously accomplished off-roader with BMW power and excellent on road performance. A first effort from a new-formed company. Impressive.

Magna Steyr, automotive ‘guns for hire’, developed the Grenadier’s suspension: a total of 11 different Eibach coil springs, Bilstein dampers, five-link suspension, antiroll bars. Ineos Automotive bought the Mercedes-Benz Hambach production facility for building the new vehicle, and every Grenadier at launch proudly carries side window decals acknowledging its build location.

The core principles of the Grenadier premise are reliability, capability, durability. The catch-phrase at the launch was ‘everything you need, and nothing you don’t’.

Hence an immense amount of thought has been put into the features included standard, and those offered as options. A certain amount of townie frippery has simply been left out.

Interior
Jump in. The inside is modern and functional. All five seats are superb – Recaro front and rear, instantly and intuitively supportive and comfortable for all-day off-road adventuring. Looking for electric adjusters? Sorry, these are all-manual in deference to the vehicle’s potential use in muddy and flooded places.

The main 12.3 inch info screen is centrally located to maximise the driver’s view of technical conditions off-road. Behind the steering wheel, there’s just a small, low-set display featuring a small readout with warning lights. The main info screen is scrollable to provide information useful on or off the road.

In what is likely a first across the 4WD auto industry, there are two horns. A gentler ‘parp’ to let horses, cyclists or pedestrians know the Grenadier is coming without scaring them and another boss horn for idiots, morons and emergencies. Or perhaps for autobahns, where louder is safer.

Selectable controls are divided between the centre console and an overhead aircraft-style panel, the latter devoted to essential functions including diff locks, hill descent control and two special drive-assist modes:  off-road and wading, the latter maximising the truck’s 800mm creek driving depth and turning off the electric radiator fans so they don’t fling waster all over the engine bay or ‘hydraulic’ their way into the fan’s core.

The console and dash are where the comfort controls are located; the interior has an IP54 rating for water resistance.
The functions of the centre touchscreen are all duplicated by actual knobs and buttons, minimising the modern frustration of greasy, sweaty fingers adding grunge to the screen.

For navigation, owners will use wireless Apple or wired Android Auto. Ineos, with adventuring in mind, urges clients to invest in a downloadable map system for those times when cell signal is lost. Steering is off-road-friendly, well damped and assisted, but not to the point where the driver is left wondering where the front wheels are in rough going. The leather clad steering wheel looks slightly small to anyone who learned to drive in a Series II Landie and a Range Rover, but once under way it’s just right. Like most such SUVs these days, it’s a smart wheel with controls for a range of functions including cruise control.

Refinement has been a focus, and in-cabin noise is admirably low. Attribute that to the use of six-cylinder BMW engines, which have won multiple ‘International Engine of the Year’ awards and are coupled to the ultra-smooth ZF eight speed auto. Also contributing to the serenity are BF Goodrich All Terrain KO2 tyres, among the best A/T treads in the world. Quiet and grippy on and off-road, they are perfectly suited to the Grenadier, which seems to have been developed specifically for these tyres.

Under the bonnet: serenity
Those engines are sublime, and choosing between petrol and diesel is a no-cost process. Both are turbocharged 3.0L inline sixes, reprogrammed to be supremely off-road capable. The diesel makes 183kW and 550Nm, the petrol 210kW and 440Nm. Acceleration (official figure) is around 8.9 seconds 0-100km/h.

The diesel uses AdBlue exhaust additive. More common in the heavy transport sector, Specifically, AdBlue is an aqueous urea solution made with 32.5 percent urea and 67.5 percent deionised water. It lowers the concentration of nitrogen oxides in diesel exhaust emissions.

For those using the Grenadier around town the petrol is more refined, but off road or on the highway the torque of the diesel rules. Sales in Australia (almost 1,000 to date) favour the diesel, while in the USA it’s petrol all the way. Funny people, Americans. They think diesel is for 18-wheelers.

Safety, plenty of it
While the 2023 INEOS Grenadier is avoids Euro NCAP or ANCAP ‘star’ ratings through its commercial vehicle status but Australian INEOS chief Justin Hocevar says the heavy-duty off-roader had been extensively crash tested as part of its development program and delivers high levels of safety for its intended purpose.

The standard safety suite includes six airbags (including side curtains), anti-lock brakes, electronic traction/stability control, automatic hazard warning, tyre pressure monitoring, lane departure warning, trailer stability assist and front parking sensors.
Five-seat models also get ISOFIX/iSize child seat anchor points for each of the two outboard rear seats, while cruise control and off-road assistance functions including off-road mode, wading mode, hill descent control and uphill assist are also standard across the range.

Overview
The Grenadier is a five-door SUV guise (actually six, as the rear door opens 30:70). It arrives as a base model with a large list of accessories; the Fieldmaster with alloy wheels, heated leather seats, and premium sounds or the more hardcore Trialmaster with front and rear diff locks and air intake snorkel.

Realistically, any variant will live up to expectations on or off road because the build spec has majored in capability, not frills and gewgaws. Uniquely, the super-smooth BMW six-cylinder engines can be specified as diesel or petrol without any cost difference.

The Grenadier will to be joined this year by the Quartermaster double-cab ute.

There’s a third model in development now that will add alternative powertrain option, though this is on a separately developed chassis. It’s clear this new vehicle will share all of the off-road capability of Grenadier and Quartermaster.

The Grenadier bears a resemblance to the Defender County Wagon that inspired it, which prompts thoughts that maybe Land Rover management are a bit sorry they didn’t work a bit closer with Ineos, given that the new vehicle erases every quirk of the old Defender, and will cruise through rough terrain that would leave a new Defender gasping.

Though up front the bonnet shape is visibly different, it follows the basic theme of a Defender, leaving the front guards alone to give the driver the best possible view of the terrain. No ‘clam-shell’ bonnet allows this kind of view.

Headlights and driving lights are LED units.

Though the truck’s turning circle is around 13m, the Grenadier coped fine with tight turns on the single-vehicle width test route. Driver inattention did see a couple of the ten-strong launch fleet into a three-point manoeuvre at hairpin turns through gateways, and as usual in Australia, iron-hard tree trunks stand right at the edge of the trail through Wombat, waiting to punish any inattention.

The steering is recirculating ball steering, which out-performs rack and pinion in true  off-road conditions and enables engineers to design steering assemblies that are well tucked up out of harm’s way.

The steering does have a different feel from straight ahead, but the truck tracks straight and true nonetheless.

The all-wheel disc brakes are by Brembo and – get this – braked towing is rated at 3500kg. That’s the ‘industry standard’ for utes, and very few SUVs can match it, especially SUVs with plush coil spring suspension at all four corners.

The Grenadier has huge ground clearance: 264mm.

That’s very useful on our test route where we were often edging down bedrock shelves or scrambling over loose flat pieces of rock the size of suitcases. Did that ground clearance make it difficult to climb in and out? Not for us, grab handles are well placed and side steps offer a robust base to climb in or out. Grenadiers equipped with rocksliders are only slightly trickier.

All five seats are by Recaro, finished in leather or cloth. Supportive and equipped with side bolsters that do the good job of retaining occupants during rough going. Again, this is an area where the Grenadier simply outshines its rivals as a purpose-designed off-road SUV.

In keeping with the ‘keep it simple’ mantra, seat operation is fully manual so less to deal with if the wading depth of 800mm is reached or exceeded. go wrong when you’re washing out the interior.

The toughest part of the drive route was Ratcliffe Track, tackled in both directions.

There was a bowling-ball rock on the apex of one corner which we avoided – at about 350mm it was more than our ground clearance was good for. Hard rock step-downs occasionally grounded-out a side step but they are obviously built to deal with much worse.

A creek drive-along presented no issues, the Grenadier in 4-lo with only the centre diff locked.

Diff articulation is as good as any 4WD with live axles can be (in other words better than any full-independent set-up). A wheel only occasionally lifts off and the 4WD system keeps the truck moving without murmur.

Hill descent control has come a long way. Our first experience of such system was at the launch of the Land Rover Freelander in the late 1990s. It was effective, though noisy and juddery on wet grass downhills.

The Grenadier’s is a revelation, speed adjustable and quite capable of bringing the vehicle to a complete stop on downhills. Feet-off downhills still feels weird, but it’s also quite serene.

This review only scratches the surface. How to describe all the many areas where the Grenadier excels with limited magazine space? Impossible. For example, the four grab rails and the four high-rated power outlets nestled safely behind the bars; the high load rated ‘utility belt’ cargo system on each side of the truck; the four standard five tonne rated recovery points; the winch (standard on some Grenadiers, optional on others) that hides behind the flip-up front number plate; the double dust seals on all five doors. The three-piece front bumper, which reduces repair/replacement costs after a tangle with a roadside rock or gum tree. Safari roof windows above driver and front seat passenger.

Any prospective owner who enjoys 4WD adventuring will find this SUV exceeds expectations.

So where did we go?
Lerderderg State Park is close by the quaint rural town of Woodend, an hour’s drive from Melbourne. It’s not far from Mt Macedon and Hanging Rock. With a population of just over 5,000 people, it nonetheless has two classic Aussie pubs. Woodend has long been a haunt of well-off Melburnians, who double the population each weekend during summer.

The Lerderderg State Park features grassland, eucalyptus forest and the steep-sided Lerderderg Gorge, carved by the Lerderderg River. Walking trails fan out from O’Brien’s Crossing campsite in the north. Part of the Lerderderg Track winds from northwestern Blackwood to Bacchus Marsh in the south. Park wildlife includes wallabies, echidnas and birds like wedge-tailed eagles and cockatoos. This is real Australia, and a suitably tough environment to drive test a proper 4WD.