Vauxhall Grandland

The advert for the Vauxhall Grandland boasts about its 50,000 IntelliVent LEDs as though sheer quantity somehow equates to quality. Vauxhall would have you believe their car is less a vehicle and more a celestial entity, beaming forth enlightenment on every journey. But behind the flashy marketing and relentless obsession with illumination lies a simple, unglamorous question: what happens when these 50,000 LEDs start to fail?

 

LEDs, for all their energy efficiency and long lifespans, are not immortal. They will inevitably degrade or outright fail, particularly when subjected to the harsh conditions of a moving vehicle, such as vibration, temperature fluctuations, and exposure to the elements. Yet, Vauxhall’s advert gives no indication of how easy or costly it might be to replace even one of these 50,000 LEDs, let alone an entire cluster. Will you need to replace an entire assembly? Call in a technician? Mortgage your house?

In practical terms, this obsession with "intelli-everything" seems more like a clever way to upsell a costly and cumbersome feature under the guise of innovation. Want to change a headlight in your Grandland? Sorry, mate, that’s a dealership job now. You'll likely be billed hundreds of pounds to replace a light source that cost pennies to manufacture. Meanwhile, the environmental toll of throwing away entire LED assemblies, rather than swapping out a bulb, is conveniently ignored.

And what of the necessity? Do we really need vehicles with 50,000 lights? For context, the average human eye can distinguish about 10 million colours. Are we expecting to hold a light show or land a plane with this car? Or is this yet another example of automotive manufacturers stuffing cars with gadgets no one asked for while ignoring the fundamental priorities: efficiency, reliability, and affordability?

Vauxhall’s fixation on this absurd LED count smacks of a desperate bid to stand out in a crowded SUV market. It’s all razzle-dazzle to distract you from asking the hard questions about the car’s engine, fuel efficiency, or how it compares to its competitors. After all, a Grandland packed with LEDs is still, at its core, just another family SUV with a hefty repair bill lurking in the shadows.

So next time you see the Grandland gliding along, resplendent in its luminous glory, remember this: those 50,000 LEDs aren’t a feature. They’re a future headache.

As an aside, I delivered a Porsche Macan to a customer in Cardiff the other day. The centre console was like the console of a 747. It took me till the Prince of Wales Bridge to figure out how to turn down the heat, diverting my attention from driving.

Ridiculous!