JUNO, part of Land Rover’s Challenger programme around the cusp of the 1990s, was a rare unsuccessful experimental military project, writes Bob Morrison.
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[Edited 12 August 2026 **]
Many military Land Rover aficionados will be aware of the unsuccessful 1985 Llama heavy duty medium utility truck project, conceived as a replacement for the company’s FC101 or One Tonne model from the 1970s, but the JUNO is an even rarer beast.
In simple terms Challenger was primarily an engineering programme to create a next generation common platform that could bridge between the utilitarian fourth generation conventional Land Rover – the coil-sprung One-Ten / Ninety soon to be renamed Defender 110 / Defender 90 – and the more car-like Discovery model introduced at the end of the 1980s. In my opinion JUNO was possibly a decade ahead of its time and with more development could have evolved into a low cost military utility pick-up truck for the 21st Century, but the success of the Discovery and the evolution of the Freelander instead as the company’s fourth product line both explain its cancellation.
When looking back through my past writings on the Project JUNO pick-up truck, a photograph of which I was shown at the time by Director of Government & Military Operations (G&MO) George Adams but not permitted to publish because of its commercial sensitivity, I came across the following which I think explains why one of the three Land Rover Challenger prototypes was clearly military in nature. “The evolution of the cheap 4×4 pick-up in the 80s and the simultaneous emergence of the Sports Utility Vehicle, both of which quickly nibbled away at Land Rover’s military utility vehicle markets, caused Solihull to investigate the possibility of producing a Discovery-derived pick-up aimed at both civilian and military markets. As previously mentioned, second line British forces deployed to Saudi Arabia in support of frontline troops liberating Kuwait in 1991 were issued with Japanese pick-ups and SUVs. Mostly these vehicles only saw road use, with the occasional foray onto desert tracks, and user feedback was markedly positive.”
In that magazine article I also went on to explain that around this time Nissan had set up a production line in Barcelona to produce Patrol-derived pick-up trucks, subsequently bought by the Spanish Government to replace their ageing licence-built Santana Land Rovers. In February 1992 UK MoD announced that many global manufacturers (including pick-up truck makers Ford, General Motors, Nissan, Mitsubishi and Toyota among others) had expressed interest in tendering for **[the forthcoming Truck Utility Light/Medium (TUL/TUM) contract] a possible Commercial Pick Up Truck contract, so it was unsurprising that Land Rover’s G&MO team were thinking out of the box. However **as the Pick Up Truck requirement appears not to have progressed and Land Rover subsequently went on in 1996 to win all but the Heavy Duty segment of the TUL/TUM contract ~ albeit after having computer redesigned the Defender’s chassis and bodywork strengthening to meet latest Health & Safety requirements and having introduced a new (300Tdi) diesel engine to meet performance and emission requirements ~ with hindsight Land Rover Discovery Product Director Dick Elsy’s recommendation that Project JUNO be dropped was probably the correct one at the time.
JUNO was essentially a hand-built stretched wheelbase (2895mm or 114”) Discovery with Defender running gear powered by a Gemini 2, i.e. experimental pre-300Tdi, engine through a four-speed Range Rover automatic gearbox. The windscreen and dashboard were derived from the Discovery, as were the stretched door panels, and although it had wind-up rather than sliding side windows the door tops were removable in similar fashion to the military Defender. Cab seats were from the Defender and these were mounted on a seat box in Defender fashion. The bodywork was handmade and there were stowage lockers in the sides between doors and rear wheels. The removable canopy, with zipped rather than laced rear opening, was similar to that on the early (i.e. Wolf 1) Defenders offered for UK MoD TUL/TUM and there was a swing-away spare wheel carrier.
Some documentation suggests that several Challenger prototypes were were planned but only three appear to have been completed, of which one was this two-door truck and two were five-door station wagons. This JUNO, rescued by Philip Bashall for the Dunsfold Collection, is the only survivor with the other two having been crushed prior to him obtaining this example. All but two of my JUNO photos used here were taken on its first public outing at the Beltring War & Peace Show in 2001, with Phil himself behind the wheel, and the other two were taken ten years later at the Dunsfold Collection Open Day in 2011.
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** Paragraph edited 11th August on discovery of a hard copy of a 12 February 1992 MoD Contracts Bulletin in my archives.
