Sommaire pour April 2018 de Wheels

And so it was driving the E34 BMW M5 that features in this month’s issue, on p30. Parked next to the high-tech wizardry, flexed sheet metal and brutish confidence of the box-fresh F90 M5, which is the focus of the piece, the older car felt remarkably simple, unrushed and unassuming. It was almost quaint, with its smaller dimensions, boxy panels and off-set pedals, which isn’t a descriptor I thought I’d use on a car that, not so long ago, was one of the world’s fastest and most engaging sports sedans. It also caused a quote I’d filed away deep in my brain to bubble to the surface. It was delivered by GM CEO Mary Barra, who proclaimed late last year, “we are in the midst of seeing more change in…

Subaru’s fifth-generation Forester, unveiled at the New York Auto Show and due in Australia around September, is set to have its eye on you. Well, more accurately, its cabin-mounted camera will. The mid-size SUV’s Driver Monitoring System ( DMS) examines the driver’s face for signs of fatigue and also delivers a convenience benefit in terms of facial recognition, enabling automatic adjustment of a bunch of individual driver settings such as seat position, climate-control temperature, and exterior mirrors. Yet DMS is arguably less significant than Subaru’s radical rethink of its Australian line-up. The Forester will be offered solely with a heavily revised version of the FA25 2.5-litre flat four, now making 136kW (up 10kW) at 5800rpm and 239Nm (up 4Nm) at 4400rpm. The default transmission will be a Lineartronic CVT automatic,…

As a petrolhead you probably wouldn’t mind cutting about in a machine penned by legendary design house Pininfarina, but if you can’t stretch to a Ferrari 250 Lusso and rightfully wouldn’t be seen dead in a Hyundai Lavita, then there is another option. In partnership with bicycle authority De Rosa, the Italian design firm has created the SK Pininfarina. The cutting edge road racing bike has a carbonfibre frame, Campag Super Record EPS V3 groupset, weighs 6.7kg and is probably faster than the Lavita. De Rosa SK Pininfarina Luxury $17,711 store.pininfarina.com If Porsche’s range of cars was a Buddhist colony then the coveted RS performance flagships would be the Shaolin monks that can tear your arms off from 20 paces. This hardback by Jurgen Lewandowski is a definitive…

BACK in 2004, Mercedes-Benz released a trendsetting cat called the CLS among unsuspecting pigeons. It was the original four-door coupe, and became a template for cars such as the Audi A7 Sportback and BMW 6 Series Gran Coupe – style-driven fastbacks commanding a price premium over the three-box sedans that provided their platforms. Stuttgart’s niche CLS has never been a breakaway sales success, but Benz has used this exclusive E-Class alternative as an entry point for selected high-end technologies. The just-launched third-gen CLS duly presents a spread of firsts from the base model up, and is at its most innovative in flagship AMG guise. The CLS53 is the debutant of an incoming range of entry-level 53-badged AMGs, all of which will feature Affalterbach’s first electrified powertrain based around a freshly…

IN AN automotive world overloaded with over-choice and over-complication, there’s something refreshingly straightforward about the arrival of Citroen’s C3 light hatch into Australia. It’s offered in just one (rich) spec level, with one turbo-triple-auto powertrain. Oh, and one pretty rich price tag, but more on that in a moment. What the C3 also brings is a generous splash of design-driven pizazz and customisable style to what is a mostly sensible, pragmatic segment. Think of it as a stiletto to the eye of a Yaris. C3 is built on PSA’s long-serving PF1 platform; an entirely conventional architecture for this class with a torsion-beam rear-end and strut front, but that does feature disc brakes on all four corners. Overall length of 3996mm makes it around 60mm shorter than a Mazda 2, yet…

HAVE you ever hopped into a car for the first time and immediately thought, “this feels right”? First impressions count, but relatively few cars in my experience have nailed that initial metaphorical handshake. However, the ones that do get off on the right foot all have one thing in common – they tend to do pretty damn well when time comes to put them through the Wheels COTY wringer. Last year, Volvo’s outstanding XC60 – winner of COTY 2018 – was one of the cars that instantly gelled, as did the runner-up Alfa Romeo Giulia. Surprise, surprise, previous COTY alumni like the ND MX-5, BMW i3, Toyota 86 and Peugeot 308 also impressed me right from the get-go, whether at their respective media launches or when picking them up for…

IT’S CHANGING me, this Volvo. Having spent last month eroding any lingering cynicism I had towards SUVs as a category (for being too heavy, too thirsty, too cumbersome and thus deserving of unquestioned enthusiast vilification), the sleek Swede has since had a similar effect on my opinion of hybrids. I’ll admit to being something of an unwilling hybrid sceptic, not because I don’t see the value in the technology, but because all the ones I’ve experienced have been disappointing. Heavier and more expensive than conventional drivetrains, they often have odd-feeling control weights (fizzing brake pedals, for example) and struggle, without exception, to reach their predicted ‘electric only’ ranges in the real world. These aren’t shortfalls the Volvo sidesteps entirely, in fact it’s still guilty of all of them, yet it’s…

YOU’LL sometimes hear it said that a new model “looks like it drove straight off the motor show stand”. That was pretty much the case with the Chevrolet Corvette C1, not only the first of GM’s now 68-year-old fibreglass-bodied sports car line, but America’s first production sports car. In January 1953, General Motors kicked off the third of its post-war Motorama vehicle shows (and the first travelling Motorama) at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York. Opening day alone pulled a crowd of 45,000. In addition to the new-for-’53 production models were a handful of concepts, most notably a two-seat roadster. The ‘EX 122’ concept’s shapely body – in new-fangled ‘pressed fibreglass plastic’ – clearly took inspiration from the British and European sports cars then gaining a foothold in the…

APRIL-MAY AUDI RS4 Avant; CHEVROLET Silverado ute; HSV Colorado Sportscat; HYUNDAI iMax/iLoad facelift; JAGUAR XJ update and XJR 575; JEEP Grand Cherokee Trackhawk; KIA Cerato sedan; LAND ROVER Range Rover Sport/SVR facelift a and Range Rover facelift; LEXUS LS; MERCEDES-BENZ X-Class ute, AMG GLC63 wagon/coupe and S-Class coupe/cabriolet facelift; VOLVO XC40 JUNE-JULY AUDI A7 and A8; FORD Mustang facelift; HYUNDAI Santa Fe and Ioniq; JEEP Grand Cherokee update; LAND ROVER Range Rover plug-in hybrid; PORSCHE Cayenne; VOLKSWAGEN Mk6 Polo Beats and Polo GTI, Tiguan Allspace DUE MAY Audi RS4 Avant You’ll be familiar with the forthcoming Audi RS4 Avant’s 331kW, 2.9-litre twin-turbo V6, which is the same donk fitted to the RS5 coupe. It’s not technical difference, then, that piques our interest in Ingolstadt’s next-gen wagon weapon, but the fact…

Consider the specs of even the tiddler F3 RC, which was all they’d trust me with: a 675cc three-pot that makes 94kW – at 14,400rpm – for a machine weighing comfortably this side of 200kg. Then there’s all the tech: four engine maps, eight-stage traction control, two-mode ABS and, neatest of all, clutchless speed-shifting up and down the ’box. Suddenly $26,600 doesn’t seem like much for something that’s a sculpture at standstill, a scalpel on the move. I won’t bang on any more – except to add that the F3 RC’s big brother, the 1000cc four-cylinder F4 RC ($62K), makes 151kW. To put that into perspective: here’s an atmo engine making 151kW per litre. Atmo-engined cars have yet to crack 100kW. Right. The point is, I was in hi-tech heaven…

DESPITE their unbridled popularity with the masses, SUVs have been copping it in the neck from Greenies for years. Critiqued as being too big, too heavy, too thirsty, or just too stupid, these behemoths have been easy whipping boys for anyone with an axe to grind about the fragility of our blue planet. While the Range Rover P400e is no less physically imposing than its established stablemates, the electrification of its drivetrain and associated cleaning up of its environmental act will surely leave critics clutching at straws when trying to find new reasons to damn the big Brit and its ilk. Drawing on the technology lessons learned through the electrification of associated Jaguars, en route to its goal of having all new models electrified from 2020, Land Rover has transplanted…

THINK Audi performance cars and one word comes to mind: quattro. The German company has spent decades, and millions of marketing dollars, tying itself to the benefits of all-wheel drive, which is what makes this new R8 variant so interesting. RWS stands for Rear Wheel Series, not rear-wheel steering, as many petrolheads would assume, meaning that unlike every previous performance Audi, this one sends all of its grunt to the rear axle. That brings the promise of oversteer, and a priority shift towards fun and dynamic purity. It’s also the least-expensive R8, despite the fact just 999 are being built (40 or so will come to Oz). At $299,500 for the coupe and $321,000 for the Spyder, it’s more than $50K less than an R8 quattro. It’s also cheaper than…

T’S UNHEARD of for a road test to be concluded before you’ve driven the cars, but I reckon this one could be a done deal. Peugeot’s 5008 has just pulled up to the bowser alongside the Mazda CX-9 and, to be honest, it looks like Grant Denyer squaring up to Lennox Lewis. Both have seven seats and both are priced around 50 grand, but the similarity ends there. The large Japanese SUV dwarfs the svelte Peugeot, its roofline arcing way above that of the mid-sized 5008, its flanks and overhangs all solid heft against the Pug’s pinched surfacing. We know the CX-9 is a formidable package, so the category-busting Peugeot will need to bring something utterly exceptional to win this one. Its task isn’t made any easier by the inclusion…

THE REPO man looked nothing like I expected. In my mind these quaint folk who come to take back your car and other possessions when you default on a loan tend to be burly blokes, wearing chunky jewellery and oversized leather jackets who speak in Cockney rhyming slang. But this repo man was a well-dressed youngster from the Holden head office who politely asked if he could swap ‘my’ mid-spec LT Equinox for another … with more fruit. Ordinarily that would be a no brainer. After all, who wouldn’t want to swap their mid-spec anything for an upmarket something, especially when in this case the upgrade meant panoramic sunroof, heated steering wheel, electric front passenger’s seat and front seat coolers, among other temptations? The only issue was I’d promised Ponchard…

THOSE who watched the Adelaide 500 race weekend in early March were almost witnessing a new chapter in Australian motor sport history. ECB SuperUtes racer Tomas Gasperak, at just 15, became the second youngest driver to compete at a national Supercars-level event. Gasperak, born on June 5, 2002, missed out on the record by just a handful of days: new Supercar sensation Alex Rullo (born June 15, 2000) had competed in the Dunlop development series two years earlier. Being 15 means that Gasperak still has plenty of time to make history. In Adelaide, he’d missed practice – “we were still putting the car together” – but stayed (mostly) out of trouble to come away from the weekend standing fifth (of 10) in the championship table. How old are the other…

MERCEDES-AMG is readying its new generation A45 pocket rocket to lock horns with the Audi RS3 in a high-powered hot hatch arms race. Company chairman Tobias Moers confirmed to Wheels at the Geneva motor show that the MFA2-based, next-gen A45 will have at least 294kW, matching the current RS3, and the dynamic performance to put all other hot hatches’ noses out of joint. “The A45 which is coming is going to be the next benchmark for the segment,” claims Moers. “This is for us the task. For performance, power output, everything. “What we’re doing for [the] next generation is developing a brand-new 2.0-litre four-cylinder engine. This is [the] key for 400-plus horsepower [more than 294kW]. There is going to be 400-plus. But that output only makes sense with driving dynamics…

What is it? A mild hybrid system for Mercedes’ latest-generation straight-six powertrains. Built around a 48-volt electrical architecture, a powerful integrated electric starter motor/ generator provides an acceleration boost, teamed with an electric compressor in AMG applications that fleshes out the bottom of the torque curve while the conventional turbo spins up. The electrically assisted six powers the Merc-AMG CLS53 four-door (p28) and E53 Coupe and Cabriolet as a ‘starter’ series of AMG’s larger cars, like the V6-powered 43 range, but packing far more tech. It also features in non-AMG Benzes such as the CLS450. How does it work? The EQ Boost system’s key piece of hardware is an integrated starter-generator (ISG); a compact motor/generator sandwiched between the engine and the transmission that acts as both a starter motor and…

OH THE STUPIDITY Halfway down the street I live on, there is a roundabout at the intersection of a busy cross street. At least three times a week, I come close to colliding with other vehicles at the roundabout because drivers are either inattentive, completely distracted, or simply unskilled. And there is an accident at this roundabout at least once a week. It has been interesting to see the road safety response to this. Improve the intersection? No. Improve driver training? No. Place mobile speed cameras near the intersection? YES! An interesting response given that it appears all the accidents at the intersection occur at below the speed limit. Yet, unfortunately, it’s also a predictable response. And while the government insists that more speed cameras will fix the road toll,…

But let’s keep this noise thing in perspective… For my own not-so-distant ancestors the sound of horsepower was hooves hitting the ground. Maybe they found the ringing clip-clop of a single saddlehorse trotting along a cobbled street or the rumble of galloping thoroughbreds on racetrack turf thrilling sounds. It wasn’t something I thought to ask them when I was just a kid and they were old men. Horses were as big a part of their lives as cars have been of mine, because they chose to be photographed with them in a time when images were costly. The proof is in my family’s photo albums, in sepia tone and black and white. Grandfather George harvesting wheat with his six-horse team, led by big Boy with the white blaze, probably sometime…

THIS is not merely an X1 with a backwards baseball cap. BMW wants to make that clear. Another message BMW wants to send is that the X2 is pitched heavily at millennials – cashed-up ones presumably. But in reality, this is a car that could appeal to a broader church than the X1. With style on its side, the X2 stands out from the crowd (in a good way), without being as compromised as you might expect. What’s more, the extra outlay required to step up to the arguably more desirable X2 is comparatively modest, at $2300. The X2’s platform and its mechanicals are shared with the X1, though tweaked to suit the X2’s posture as a sportier, style-conscious offering. Wheelbase is identical, but compared to the X1 the X2’s…

Parked side-by-side the F90 makes the E34 M5 look like a scale model YOUR brain harbours a bizarre psychological quirk known as the Proust phenomenon. An anatomical anomaly involving the olfactory pathway and its proximity to the amygdala and hippocampus means that a certain smell can trigger a vivid autobiographical memory. And I’ve just experienced it, after opening the door to an old BMW. Inhaling a lungful of the gently ageing petrochemicals inside this 1990 M5 feels to me like coming home. I learned how to drive in an Alpine White E34 5 Series similar to this one. It was owned by my dad, and had exactly the same cosily familiar, sun-ripened scent when he bought it as a 10-year-old car. The fact it was second-hand didn’t matter to him.…

NOT LONG ago, Aston Martin was placing different badges on two different cars created shortly after God invented the wheel. Thankfully boss Andy Palmer has given the place a kick up the backside during three years in charge: lately we’ve had the DB11, DB4 GT Continuation, the introduction of V8 AMG power, and there’s a DBX crossover, an all-electric Lagonda, Newey’s Valkyrie hypercar, and two other mid-engined supercars coming too. The new Vantage is arguably the most important. It replaces Aston’s most affordable, biggest-selling sports car, a model that shifted 25,000 units in its previous incarnation. We’ve got a day to get under the Brit’s skin, first on Portuguese mountain roads, then the epic Portimao race circuit. The Vantage is an all-new car versus its predecessor, but its pricing represents…

HERE IT is folks, the last Aussie-built Holden Commodore V8. Yep, the production car that provides the silhouette is sourced from Germany in front-or all-wheel drive and powered by a four-cylinder or V6 engine, but the ZB Commodore that hits Australian racetracks in the Supercars championship is still a locally built, rear-drive V8 … the only hurdle is this one will set you back $645,000. From the chassis up, this is an Australian car full of local engineering know-how and craftsmanship, just like its predecessors. Yet it breaks new ground because it’s based on an import while sticking resolutely to the local tradition and rulebook. But as of next year, that local identity will be eroded significantly. The Chevrolet V8 engine that’s been developed under the bonnet of Holden touring…

AT THE beginning of my half-year with the (breathe in) Megane GT TCe205 EDC 4Control Break, I pondered whether it might be all the car I would ever need. Wagon practicality meets Renaultsport verve, in an attractive and spacious yet compact package. That it was French and featured four-wheel steering had me hoping for some sort of R16/Honda Prelude mash-up. What I ended up with instead was something rather more substantial. AOC-309 certainly stood out from the sea of medium-SUV alternatives, with its elegant, low-slung styling, big alloys filling up the wheelarches and smart LED lighting. Which makes the Megane’s slabby dash seem profoundly mundane in view of such visual boldness elsewhere. Lacking flair, it is the antithesis of the stunning fascia Peugeot is currently serving up. It’s as if…