Simon Saunders, director of Ariel, told Autocar that back when the company was only making the road-focused Atom, an American called the company asking for an Atom with “about three feet” of suspension travel. Ariel wasn’t ready to do that then, but the idea percolated until Ariel turned it into the Nomad, launched in 2015. Having learned much while building hundreds of Nomads in the past 10 years, and having watched the off-road segment blow up, Ariel is ready with a second-generation Nomad 2. Only the steering wheel, pedal box, and fuel cap from the Nomad have carried over to Nomad 2. Starting with the frame, engineers used larger 2- and 2.5-inch-diameter tubing to increase stiffness by 65%. That figure’s achieved even with the Nomad 2 expanding its footprint, its wheelbase 1 7/8 inch longer, its track 2 inches wider. This also provides additional room in the cockpit, a reshaped aperture making for the easier ingress that original Nomad buyers requested.
There’s a shock behind the cockpit, that being a Ford engine. Ariel said the Honda K24 engines used in the first Nomad, starting with a naturally aspirated 2.0-liter and then a 2.4-liter four-cylinder, are increasingly difficult to source. So while the Atom 4 sticks with the turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder out of today’s Honda Civic Type R, the Nomad 2’s been swapped to the turbocharged 2.3-liter four-cylinder from the Ford Focus ST. The Nomad’s 2.4-liter Honda mill was tuned to 235 horsepower and 221 pound-feet of torque. The standard Focus ST makes 276 hp and 310 lb-ft. The base Nomad 2 comes with a detuned version of the Ford mill making 260 horsepower and 284 pound-feet of torque. An optional upgrade installs a new ECU with three engine maps starting at that base level, then rising to either 302 hp and 333 lb-ft. or 305 hp and 382 lb-ft. Shifting comes via the Focus ST’s six-speed manual gearbox or an optional Quaife six-speed sequential transmission.
The extra power motivates a rig that still only weighs about 1,550 pounds. The dash to 60 miles per hour is estimated to take 3.4 seconds, hitting 100 mph in another 4.1 seconds. Larger rotors with 40% more swept area and ABS get the thing stopped in reasonable time. The engine breathes easier, too, thanks to a radiator 2.5 times larger than before, and multiple filtering stages for the intake air.
At the corners, new suspension geometry with fully sealed bushings and ball joints not only swings the arms through 50% more travel, the angles cut down on the squat, pitch, and wallow of the first Nomad. K-tec dampers with Eibach dual-rate springs come standard; the options list starts with three-way adjustable Ohlins TTX dampers with remote reservoirs and springs and tops out at Bilstein two-stage dampers with remote reservoirs. Wheels are either plain 16-inch alloys, 16-inch beadlocks, or 18-inch lightweight forged units, the tire selection ranging from road to hardcore all-terrain. No matter how buyers mix and match, an optional hydraulic rally-style handbrake will make those J-turns and Scandinavian flicks that much crisper.
Body parts are fashioned from the same plastic used to make safety cones. Along with the larger entryway, livability takes big steps up in many small ways. A wing-shaped header rail above the windshield channels air to the dual-level intake behind the cockpit, also acts as a sun visor, and prevents illumination from the auxiliary Lazer LED spotlights from leaking into occupants’ eyes. Lightweight seats available in two widths or in carbon fiber can accommodate four-point harnesses. Switchgear from the Atom 4 is easier to use, flanking a full-color TFT display that includes gear position and shift lights, data logging, and an image from the reversing camera.
An options list with more than 100 items heightens customization, adding everything from a winch to in-cockpit brake bias controls. Ariel hasn’t revealed a price for North America, but based on the previous Nomad starting in the mid $80,000s, expect something over $90,000 this time.
