Innholdsfortegnelse for 16/05/2018 i Autocar

VERY FEW CARS cross into mainstream popular consciousness, let alone a humble four-door saloon costing from £25,000. Yet the Tesla Model 3 has done just that: the whole world seemingly knows what it is and represents. And now it can be said: the Model 3 is not a mythical dream engulfed in “production hell” (according to Tesla boss Elon Musk), but a truly desirable, big-range, affordable, compact executive car that’s brilliant to drive and just half a star shy of a maximum five-star Autocar verdict on Matt Prior’s first acquaintance (p26). The Model 3 proves that Tesla can make a great car, but it still needs to become a great car company. Finding a way to reliably build and then supply Model 3s to the hundreds of thousands of people…

THE UK’S DRIVER and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) has accused BMW of providing false information about a critical electrical issue in its cars that has recently been linked to a fatal road accident. The DVSA told Autocar that BMW knew in 2014 about 19 cases of an issue that can render a car completely powerless but it provided “incorrect information” that prevented “an informed decision” from being made to avoid a serious accident. The issue came to light during an investigation by the DVSA and a subsequent investigation by the BBC’s Watchdog. It is now known that close to 312,000 models, including 1 Series, 3 Series, Z4 and X1 petrol and diesel models produced between March 2007 and September 2011, are affected in Britain. BMW said the problem stems from…

Aston Martin has boosted the performance of its DB11 with an uprated V12 engine and race-inspired features, giving the new top variant, the DB11 AMR, enough firepower to compete with its most potent rivals. Replacing the two-year-old DB11 V12, which accounts for 40% of annual DB11 sales, the DB11 AMR gets an uprated twin-turbocharged 5.2-litre powerplant that develops 630bhp at 6500rpm and 516lb ft at 1500rpm. While the torque remains unchanged, the power represents a boost of 30bhp over the outgoing V12. Not only does this ensure that the hottest DB11 now has 127bhp of breathing space from the entry-level, AMG V8-powered car, it also provides enough muscle to take on the 626bhp Bentley Continental GT W12 and 621bhp V12 Mercedes-AMG S 65. As the AMR (Aston Martin Racing) moniker…

BMW says its new X7 will offer the same levels of luxury as its 7 Series saloon, in an attempt to take on the Mercedes-Benz GLS and Range Rover. The seven-seater, due in UK showrooms next year, will sit above the X6. Autocar recently had an early taste of one at BMW’s US factory in Spartanburg, South Carolina. “It’s much more than simply a long-wheelbase X5,” said Joerg Wunder, X7 project leader. “We set out to create an SUV that offers the same levels of luxury and comfort as the 7 Series. At the same time, great effort has gone into ensuring the X7 delivers the sort of driving dynamics and on-road characteristics that traditional BMW buyers expect.” Originally previewed in concept car form at last year’s Frankfurt motor show,…

“I spent an evening taking our Zafira's ventilation system apart and identified the fault” As a karate enthusiast, Dan Hunt is used to flooring opponents with a few well-placed strikes. However, it was his training as an electrical incidents investigator that helped bring his biggest opponent, Vauxhall, to heel. You see, Dan is the man who identified the cause of the fires that have claimed more than 300 Vauxhall Zafiras sold between 2005 and 2014. With the backing of Jo, his wife, and supported by the Zafira fires Facebook campaign group founded by Sue Freemantle and Claire Wheatley, Dan’s evidence contributed to the launch of two safety recalls, a report by the House of Commons Transport Select Committee and a criminal investigation by Trading Standards. “The work of Dan and…

Elon Musk wants to start a candy company. Yes, the CEO of Tesla (and SpaceX, once of PayPal) is, apparently, deadly serious about this, he tweeted the other day. Thus it means it has “never been harder to be a parody account”, according to a perpetually amusing Elon Musk parody account that presents ideas as if they were from a bored Elon. This stuff makes it hard, sometimes, to separate the noise around Tesla from the substance of Tesla. There’s more hubbub, more hype, more anti-hype, more short-selling of stocks, both more hoo-ha and doubt, more nonsense surrounding the company than there is any other vehicle maker. More scrutiny than there is around even Volkswagen. Despite, y’know, the obvious. To the chase, then: this is the Model 3, the third…

Common platform strategy must work out rather well for the Volkswagen Group, but for the Volkswagen brand its positive effect looks less clear. If your potential customer knows just enough to know that a VW Golf and a Seat Leon share a platform, after all, that knowledge is inevitably going to make the cheaper vehicle in the equation look like the smarter buy. With the new VW Touareg, however, the boot’s on the other foot. The cars this third-generation luxury SUV is related to are mostly more expensive. The Touareg’s active roll cancellation system uses the same technology you’ll find on a £140,000 Bentley Bentayga, and its four-wheel steering system is shared with a £165,000 Lamborghini Urus. But if you bought a new Touareg on the basis that it’s some…

The A110 is riotously rewarding on a dry track. The car’s moderate grip levels and permissive on-road body control are sufficient, on a circuit, to allow you to drive at what feels like full-blooded sports car pace when you want to. But when you discover what the car is really good at, pace isn’t what you’ll be interested in. Having selected Track mode and fully switched out the ESP, you can explore what must be one of the most forgiving, exploitable and brilliantly immersive chassis that the sports car market has produced in decades. The A110’s ‘yaw damping’ – the term dynamics experts most commonly use to describe a car’s ability to remain controllable in an oversteer slide – is quite spectacular. Unlike so many mid-engined cars, it’s happy to…

This isn’t the first time we’ve had this dilemma. Do we invite back last year’s Britain’s Best Driver’s Car winner (the Porsche 911 R), as is our protocol, even if it is no longer available? Or do we pick a version of the car that has, effectively, superseded it (the Porsche 911 GT3)? After all, you can’t realistically have them both there now, can you? So we made the sensible call: bring the new one, the one you can buy; or, at least, the one that is as available as any Porsche from the Weissach GT division. And trust that they’ve made it better or that, at least, it’d hold a candle to the previous year’s winner. It would. The 911 R (winner of this contest in 2016) was a…

Spare a thought for the Mk1 Audi S3, because only 0.5% of more than 4250 respondents reckoned it was the best hot hatchback of all time. Instead, there was a considerable landslide for the latest Honda Civic Type R, which may or may not have anything to do with Type R owners and their predilection for going online. Anyway, it took an astonishing 20% of the overall vote to become the Autocar Readers’ Champion, more than twice as much as the next contender. That car, the Lancia Delta Integrale, was one solitary vote more popular than the third-placed Peugeot 205 GTi. Alfa Romeo’s Alfasud and the Ford Fiesta ST were next up, with notable mentions, too, for the Alfa 147 GTA, BMW M140i, Ford Focus RS (Mk3), Volkswagen Golf GTI…

FIRST REPORT WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To determine whether the country’s best-selling new car is as worthy of that title as its brilliant predecessor was ‘Something-Line’ models. You know the breed: they’re the sheep in wolf’s clothing, the converse of a Q-car. They wear the muscle of their most athletic cousins but behind the spoiler and big wheels are the heart and lungs of the family accountant. They’re everywhere: diesel Golfs dressed like Golf Rs, Corsas impersonating the VXR and C-Classes with dreams of being C63s. Now there’s another and it has just joined the Autocar fleet. Say hello to our new Ford Fiesta ST-Line, which flexes biceps with metallic alloy wheels (ours are the optional 18s), beefier bumpers and an ST front grille, but beneath its bonnet lives a…

2004 The year the Wind concept was revealed in Paris A lot of wind circulates around the nation’s garages but rarely of the Renault variety. “Never seen one” was the response of most mechanics we spoke to when seeking mechanical insights into the Renault Wind. Most but not all. In any case, they should be bracing themselves for a flood of the things. The Wind, a compact two-seat coupé with a clever folding roof, needs a new cambelt every six years or 72,000 miles, whichever comes first. Few have racked up that kind of mileage but, given that the car was launched eight years ago, the first 2010 Winds are long overdue a new belt while those from 2011, its final year after Renault canned it along with its other underperforming…

“The Cullinan is a full-capability off-roader ‘able to do whatever a Range Rover can do’” Rolls-Royce has bitten the bullet and created a super-luxury SUV designed to trump Range Rover and the Bentley Bentayga. Officially, it’s only three years since CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös revealed that his Goodwood-based company was planning a model to sit at the very top of the SUV market. But, by that stage, the Rolls-Royce off-roader idea had been simmering for a decade, not least because the marque’s BMW owners had been asking persistently for such a model. This week, the all-new, £250,000 Rolls-Royce Cullinan SUV is revealed, named appropriately after the world’s largest raw diamond, found in South Africa more than a century ago and now part of the crown jewels. Rather than being a mere…

You won’t find tourist buses in Unterhollerau. Not unless their occupants are touring automotive aluminium centres of excellence, which you’ve got to say is unlikely. But Unterhollerau is a vital and highly effective outpost of BMW – or, more accurately, Rolls-Royce. It may not be beautiful, but in these cream industrial buildings, every new Rolls-Royce will soon start its life – because every car will use the same chassis frame, trimmed to different widths, angles and dimensions according to model. I’m here to meet men who make this work: head of Rolls production concept Neil Crichton, Cullinan product manager Phil Harnett and two hugely experienced, grey-coated manufacturing gurus called Thomas and Manfred. I’ve been here before, but this time I’m going to learn what flexible architecture really means. Crichton, a…

THE FIRST PRODUCTION model from Aston Martin’s revived Lagonda brand will be a radical super-luxury electric SUV to reach the market 2021 as a rival to the Rolls-Royce Cullinan and Bentley Bentayga. The 114-year-old brand is being relaunched as a standalone maker of futuristic, high-tech luxury cars. That was previewed by a Lagonda Vision Concept saloon at this year’s Geneva motor show. While the first production Lagonda will be an SUV, a preview image released by the firm shows that it will follow the same bold design language. Marek Reichman, Aston Martin’s design boss, previously told Autocar that future Lagonda models would be “game changers” in the super-luxury class. He said the brand contrasted with Rolls-Royce and Bentley, which were like “Ancient Greece today” in comparison. Apart from confirming it…

The six-year journey that ends with this final instalment of the third-generation Lotus Exige is somewhat convoluted. First we had the V6 S, which was replaced in 2015 by a lighter Sport 350 model. A year later the fabulous Sport 380 arrived. Toyota’s 3.5-litre V6 had been stoked, yet more kilos were trimmed thanks to a generous helping of carbonfibre bodywork and there was an aero package. Then, last year, we drove a hardcore Cup 430 version. With revamped suspension, even more downforce and even less weight, it was the quickest street-legal Exige that ever was. It cost £100,000, was utterly beguiling on track but rightly compromised as a tool for the road. Which brings us to the last-of-the-line Sport 410. Think of it as a de-tuned, road-ready Cup 430…

Every significant component part of the A110’s driving experience – from the rasping turbocharged torque of its engine to the hilariously immersive poise and panache of its handling – is all about the F-word. Moreover, it’s ready to deliver its own fresh brand of intoxicating fun pretty much whenever, wherever and however you might want. It brings to life journeys and roads that rivals wouldn’t; and yet it has handling for which your affection can only grow as you explore it more closely. Anatomise the car and you won’t find too many mechanical ingredients or areas you could call genuinely exceptional, often in comparison with objectively stronger but less stirring rivals. But put them all together and you can’t help but conclude that the A110 is a much, much greater…

Say hello to the Vauxhall Victor. Well, if only we could. Insignia sounds like a disease you could catch or a dodgy tattoo. Name aside, there is an awful lot to like about this good old-fashioned car, which is our used car hero based on its real-world usability and its value. The latter is something that the Insignia celebrates. Back in 2009, even the basic S came with air-con, electric mirrors, cruise control and audio controls on the steering wheel. SE and Elite trims really deliver the goods. If you want to be naughty, an SRi is a move in the right direction and onto the pleasantly bonkers four-wheeldrive VXR performance model. From 2013 there was a major upgrade in terms of engines, spec, suspension and interior, so you will…

KIA STINGER GT For the past decade or so, Kia has found itself going from strength to strength. Quantum leaps in perceived quality and desirability have seen the brand evolve from a budget, often overlooked alternative to a bona fide mainstream contender across nearly every sector of the automotive market, from city car to seven-seat SUV. The arrival in 2006 of Peter Schreyer as design boss from Volkswagen played an integral part in this transformation. It’s thanks to Schreyer – recipient of our Sturmey Award last year – and the fresh approach he brought to reinventing Kia’s design language that the Korean manufacturer now has such a wealth of visually appealing cars in its line-up. What it has lacked, though, is a flagship; something to help elevate its brand image…

I met Toyota’s president, a genial and welcoming man with the merest hint of steel, standing outside the main office building that contains his office suite. Given that this was the Issigonis Trophy, and that Akio Toyoda himself used an original Mini to get around London in the 1980s while working for a merchant bank, his staff had sourced a neat little red Mini Cooper to be the perfect photographic prop. Toyoda drove it enthusiastically for photographs and posed, cheerful thumb up, from the driver’s seat. His office, where we chatted for considerably more time than I’d been told he had to spare, was extraordinary. It was stuffed on all sides with curios – trophies from Toyota’s Nascar campaign, messages from Formula 1 heroes, a hundred framed photographs and cartoons…

OUR REACTION TO the Alpine A110 alone would be enough to grant its chief engineer, David Twohig, the Mundy Award for Engineering, an award named after Autocar’s former technical editor and esteemed engine designer, Harry Mundy. Twohig and his 130-strong team managed to pull off the reinvention of Renault’s historic sporting brand in a spectacular way with the A110, as you can read on page 38. Twohig’s achievements don’t start and finish there. He is also the man behind the first-generation Nissan Qashqai – a seminal model that continues to heavily influence the car industry today – and the Renault Zoe, which launched at a time when electric vehicles were definitely not the norm. Twohig, reluctantly, says the Qashqai is his favourite of the three models: “It was the first…

WIN Letter of the week wins this ValetPRO exterior protection and maintenance kit worth £48 I fear Steve Cropley is wasting his time asking the chancellor if he knew his latest tax bands would have a devastating effect on new car sales (25 April). Philip Hammond can never see past balancing his books, so the answer will be no. The best clue so far as to what he is really up to can be seen in the latest DVLA budget. Only around 10% of the income from car tax finds its way into Phil’s coffers, most going on staff and collection costs. The DVLA predicted a lot less would be passed to Phil this year, because of the anticipated growth in zero-emissions/low-emissions vehicles. So, under the guise of an anti-pollution measure,…

MILEAGE 8328 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To see if the most hardcore TT is preferable to the cooking versions and a genuine alternative to a BMW M2 Whatever opinions you’ve pre-formed about the TT RS, its combination of talents is unarguably hard to find elsewhere. We’re not just talking about 400hp and all-wheel drive, either. Desirable two-door coupés with a compact wheelbase and usable boot are not exactly thick on the ground. Sure, there’s the BMW M2 and the Porsche 718 Cayman, but most mainstream manufacturers abandoned the segment long ago. Consequently, one of the RS’s most significant rivals comes from within Audi’s own stable: the slightly more middleweight in concept TT S. Its headline advantage over the range-topper appears, naturally enough, at the bottom line. A coupé, with a…

You’d have thought that after spending a fairly substantial but quite reasonably documented sum on the Lorry’s restoration, the windscreen wipers would have been replaced. Surely, they would cost about a quid. Well, with my trade discount card, the tiny little things cost a measly £7.50. At the time of writing, I haven’t fitted them but am poised to. It will be dead easy. I also bought a set of rather more expensive rubber bits for the Volkswagen Golf because, of course, modern cars have two different sizes. We will get on to that. Meanwhile, to be roadworthy, I’ll get on with the job.…

An expert’s view ALEC COBB, WIND OWNER “I bought my Wind, a 2011-reg 1.2 TCe GT Line, two years ago. It had only done 20,000 miles but has since racked up another 40,000. I had the cambelt changed last year for £450, which seemed reasonable. There have been two issues. The first was when a front ball joint started knocking and needed replacing and the other when a boot strut failed. The lid’s quite heavy so I guess the struts are under some strain. I say two issues but there is a third: the fact that even specialist workshops are unfamiliar with the model. The Wind shares many parts with other Renaults but it does have its peculiarities and it would be reassuring knowing a mechanic is aware of them.”…

Anew 286bhp version of the Golf GTI has been unveiled as the TCR Concept by Volkswagen at the annual Wörthersee fan meet in Austria. The new hot hatch has been conceived to celebrate Volkswagen’s participation in the TCR (Touring Car Racing) championship, in which it provides factory support to privateer teams with a 345bhp track version of the Golf GTI. Although billed as a concept, the front-driven Golf GTI TCR has been confirmed for production later this year, with Volkswagen officials suggesting volumes will not be restricted in number. But the development of the new Mk8 Golf, planned for introduction in 2019, is already at an advanced state, so the road-going Mk7 Golf GTI TCR appears set for a relatively short production life. Power for the latest in a long…

By 2040, the government’s proposed ‘Road To Zero’ emissions plan will require each new car sold in the UK to have an electric driving range of at least 50 miles. Cars on sale will be a mix of pure-electric vehicles, and fossil fuel (or other fuel) hybrids, augmented by a plugin battery and electric drive motor, as Britain’s motoring moves towards having no tailpipe emissions. The plan hasn’t met wholesale approval. The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders said it could not support plans that “do not appreciate how industry, the consumer or the market operate and which are based neither on fact nor substance”. CAN THE INDUSTRY COPE? The motor industry’s issue is that single-market legislation makes cars more complex and expensive. If, say, the rest of the EU…

MODEL TESTED PREMIERE EDITION Price £51,805 • Power 248bhp • Torque 236lb ft • 0-60mph 4.7sec • 30-70mph in fourth 6.0sec • Fuel economy 28.5mpg • CO2 emissions 138g/km • 70-0mph 42.6m There’s something distinctly Herculean about Renault’s revival of the Alpine brand. Here’s a French sports car manufacturer that hasn’t actually manufactured a sports car – or any car, for that matter – in around two decades. And yet the target that this Lazarus of the automotive world now has its sights set on with its first production car since 1995 is a true sporting giant: the Porsche 718 Cayman. Welcome, then, to the new Alpine A110. We first caught wind of a revived Alpine back in 2012 but it wasn’t until four years later – with the launch…

Greatness could easily make the good people of Rolls-Royce Motors Cars Limited complacent, couldn’t it? Think about it: what an unbelievably powerful brand they’ve got. Does any other car maker have the right to aim to make such an uncompromising luxury car? Probably not, and that has to make the working life of everyone at the company more simple, from designers and engineers right down to the men and women building the cars on the factory floor. Simple, perhaps, but clearly not easy. It isn’t easy, for example, to create something with the staggering technological complexity of the eighth car in all to bear the Phantom nameplate, and make it function with such immaculate refinement, polish, comfort and grace, straight out of the box, as this. The car’s ride isn’t…

As with supercars, the hot hatch market is dominated by cars that do very specific things. Yes, sure, they’re all hatchbacks and they’re hot – they’ve all got that in common. But the lines of demarcation are quite clear. A Volkswagen Golf GTI is a sound everyday driver with a degree of entertainment, a Golf R turns up part of that but stays usable. A Ford Focus ST is like a GTI but a touch more focused, a Fiesta ST more focused again and a Focus RS the one you wouldn’t necessarily opt for every day because it’s as keen to drive as a Renault Mégane RS. Which is a bit like the Focus RS, only less powerful, very keen to turn and ropier inside. Against all of these, a…

IT IS ENTIRELY in character that Ian Robertson – the inspirational sales and marketing board member at BMW for the best part of a decade, a former Rolls-Royce chairman and managing director at Land Rover – is setting up a new office within shouting distance of parliament at a time when he is officially retiring from the front line with the Bavarian manufacturer. Although he’s coy about the reasons behind the office, what’s abundantly clear is that Robertson has no intention of retiring in the conventional sense. Always on the front foot, always brimming with positivity and always ready with an answer to a question, this proud Brit’s talents are, you suspect, about to be put to good use by the powers that be. As such, this Lifetime Achievement Award…

DRIVEN New BMW M3 CS This M3 split opinion when it was launched, but it has evolved into one of the great sports saloons. We drive the ultimate version, the CS FEATURE DRIVE Porsche 911 GT3 RS vs Isle of Man Taking on the Mountain in Porsche’s finest driver’s car yet FIRST DRIVE New Audi A6 It’s a bread-and-butter Audi that promises to handle. So does it? EVERY WEEK ROAD TEST Aston Martin Vantage Reinvented sports car gets the full eight pages. Target: Porsche 911 FIRST DRIVE Volvo V60 The 40 and 90-series new-era Volvos have sparkled. Next up: Volvo’s 3 Series LONG-TERM TEST Mercedes-Benz X-Class Steve Cropley has the keys to Mercedes’ first pick-up truck SUBSCRIBE autocar.co.uk/subscribe or see p24…

MILEAGE 6121 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To discover if Vauxhall’s flagship offers an unbeatable mix of practicality, value and executive comfort in estate form I had intended to write about Brexit and being a ‘British brand since 1903’, as the Vauxhall radio ad goes. I had intended to praise the PSA Group on investing in Vauxhall’s light commercial vehicle production in Luton. I had intended to be asleep right now. I am, though, sitting in A&E and I’m bored. Three hours and 58 minutes ago, I was watching another trashy late-night documentary on another conspiracy theory about another missing passenger flight, waiting for my McLaren Senna video edit to go live on Autocar’s YouTube site. The dog started to bark. There was banging at the window. Shouting. Not an intruder. Grandad…

QUESTION My father is 82 and wants to replace his elderly Toyota Yaris with a small and reliable car that has an auto ’box. Ideas? Emma Read, Bridlington ANSWER The archetypal car for this sort of work is the Honda Jazz. It’s reliable, compact outside and large and practical inside, and if he’s buying new, there’s the option of a CVT automatic gearbox. If he’s buying used, lots of them were specified with this ’box too. AR QUESTION I need to transport building materials for my job. Can you recommend a large estate that’s good to drive for £15k? Ian Callow, Totnes ANSWER Two spring to mind: the Ford Mondeo Estate and Skoda Superb Estate. Both are decent to drive and offer acres of space in the back and in…

WAFT IN CUT-PRICE LUXURY Buyers have never flocked to big Citroëns in quite the way people who fancy big Citroëns have always thought they should, largely due to the question mark over their complexity and the reliability and depreciation issues attached therein. So hats off to those brave few who took the plunge and bought one of these lovely C6s when they were new. In fact, in the land of the UK, fewer than 1000 people did, which makes it something of a rarity and therefore, in our eyes, a collector’s car. But those who have travelled in one can hug themselves in self-congratulatory glee, knowing that this sleek aerodyne can, thanks to its self-levelling hydropneumatic underpinnings, waft with the very best of them. There’s a soft, pillowy ride with…

HONDA BEAT The trouble with a lot of otherwise admirable cars – the Mazda MX-5, the original Lotus Elan, the Fiat X1/9 – is that they’re simply too big. But the Honda Beat is a tiny mid-engined jewel of a car that packs a 63bhp, 656cc, 8000rpm three-cylinder engine and two seats into an overall length of just under 130in. Styled initially by Pininfarina, this ‘kei’ car’s design influenced other small convertibles, most notably the MG F. Immense fun to drive and rarer than hen’s teeth, this neat example sold at auction recently for under £3000, which in anybody’s book is a bargain. GET IT WHILE YOU CAN Ferrari California T Price new £156,060. Price now £147,000 The old entry-level Ferrari, the 2+2 drop-top California T, has been replaced by…