Innholdsfortegnelse for 2/5/2018 i Autocar

TAKE THE CARS and stands from the Beijing motor show last week, remove their badges, put them in the Detroit show halls and you’d struggle to tell the difference between the average, everyman Chinese car and its US equivalent. That’s how much progress has been made in the Chinese car industry, a celebration of which we experienced in Beijing. Yes, there is still the odd unwelcome copycat design, but the average Chinese car now bears no relation to the stereotype. They are not necessarily yet suited to European tastes, but that is also true of many US cars. One car in particular stood out at Beijing: the Geely Icon. It’s a close-to-production on-trend concept with a distinctive design of true global appeal. True, it has a head start on most…

The X-Motion will become MG’s third SUV in the UK when it arrives next year. Shown in concept form in Beijing, the model takes design cues from last year’s E-Motion electric sports car concept. The X-Motion will sit above the ZS and GS in MG’s SUV line-up and get a 2.0-litre petrol engine. Electrified variants are also expected. AUDI STRETCHES Q5 – FOR CHINA ONLY Audi’s first long-wheelbase SUV, the Q5 L, is claimed to have 110mm more leg room for rear passengers. It is a China-only model, catering for the country’s unique demand for models with more space for rear occupants. FORD ESCORT IS ALIVE AND WELL Ford has shown a new China-only Escort, a midsized saloon to be sold alongside the new Focus. The Mk1 Focus replaced the…

The forthcoming Lotus SUV will position the Norfolk-based brand as more of a luxury car maker than previously. Peter Horbury, design boss of Geely, which acquired Lotus last year, said: “The question is where Lotus can be positioned in the market, where it is today and where the competition might be. China is a huge market for luxury, more expensive cars, so that’s a possibility. “SUVs were never on the agenda at Porsche until someone dared to suggest to the board it might be a good idea. Where would they be today if they hadn’t?” Horbury, who previously headed Ford and Volvo design, was coy about details of the upcoming SUV but said: “It’s never going to be as light as an Evora. But I’m sure if you’re calling it…

Details, details, details. Yes, there’s a new Porsche 911 GT3 RS and that means there are lots of them. This is how GT Porsches go. Is there a more consistent, more progressively evolutionary range of sports cars? GT comes, GT goes, probably a 3, maybe a 2, sometimes an RS, another GT arrives. All towards the latter end of a particular 911’s model cycle. All with minor but significant upgrades over the last. And, usually, redefining just how lovely you thought a driver’s Porsche could be. The latest evolution comes in the form of the ultimate naturally aspirated ‘991.2’ generation of the 911, if you like these codes (and they seem to be the only way to keep up, sometimes), which will remain on sale until this generation of the…

Before we discuss the process of driving this tactile mid-engined Porsche, you need to establish how you feel about a four-cylinder sports car that costs £76,000. Granted, that is some way in excess of the £59,886 base price for this Cayman GTS, and chiefly down to its superbly crisp composite brakes (£5117), the perhaps overly firm caress of its optional bucket seats (£2316), a fashionably ordinary exterior hue known as Crayon (£1658) and crystal-clear LED headlights that adapt their gaze for oncoming traffic (£1397), but for many, that kind of money should still bequeath at least half a dozen pistons. Not that this 2.5-litre boxer engine has ever lacked raw performance. Here, a new intake duct and revised turbo raise its output to 361bhp – 14bhp over the £51,850 Cayman…

FIRST REPORT WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To ascertain if so much power and four-wheel drive are assets or unnecessary excess. And, well, because it’s an M5… I can’t remember a car that has been busier on its arrival on the Autocar long-term test fleet than the new BMW M5. With decent reason, I suppose: it’s a new M5. They are rare, and we want to see, as quickly as possible, just how good they are. From the moment it was collected from north Wales, the M5 was being used in a group test alongside a Mercedes-AMG E63 S and a Cadillac CTS-V. It won. Then it was videoed alongside an E63 with two different testers – me included. It won again. (Albeit with a lot of love for the AMG,…

Suzuki Swift Sport £10,000 The saucy Suzuki Swift Sport is an entertaining little rascal that we’ve always had a soft spot for. It has belligerently bucked the turbocharged, small-capacity engine trend and proudly flown the flag for natural aspiration. But the next Swift Sport will be getting a turbo. Shame. The sensible stuff first. The boot is small and the rear seats are best suited to young children, but then this isn’t a very big car. It’s a well-equipped one, though, with all the mod cons such as climate control, satnav, cruise control and a DAB radio. None of this makes it go faster, but it’s welcome in a sensible commuter car. When you do escape the urban sprawl, there’s a naturally aspirated 1.6-litre petrol motor that thrives on revs…

“The 911’s new structure is claimed to bring greater levels of static stiffness and dynamic rigidity” Porsche is less than six months away from the launch of its fastest and most technologically advanced 911 yet. The new eighth-generation model, which uses the internal codename 992, is set to make its public premiere at the Los Angeles motor show in November before going on sale in the UK early next year in initial rear-wheel-drive Carrera and Carrera S guises. Further new 911 models will follow throughout 2019, including an advanced new four-wheel-drive Turbo, which insiders at Porsche’s Stuttgart headquarters suggest will make as much as 600bhp in range-topping S form, giving it the same output as the limited edition 911 Turbo S Exclusive launched last year. The 20bhp increase in output…

Blume has granted a production green light to a new coupé derivative of the third-generation Cayenne. The new model, conceived to rival the BMW X6 and Mercedes-Benz GLE Coupé, is intended to broaden the scope of the Cayenne line-up. UK sales are planned to begin during the fourth quarter of next year, according to engineering sources close to the German car maker. First hinted at by Blume in an interview with Autocar last year, the five-door Cayenne coupé will be based heavily on its more practical Cayenne sibling, alongside which it will be assembled at Porsche’s factory in Leipzig, Germany. The new Porsche model receives the same front-end styling as the third-generation Cayenne, albeit with a unique front bumper design. But in a move mirroring that of its key rivals,…

Geely has a long-term ambition to sell cars under its own brand name in Europe, with a production version of its Icon concept from the Beijing motor show a possible first step. The Icon concept, which is based on the Volvo XC40’s CMA architecture, should make production within 12 months. With minimal changes expected, it will be the most sophisticated and technically advanced Geely model yet. That sophistication also opens it up to wider export appeal. The Chinese car maker, which owns Volvo and with the Swedish company has set up the Chinese marque Lynk&Co that will export to Europe and North America, exports to South America, Russia and the Middle East with Geely branded models but has yet to enter a western market. “We’re not stuck to China with…

PEUGEOT IS PLANNING a dramatic new concept car that previews a potential new range-topping model. While details of the concept car are scarce, CEO Jean-Philippe Imparato confirmed to Autocar that the Paris motor show in September would play host to “something very outstanding and radical”. The concept is likely to be electric. This would be in line with Peugeot’s plans for every new model from 2019 to have an electrified version, according to Imparato. He said the firm would not be launching stand-alone electric vehicles, nor dropping diesel. Instead, an electrified version would be one of the options available in any given model range, alongside traditional petrol engines and, in most line-ups, diesel. “One hundred per cent of new launches will have electrified versions from 2019,” said Imparato. “You will…

The fastest thing about many supercar start-ups is the speed at which they fold, some producing nothing more than broken promises during the brief period between foundation and demise. Not so Pagani. The Italian manufacturer remains a tiny player when compared with Ferrari and Lamborghini, but it has proved to be in it for the long haul. Next year marks the 20th anniversary of the company’s first car, the Zonda, and its second, the Huayra, is still going strong in £2.3 million Roadster guise. But the company is far from complacent, with boss Horacio Pagani telling Autocar that he is seriously considering an electrically powered future for the brand. Horacio Pagani has always been a pioneer. He left his native Argentina to work for Lamborghini in the 1980s, rising to…

MODEL TESTED W12 FIRST EDITION Price £191,500 • Power 626bhp • Torque 664lb ft • 0-60mph 3.6sec • 30-70mph in fourth 5.0sec • Fuel economy 20.3mpg • CO2 emissions 278g/km • 70-0mph 43.7m Is it fair to define the Bentley Continental GT as a modern-day icon? On the basis that rivals chiefly built in Maranello and Gaydon have persistently kept it from the top rung of Autocar’s road test rankings for super-GT cars, you could convincingly argue that it is not. Then again, few other machines at the pricier end of the spectrum have had such an overwhelmingly positive impact on their maker’s fortunes, and certainly not when that maker possesses the history, cachet and general pomp of Crewe’s famous automotive export. Bentley was acquired by Volkswagen AG in 1998…

McLaren’s suspension system is no less fiendishly complicated on the Senna than it is on its other road cars. It has hydraulic springs, with two chambers on each corner: one for heave (front-rear), the other for roll (side-to-side), with an accumulator between them, to accommodate fluid as it moves. With one side or end pressuring another, the Senna stays flat and resists dive and roll, the latter without anti-roll bars. It’s what gives its road cars exceptional ride quality. So while there’s a coil spring on each corner of the Senna, it’s very small and just there to maintain a static ride height. There are oil-filled dampers on each corner, too, and as you flick through the road-biased driving modes it’s these that stiffen, thanks to a reduction in the…

Get from A to B to Zzz Reading the article on Clearmotion’s suspension technology and Steve Cropley’s column on autonomous cars (Autocar, 11 April), one cannot help thinking that in the future cars will become multimodal transport. I for one would welcome a car with ‘office mode’ with a nice smooth ride and 5G access in a brightly lit environment. Or how about relaxation mode with massaging seats and mood lighting? Or sleep mode for longer drives where you can have relaxing background sounds and perhaps the suspension adjusted to a gentle rocking mode? Party mode with flashing lights and bass tube, anyone? The opportunities for full-on spirited driving in maximum attack mode are becoming increasingly limited so perhaps we need to look at how future cars can better fit…

MILEAGE 6851 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT It’s the first in a two-parter: diesel vRS for three months, petrol vRS for three months. Which makes the better buy? You’ve just landed at Gatwick airport on a soggy, misty evening in March. Your flight was delayed by a couple of hours and you still have 140 miles to drive home. You’re moody and irritable. It’s at times like these that all you want from your car is comfort, a level of effortlessness, plenty of fuel range – there are few things more frustrating than having to stop at a fuel station when all you want is to get home – and for the Bluetooth to just work. That’s exactly what the Octavia vRS does so well. As I said in the first…

MILEAGE 81,500 Farewell, then, to the toy car, which never let us down. It ate a few tyres but otherwise cost us nothing apart from the usual consumables and MOT tests. Here is the bottom line: it cost us £5000 four years ago from a dealer. We sold it for £3000, which means it cost us £500 a year. That is pretty spectacular value. Yes, we could have bought something for a grand and then spent a fortune keeping it on the straight and narrow. This was much better. It will be hard to replace, but we have. Details to follow very soon.…

There’s an all-new Wrangler coming to these shores next year. It looks a lot like the old one but, even more important, like the one before that. It’s a good time, then, to consider this most ancient version, the well-regarded Wrangler TJ, from 1996 to 2006. In fact, Autocar ran one – a Sahara 4.0 – as a long-term test car and, its lazy power delivery and bouncy ride notwithstanding, what fun we had. Today, prices start at £5000. As ever, when you’re talking about motors as old as 22 years, condition is everything, which is why you’ll find there’s little relationship between price and vehicle age. That said, be wary of ‘Defender inflation’ – the tendency for sellers to ask a bit more, since what else is there? Unless…

You may have read about the James Hull collection auction in our 28 March issue, but this 1968 Renault Caravelle stood out as one of the few cars at the sale from a foreign manufacturer. Produced between 1958 and 1969, the Caravelle was a rear-engined two-seat convertible to rival the Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. The listing for this late model made no mention of the removable hard-top it would have had as standard but it did say it needed fettling to make it roadworthy; the £5400 it went for is rather strong money for something without an MOT and missing ultra-rare bits. GET IT WHILE YOU CAN Ford Focus 1.0 Ecoboost Titanium Price new £24,405. Price now £15,400 The new Ford Focus has just been announced, which means you can find…

Upcoming Mercedes-Maybach models will have “next-level” suspension systems that will be an advanced version of Mercedes’ existing Magic Body Control set-up, according to Maybach chief engineer Jürgen Weissinger. He said one of the key elements is a new camera system, “so we have better information from rough roads so that drivers can slide over the road”. A new drive programme aimed at chauffeurs is also being introduced for the next generation of Maybach models. “We’re making a special drive programme, which means the gearchanges don’t happen too often so that the chauffeur can drive in a very comfortable, luxury way. This works without gearshifts and with maximum torque,” said Weissinger. These features are first expected to appear on the forthcoming Maybach GLS, which is due to be unveiled at the…

LYNK&CO HAS CONFIRMED that its first European vehicle, the 01 SUV, will launch as a plug-in hybrid. It will spearhead a range of five models for Europe that will be offered as only plug-in hybrid (PHEV), hybrid and electric variants. The brand, owned by Chinese firm Geely, will launch the 01 PHEV in Europe in 2020. A pure electric variant will follow by the end of 2020, said Lynk&Co boss Alain Visser. The 01 will be followed by the more compact, recently revealed 02. Although a 03 saloon concept has already been shown, it is most likely to be sold in China only, where such models remain popular. Visser said it is likely five Lynk&Co models will eventually be sold in Europe and it will be an “SUV-orientated brand”. However,…

Volkswagen’s motorsport boss Sven Smeets says that lessons from its 671bhp ID R Pikes Peak hill climb challenger will benefit the range of ID electric cars it will start rolling out in 2020. The machine has been built in an attempt to break the electric car record at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb in Colorado, which takes place on 24 June. The ID R is based on a heavily modified monocoque of a Norma prototype, which Romain Dumas – who will drive the ID R – has used to claim victory in the event for the past three years. It features two electric motors, which combine to offer permanent four-wheel drive and 470lb ft of torque. With the car weighing less than 1100kg (including driver), VW cites a 0-62mph…

FORD IS DEVELOPING its most engaging Focus ST yet with the proven 2.3-litre Ecoboost engine, making the future model its last non-electrified high-performance Focus. Replacing the old ST’s 2.0-litre, the 2.3 unit will have close links to the aluminium four-pot used by the 345bhp Focus RS but be adapted for life in the front-wheel-drive ST to offer around 250bhp. Since the next RS is due to kick-start hybrid power for Ford’s hot models from 2020, the upcoming ST will serve as the final chapter in pure combustion power for Focus hot hatches when it arrives in early 2019. Ford is understood to have chosen the 2.3-litre powerplant, rather than a more powerful version of the 1.5-litre three-cylinder featured in the new Fiesta ST, because the smaller engine would have to…

We’ve waited a long time for the BMW i8 Roadster. It was first previewed as the i8 Concept Spyder in 2012 but finally the plug-in open-top hybrid is on its way to the UK. It’s still decidedly contemporary, though. Even three years after the launch of the i8 Coupé, few cars at any price make such a powerful visual and technical statement as the new open-top BMW. If anything, the i8’s futuristic lines are further enhanced by the loss of its fixed roof, most notably around the rear, with its two large buttresses. The large fabric roof opens automatically in 15sec at speeds of up to 31mph and stows behind the two-seat cabin between the rear bulkhead and mid/rear-mounted petrol engine. To accommodate the new soft-top, BMW has modified the…

The sporting realignment of the Continental GT has got off to a fine start with this new 12-cylinder, launch-edition coupé. It retains all of the tactile material lavishness, top-level luxury and first-order touring refinement we’ve come to expect from its maker, but it probably halves the gap that existed between its predecessor and the best-handling cars in the super-GT niche on driver appeal. The car’s towering real-world performance and all-surface stability will be big draws for customers who use their cars on a daily basis, but they come partnered with much better body control and cornering poise than existing GT owners will be used to. But for one or two details, it’s hard to imagine how Crewe could have better delivered on this car’s dynamic brief. Granted, a couple of…

Walking into McLaren’s customisation suite is, I expect, a little like entering the Batcave. Housed on McLaren’s high-tech campus in Woking, the room is accessed by a flourish of the hand. There are no buttons or handles to get in, just high-gloss white walls all around. Open sesame, and you find yourself in a simplistic room with high-gloss white furniture full of car options, a large screen to showcase how your customised car looks in CGI and, the pièce de résistance, a real-life Senna, McLaren’s latest hypercar. Named after Ayrton Senna, the car was revealed at the Geneva motor show in March and the first of 500 customer cars will be delivered in July. So McLaren is well under way entertaining the first round of Senna buyers, showing them endless…

Goodwood Motor Circuit is steaming, but the Revival is still a fair few months out so this has nothing to do with the general atmosphere. Rather, the problem with which David Pook is deftly contending concerns the haze of evaporating rainwater partially cloaking a patchwork of standing water, bone-dry islets and every shade of unpredictability in between. He’s making corrections little and large, and he’s making them in areas of this frighteningly quick circuit not only where you might expect the need to arise but also where you absolutely would not. The time for discourse about the car’s limited suitability for daily driving, its frankly outrageous exhaust blare – which met homologation requirements with 1dB to spare – and his desire to capture, at least in part, some of what…

“It’s every bit as accelerative as its 523bhp output suggests, but it’s also nimble and athletic” When the new BMW 8 Series goes into production towards the end of this year, there’ll be a version that will be thumped along by a powerful twin-turbocharged V8 engine. The 4.4-litre motor will develop much more than 500bhp and it’ll drive all four wheels. What you need to know about the car is that it’s every bit as accelerative as that horsepower figure suggests, but it’s also nimble and athletic. Far from being a wallowy old bus, it is actually a lot of fun to drive. What’s most remarkable about the pre-production 8 Series I drove for a few hours on the best roads in North Wales, though, is that it won’t even…

DRIVEN New Ford Fiesta ST Our favourite pocket rocket is back, complete with a three-cylinder turbocharged engine. Matt Saunders rates it COMPARISON BMW M5 vs Alpina B5 Who makes the best BMW super-saloon? Andrew Frankel referees FEATURE Prodrive: what happened next From Le Mans-winning Astons to hybrid Ford Transit vans EVERY WEEK ROAD TEST Porsche Cayman GTS BMW M2 Competition rival runs the road test gauntlet FIRST DRIVE Mercedes G-Class Our verdict on the off-road icon completely reinvented for 2018 LONG-TERM TEST Land Rover Discovery Our time with the fifth-gen Disco is up. Matt Prior gives his final thoughts SUBSCRIBE autocar.co.uk/subscribe or see p22…

MILEAGE 11,130 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT Is it a logical next step towards full electrification or an expensive distraction? Few cars intrigue more While driving an electrified car requires some significant changes to your motoring life – getting out and wrestling with a whacking great cable as you plug it in being the most significant – there are also many more subtle aspects that creep up on you. I reckon all of them are positives, as three weeks and more than 1000 miles in the Prius reiterated recently. There’s the way, for instance, that chasing good economy scores suddenly becomes an unconscious goal. In the case of our plug-in hybrid, that principally meant keeping the mpg figure as high as possible, as well as gaming the car’s own scores that…

Civic buyers are nice, responsible people who know a reliable, well-built car when they choose one, even if the styling is a little bland. It’s a no-brainer buy, because it will never, ever let you down. Build quality is generally superb and reliability pretty much unquestioned by the vast majority of owners. All round, it’s a very safe set of wheels to buy and run. There is a lot to be said for owning a car that won’t cause you any hassle. Interestingly, the Civic can also deliver just a little bit more than basic transportation.…

An expert’s view CHRIS BASHALL, SURREY OFF-ROAD SPECIALISTS “Assuming both vehicles are in standard trim, a Land Rover 90 will beat a Wrangler TJ off road. The Jeep’s ground clearance just isn’t great enough and you can easily wallop the fuel tank. However, raise it a couple of inches with a good lifting kit such as ARB’s Old Man Emu and fit 31in tyres, and they’re more evenly matched. Being smaller and more agile, a well-prepared TJ will beat the later Wrangler JK as well. If you’re looking at a modified one, check it’s quality kit and that it has been fitted properly.” Buyer beware… ▪ ENGINE The 4.0-litre is prone to water pump issues so check for leaks. While you’re there, look for oil leaks from the engine’s rear…