Innholdsfortegnelse for March 20, 2024 i Autocar

Renault is set to launch an electric version of the next-generation Clio to sit above the reborn 5 as a slightly larger and more family-focused EV supermini. As previously reported by Autocar, Renault will introduce a new-generation Clio in 2026. In line with its commitment to provide small, affordable cars as it electrifies its line-up, the new Clio will continue to be offered with a full-hybrid petrol powertrain, but the flexibility of its architecture means an EV is possible too. The electric Clio will sit on a variation of the new Ampr Small platform, which underpins the new Renault 5, while the combustion version will continue to use the CMF-B architecture that is underneath today’s car. Ampr Small will be produced in three sizes – one for the 4 and…

THE MINI ACEMAN has been outed early, courtesy of new images published by China’s vehicle homologation body. The chunky electric crossover, which is due to be unveiled officially at the Beijing motor show next month, is in effect a downsized Mini Countryman. It will be offered in the same range of trim levels – C, E and S – and with a John Cooper Works range-topper that will feature larger wheels wrapped in lower-profile rubber. The electric-only Aceman, which is billed as the Mini with the broadest appeal, will initially be built in China on the same Spotlight platform as the Cooper EV, before both cars begin production at the firm’s Oxford plant in 2026. ZEEKR LEAK REVEALS MIX The new Zeekr Mix has also been leaked. The premium brand’s…

Mercedes-AMG’s first dedicated electric car is nearing completion ahead of its launch next year, with new images of the 1000bhp Porsche Taycan rival giving the best look yet at its sleek, aero-optimised design. Equipped with innovative drivetrain technology that is likely to make it the firm’s most powerful road car yet, the new super-saloon will in effect be a replacement for the V8-engined GT 4-Door Coupé. Mercedes’ performance division previewed the rakish four-seater in 2022 with a radical concept dubbed Vision 2025, which gave clues to how AMG plans to differentiate its own sporting EVs from the mainstream equivalents offered by its parent company. The concept was clearly more performance-focused than models such as the Mercedes-Benz EQE and EQS saloons, with a much lower and sharper silhouette. Distinctive styling cues,…

The Peugeot e-5008 has been unveiled as the French brand’s entry into a burgeoning class of electric seven-seaters, offering the best range in its segment and most likely the lowest price. The e-5008, which will also be available with a choice of hybrid powertrains, is in effect a stretched, straightbacked version of the e-3008: everything forward of the front seats is identical to the SUV-coupé, including the 21in wraparound infotainment screen, i-Cockpit control layout and array of 10 i-Toggle shortcut buttons inside. The new 5008 is, however, 250mm longer and 50mm taller than the 3008 and has a 150mm longer wheelbase. This expansion means there’s room inside for a third row of seats, suitable for teenagers, and provides roughly as much cabin space as the old 5008. The available boot…

MONDAY Fascinating to hear that MG’s centenary will be the big celebration at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed – and that the vehicle most prominent in sculptor Gerry Judah’s monumental installation in front of Goodwood House will be the Cyberster, a two-tonne electric roadster, special show editions of which are probably being built in China right now. Given the car’s mass, Goodwood engineers might even have to reinforce the elaborate but discreet foundations under the Duke of Richmond’s lawn to handle the weight of Judah’s girder-based structures. It has lately become fashionable to observe how canny MG’s Chinese parent, SAIC, was to purchase a well-known and succinct marque name – with an octagonal trademark thrown in. These assets have certainly brought success to the cars. But SAIC’s perception of…

Electric cars struggle to excite enthusiasts, so Maserati has used some powerful imagery to sell its inaugural crop of EVs: lightning, or folgore if you’re Italian. The first of them to arrive is the Grecale Folgore, a large (4.8m-long) SUV that has been on sale here in V6 and four-cylinder turbo petrol forms (and viewed with tempered admiration by Autocar) since 2022. There’s a lot of weight on its broad shoulders, not just because it sets the tone for the Italian luxury brand’s switch to electric power but also because it will be the volume seller – well, at least relative to the impending Granturismo Folgore coupé and MC20 Folgore supercar. That might be why, unlike the standard Grecale, which was very late to the D-segment SUV party, the Grecale…

Small BMWs have often shown a bit of an inferiority complex over the years. Transverse, high-set engines have meant they’ve lacked the perfect weight distribution and native rear drive that BMW is renowned for, leading them to overcompensate with a too-firm ride and reactive steering – just a slightly try-hard vibe. Electrification would, you might imagine, be an opportunity to start from a clean slate, but for now BMW is adapting ICE platforms for most of its EVs – including the new iX2. Its main motor goes in the front; the entry-level eDrive20 version is exclusively front-driven, while this xDrive30 gets another motor at the rear and thereby four-wheel drive. This is the car BMW is offering up against Audi’s Q4 E-tron Sportback, and it’s clearly hoping that sporty styling…

Macallan is the Bentley of whisky makers, so they tell me, and from the evidence I’ve seen, I will gladly take their word for it. It is 200 years old this year, and on its 458-acre estate opened a new distillery in 2018 and a year later a visitor centre that’s a cross between a Bond villain’s lair and the Willy Wonka factory. The distillery houses 36 stills that make 12 million litres of spirit a year. Just a dozen of the 270 people working at Macallan are responsible for making the 63.5%-proof spirit that provides 20% of the flavour of the whisky (it can only become a Scotch whisky if it has sat in an oak cask for more than three years), the rest coming from the sherryseasoned casks.…

n the evidence of this outing, the Silence S04, a new electric O quadricycle from a Spanish company that also makes electric motorbikes, does everything that the Citroën Ami promises to do but better. Established in 2014 by former Dakar motorbike racer Carlos Sotelo, Silence claims to now be the biggest specialist EV maker in Europe – which probably says as much about European and Chinese EV strategies as it does about Silence itself. It makes 40,000 bikes a year at Barcelona’s former Nissan factory. In the UK, Silences are imported by a team that includes former Jaguar Land Rover bigwig John Edwards, who greets me at the company’s Solihull headquarters. Opposite a parade of shops and takeaways, you can walk into this showroom and buy one of Silence’s e-motorbike.…

Let’s help ourselves To use British taxpayers’ money to help people buy foreign-made EVs – which helps foreign workers pay taxes to their governments, not ours – would be insane. Our tax money to help a foreign country succeed. However, to make an EV purchase grant applicable to only British-made cars (with Britishmade batteries) would make good financial sense. It’s the sort of upside I hoped to see from the mainly disastrous Brexit situation. ‘Lightbody’ Via autocar.co.uk It’s a non-starter Vauxhall boss James Taylor strongly criticised the lack of EV incentives in the chancellor’s spring budget. Today, you can buy a £40k Mokka Electric with delivery miles from a Vauxhall dealer for £23k. If the incentives that Vauxhall has called for were in place, Joe Public would still be able…

Edge by name and edge by its position in the used car market: this Ford sits in the peripheral vision of most buyers seeking a large SUV. It doesn’t help that the volume-brand rivals like it, such as the Hyundai Santa Fe and Kia Sorento, have seven seats compared with its five, or that the premium-brand cars with which it would rather compete, such as the Audi Q5 and BMW X5, have lots more cachet and ability. Nor does it help that it was on the market for just three years – from 2016 to 2019. However, you know where this is going: with prices starting at around £11,000 for a privately advertised 2016 210bhp 2.0-litre diesel auto with 77,000 miles and a full Ford service history, the Edge deserves…

WE WERE AMAZED last week by Porsche’s new Active Ride system, which nullified roll and pitch in a 2.4-tonne Panamera Turbo, even at track speeds. Twenty years ago, we were similarly impressed by novel suspension from a source we’d never have expected: Bose. In the Porsche system, each damper is actuated by a sensor-fed unit, inside which electric motors drive hydraulic pumps to lower or raise the wheel, thereby keeping the car’s body level at all times. In the Bose system, above each wheel where you would normally find a coil spring and damper was a linear motor containing coils and a magnet. With current applied, this would raise or lower the wheel as much as 20cm from the car’s body – more than 100 times a second if required.…

Many car designers over the years have restricted themselves to particular classes of cars, but Marcello Gandini, who passed away last week at the age of 85, could turn his hand to virtually anything, from storied supercars through to family hatchbacks and everything in between. So let’s pay tribute to a true automotive great by looking back at some of his best creations. Lamborghini Miura 1966 Gandini made his mark when he replaced Giorgetto Giugiaro as chief designer at Bertone and delivered this striking mid-engined supercar that was so gorgeous, Giugiaro claimed a part of it. Whatever the truth about the start of the project, Gandini delivered a statement of intent for upstart Lamborghini that even Enzo Ferrari couldn’t ignore. Gandini followed it with the open-topped Miura Roadster, with its…

“The first EV will be revealed in late 2026, with deliveries starting by the end of that year” Bentley is gearing up for the launch of its first bespoke electric car, which will offer up to double the power of any model in its current line-up. The British firm’s maiden EV had originally been due in 2025 as the first of five electric cars set to arrive at a rate of one per year when announced in 2022. The first EV, a standal-one model in the range, will now be revealed in late 2026, with deliveries starting by the end of that year. The later arrival of this electric car means that the subsequent EVs, which will replace existing models in Bentley’s range, have also been pushed back. Now, the…

RENAULT IS AIMING to slash its car development phase from three to two years in a bid to respond to market demands more quickly and cheaply. The move was announced recently by Renault Group CEO Luca de Meo, who said it would make the firm “more agile, more virtuous and more competitive”. Now, the company’s engineering boss, Gilles Le Borgne, has outlined exactly how such a drastic reduction in lead times can be achieved. Developing cars more quickly is crucial to Renault being able to compete with a wave of new Chinese manufacturers, which are rapidly occupying the most popular car segments in Europe with keenly priced alternatives to the established mainstream models. “If we don’t move, we are dead. We need to keep up,” Le Borgne (below) told reporters.…

VOLKSWAGEN HAS expanded its offering of warmed-up EVs with GTX versions of the ID 7 Tourer estate and ID 3 hatchback, with the latter serving as a long-awaited electric equivalent to the Golf GTI. As standard, the ID 3 is fitted with VW’s APP550 motor on the rear axle, where it makes 282bhp – up from 201bhp in the regular car. The increase in torque is even more substantial, with the electric motor producing 402lb ft – considerably more than the Golf R’s 310lb ft. The top-of-the-line ID 3 GTX Performance is more powerful still, with 322bhp giving a 0-62mph time of 5.6sec, making it VW’s quickest-accelerating EV. It has a retuned steering system configured for “greater precision”, while the Performance model features a new Dynamic Chassis Control system that…

THE MERCEDES-BENZ A-Class is set to be produced well into 2026, following the announcement that plans to retire the fourth-gen hatch this year have been cancelled. News of the move comes after Mercedes-Benz confirmed it was abandoning its EV-only stance in favour of what its CEO Ola Källenius describes as a more “flexible” model strategy, under which it will continue to produce combustion-engined models based on existing platforms into the next decade. The firm had been preparing to make its line-up fully electric by 2030, but Källenius has revealed that the firm’s latest studies project PHEVs and EVs are likely to make up just half of its global sales by then. “I don’t think anyone had ever thought that the oncein-a-century transformation of the auto industry will be a straight…

FORMER JAGUAR DESIGNER Ian Callum has partnered with Motability to create an EV concept for wheelchair users. The eVita, designed by Callum’s eponymous agency, is said to show what is possible “when inclusive design and engineering are at the fore”. Measuring 4520mm long and 1908mm wide, the concept takes up about as much road as a Hyundai Tucson but is substantially taller at 1800mm. With a slimline battery packaged just behind the front seats rather than across the floor, that means it has a much higher ceiling than is usually possible in EVs of this size. The completely flat floor enables wheelchair users to move around more easily and sit closer to other passengers, while the low, 180mm ride height means they have an uninhibited view of the road ahead.…

A feelgood Formula 1 story? Just what was needed in the circumstances. Thank goodness for young Oliver Bearman. Two races down, the 2024 season has been a barrel of laughs so far… Two dominant Max Verstappen victories, a pair of Red Bull onetwos and this bizarre scenario in which the sharpest team on the block seems intent on ripping itself apart from the inside. The power struggle involving Christian Horner, Verstappen’s father Jos, Helmut Marko and Red Bull company ownership factions in Austria and Thailand is a tawdry saga a long way from resolution. As ever, F1 moves on apace, this weekend to Australia. But the blast of fresh air provided by Bearman’s remarkable F1 debut for, of all teams, Ferrari will hopefully linger and invigorate a sport facing uncomfortable…

Don’t you hate it when you take a wrong turn on the way to the office and end up in a lake? Clothes are ruined, the car’s wrecked, and people fishing get cross. Well, the Yangwang U8 is here to help, because it can float for 30 minutes and even motor itself out by spinning the wheels. Allegedly. A Yangwhatnow? Yangwang is the prestige brand of BYD, and although there are no official plans to sell it in the UK yet, the firm’s executives are strongly considering it, and the fact that they’re showing the U8 to a bunch of UK journalists does say something. Yangwang isn’t pronounced the way you might expect it to be, by the way. The ‘ang’ bits sound more like the ‘aww’ you might say…

The second-generation Toyota C-HR in essence appears to be an impressive wholesale update of the original, but there is one thing that’s entirely new: the option of a plug-in hybrid powertrain. It has the larger of the regular hybrid’s two petrol engines, a larger battery, a more powerful electric motor for its ‘epicyclic power splitter’ transmission and some finer-detail technical differences. The PHEV carries its battery under the centre of its cabin floor and weighs just under 200kg more than the 2.0-litre hybrid. But it also features stiffened axles and chassis members, extra vibration damping front and rear and new frequency-selective passive dampers. With 220bhp, the PHEV is nearly a second quicker to 62mph than the 2.0-litre hybrid – although it clearly won’t be blowing any socks off. Efficiency and…

The W12 engine configuration, favoured as effectively a shorter V12 for better packaging, was used in fleeting aircraft and motorsport applications before finally appearing in a road car in the Audi A8 of 2001. It also served in Volkswagen’s Phaeton and Touareg, but its application is most famous in various Bentleys. Since first appearing in the Continental GT in 2003, the W12 has had its power improved by 34% and its torque by 54%, peaking at 740bhp and 738lb ft in the 2023 Batur, all while CO2 emissions have been reduced by 25% (it entered a second generation in 2015). Each 254kg engine takes 30 people six and a half hours to build from 294 components and is then tested for 21 and a half minutes to 3800rpm and a…

MODEL TESTED M COMPETITION • Price £131,405 • Power 617bhp • Torque 553lb ft • 0-60mph 3.5sec • 30-70mph in fourth 4.8sec • Fuel economy 20.5mpg • CO2 emissions 291g/km • 70-0mph 44.6m Super-SUVs like the BMW X6 M have always been a puzzling concept: big, heavy and tall, yet supposedly also fast, sharp in the corners and fun to drive. For the traditional car enthusiast, they have never really worked. But it seems modern suspension technology is allowing the super-SUV to come of age. Four-wheel steering, active anti-roll bars and air suspension – or in the case of the Ferrari Purosangue, mind-bending spool-valve dampers – all work together to deal with the weight and high centre of gravity of these SUVs to create genuine driver’s cars. The X6 M –…

MILEAGE 4554 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To see if the most important McLaren in a dozen years is as easy to live with as it is fun to drive It seems strange having seemingly just got hold of the Artura to discover the car is already being updated. Now it is entirely normal for companies to fractionally change their cars with each new model year, but this is no minor cosmetic tweak: it’s a major mechanical upgrade. Because it coincides with the arrival of the Spider version, it might be easy to miss that the revised Artura comes with another 20bhp, 25% quicker shift times, electronic dampers that react 90% faster, a new exhaust system to make the most of the V6’s natural tones, a wheelspin mode to the launch…

Oh, Matt Prior, how right you are about the driving skills of the UK public, their lane choice, their signalling, their distraction and the need for more ongoing training (Tester’s Notes, 28 February). I’ve worked in the automotive industry for many years and received plenty of continued driving training and assessment. More recently I undertook the four-week CERAD course to drive ambulances in response situations (so with blue lights). Even after many years of driving, the amount I learned was phenomenal. The driving skills I see on a daily basis sometimes beggar belief. Can I add one lost skill set – the use of rear-view mirrors – to your list of woes? I find it amazing the number of drivers who have no awareness of a large, yellow and green…

An owner’s view KEVIN FINNIS “My Edge is a 2016-reg Sport with 61,000 miles. It’s a TDCi 180, so it has the manual gearbox, which is smooth. Economy is around 37-40mpg. It has been trouble-free apart from a failed alternator. It’s a big car but not so big that you have to find a parking space at the far end of every car park. It fits between other vehicles and access is fine. It fits under multi-storey car park barriers, too. There’s bags of rear-seat space. We have fitted a child seat that can turn 360deg, and getting our youngest in and out is so easy. I didn’t know about the noisecancelling feature, but it’s very quiet.” Buyer beware… ENGINE All engines have a timing chain, so routine replacement is…

“The SQ6 E-tron has its motors tuned to offer 483bhp, rising to 510bhp when launch control is on” The new Q6 E-tron represents a “technological leap” for Audi, boss Gernot Döllner has claimed, as the brand’s first model built on a high-tech new platform. The BMW iX3 and Jaguar I-Pace rival will be launched with a choice of dual-motor all-wheel-drive powertrains, including a range-topping SQ6 E-tron with up to 510bhp. It will sit between the Q4 E-tron and Q8 E-tron in Audi’s bespoke electric SUV line-up. But while the new SUV’s exterior styling is a relatively conservative development of those existing models, the technology it features promises a significant step forward from the firm’s previous EVs. The Q6 E-tron uses the advanced new Premium Performance Electric (PPE) platform that Audi…

The Epiq name is apparently derived from the ancient Greek word ‘epos’, which can mean ‘word’, ‘verse’, ‘tale’ or ‘poem’. Skoda says it “evokes positive associations such as amazing, extraordinary and remarkable”. The next model in Skoda’s electric car offensive will be a new entry-level SUV called the Epiq, which is due to go on sale next year at less than £25,000. The Epiq, which was shown in concept form as Skoda revealed its 2023 financial results, is a rugged, 4x4-inspired sibling to the Cupra Raval and Volkswagen ID 2 superminis, conceived as a rival to the likes of the reborn Fiat Panda and Renault 4. It is the second of six new electric cars due from Skoda in the coming years, the first being the Elroq compact SUV, which…

BACK IN THE day, if you wanted a car with rock-solid cornering and limpet-like grip, the trade-off would be giving up any expectation of ride comfort. That doesn’t matter on a race track, but even the most devoted enthusiasm can fade under the relentless, toothloosening onslaught of rigid suspension. Premium car makers have battled with this compromise quite successfully over the past couple of decades, using tech such as adaptive dampers, active anti-roll bars and air springs to get as close as possible to the ideal body control/comfort compromise. One of the latest examples is the Porsche Active Ride system, announced early this year. The boast is that the system gives both the comfort of a saloon and the handling and agility of a sports car – so how does…

IF YOU WORK in a large organisation like a car company, you learn to keep little files ‘for future use’. These are not pictures of your boss in compromising positions but much tamer material, kept stashed away to help win arguments. The head stylist at one car maker pulled out his file named ‘Wheels’ when trying to get the engineering department to agree to fit 21in rims on the facelifted version of a sports coupé. The engineers insisted 21s would need expensive modifications and ruin the ride, handling and fuel consumption, leading to customer complaints. It simply wasn’t worth the effort. The designer waited for them to finish their presentation then showed a similar set of slides that the department had given when there was a battle over 20in wheels…

I don’t use a dashcam, despite how useful they can be to prove one’s innocence following a collision. That’s partly because of the faff of setting one up every time I test a different car, but mostly because of who I might become. When dashcams first appeared, I didn’t anticipate how they could turn a number of us into – how to put it? – such antagonistic snitches. A bunch of lowdown grasses. Squealers. People thriving on catching other road users making errors and then taking delight in fessing them up online. Could I be that kind of person? Perhaps. Best not find out, I think. So popular, if that’s the word, is the pastime that it’s encouraged by police services, who appreciate us doing the legwork. They even later…

In a decidedly old-school format, Skoda’s latest Superb Estate follows the theme set by its predecessors. This large estate (and hatchback, to follow shortly) has plenty of equipment and is cavernous inside, and it comes with a range of purecombustion, or mild or plug-in hybrid, engines. Even a diesel, of all things. Crikey. The Superb has typically been well received in the UK – we’re among its biggest markets – from which other similarly conceived cars (Ford Mondeo, Vauxhall Insignia) have been departing. “That gives us the opportunity to fill the gap for customers looking for a traditional offering,” says Tatiana Cizmar, from Skoda’s product marketing division. She says those customers want “roominess, practicality, usability, a good range of equipment…” I mean, that lot does sound quite straightforwardly compelling. Prices…

After not even two years on sale, the Volkswagen ID 5 has been through a round of revisions. The ID 5 is an SUV-coupé, in manufacturers’ terms: a 4.6m-long, 1.6m-tall five-seater with a decently large (549-litre) but raked boot. Here I’m testing the GTX rangetopper, with dual-motor four-wheel drive and a list price of £55,650. It has had a 40bhp increase to 335bhp, as all ID 5s (and their square-backed ID 4 siblings) now use Volkswagen’s AP550 drive unit, as introduced on the ID 7 saloon. Meanwhile, some efficiencies have been made in thermal management to get more out of the 77kWh (usable capacity) battery. The official range is therefore up by 10 miles to 328 miles, while it can now be charged more quickly too, at up to 135kW.…

“First, what do you think?” asks Kirsteen Campbell, creator of the new Bentley as I approach her with a few questions about her latest work. This isn’t after getting out of the Flying Spur Speed Edition 12 that I had spent the day driving – one of the very last W12-powered Bentleys to leave the Crewe factory line as the famous old engine fast approaches retirement – but after having a taste of the latest Bentley. For this is no normal Bentley but a whisky, and Campbell is no normal Bentley engineer but a master whisky maker. Don’t worry, you are still within the pages of Autocar and I will explain how we got here shortly. Rather than Crewe, this story of the development of a new Bentley comes from…

“What I like about BMW is that there’s often a story and even a bit of romance about even the smallest detail,” says Steve Saxty, automotive design engineer turned author. “It’s far from being the typically cold German company people might imagine it to be.” Through a selection of design details associated with the brand, Saxty hopes to persuade me of that. However, before he runs through his favourite, heart-warming BMW stories, gleaned from research at the company for his latest tome, he wants to talk about PSD, short for proportion, surfacing and detailing. “There’s a misconception about car design that you pop on a signature detail and you have a brand,” he says. “To begin with, there are the car’s proportions to consider. They’re determined by many things, not…

MILEAGE 4333 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To see if the new Avenger is finally the Jeep to crack Europe The terrible wet and windy weather we’ve been having these past few months seemed to peak one Saturday morning in early March, the M25 virtually turning from day to night as the spray from the surface met with low rain clouds above to make visibility very poor. I was in the outside lane but, like everyone, driving sensibly at no more than 60mph. Then the turning of day to night occurred inside the Avenger too, with all the digital features dying entirely. The radio went first, then the touchscreen, then the instrument display. There was a loud beep, like the one when you pressed all the keys at the same time…

12-CAR MEGA-TEST The best EV for less than £40,000 New Volvo EX30 takes on Tesla Model 3, Renault Mégane, Kia Niro and more as we seek the best affordable EV on the market DRIVEN Suzuki Swift Supermini gets new look and upgraded petrol powertrain for fourth generation DRIVEN Jeep Avenger Is the new baby Jeep as impressive with an engine as it is with a motor? EVERY WEEK ROAD TEST Fiat 600e New crossover aims to blend 500’s retro charm with family practicality USED GUIDE Citroën Grand C4 Picasso Who needs an SUV when you can have this bargain seven-seat MPV? SUBSCRIBE autocar.co.uk/subscribe or see p22…

A road test in any other magazine might well be a short, subjective summary of a new car produced under almost any circumstances, but the Autocar road test is different. Specific, rigorous and detailed, it’s the closest examination we can give of any new model. It appears over at least eight pages and is close to 50 man-hours in the making every week. Most of what the road test process entails is designed to be strictly repeatable and fair. We benchmark standing-start and in-gear acceleration at a purpose-built test facility every week. We carry out both subjective and objective handling tests on both road and track, on the latter up to and beyond the limit of grip, so as to fully assess stability, drivability and limit handling appeal. And while…