Price as tested: €47,670
+ Sharp chassis, more welcoming interior, practical, plenty of poke from smaller engine– Still looks a little awkward, pricey= Really quite a sweet carIn just two and a half years, the BMW X1 has notched up sales of more than a quarter of a million units, and that it without it being sold in the massive US car market, a situation BMW is well on the way to rectifying. If you ever doubted the massive current global appetite for classy, compact SUVs, then doubt it no more.
There is a massive slice of my brain that rails against these cars though. Take the specific car we’re testing here; €47k’s worth of X1 18d Sport. Yes, it’s chunky, good looking (if you appreciate the current BMW design idiom) and both decently spacious and practical. But for the same money, you could be in a lower-slung, better looking, better-driving BMW 3 Series Touring, a car that I believe to be just about perfect. Yet people will continue to flock to the X1.
Which should be abhorrent to me (I just love estates) and yet, with a few days in the X1’s company it easily charmed its way into my affections.
The styling has been updated for this year, with a new bumper, front airdam, tweaked lights and some other small adjustments. Cleverly, the converging lines of the bonnet’s power bulge and the upsweep of the front bumper actually makes a subtle X-shape. Clever, that.
Inside, the quality of materials used and the fact that the centre console has been redesigned (it now faces more obviously towards the driver) is genuinely welcoming. The Sport spec helps here, with figure-hugging seats that, in spite of a distinctly offset driving position, mean long journeys are very comfy experiences. In spite of being an X1, it’s pretty close to the 3 Series in space terms, and the boot out the back is large (420-litres), deep and square. A shame that the X1 doesn’t get a separate opening glass window in the tailgate (as does the 3 Touring) but hey, you can’t have everything.
Having some cake and eating it is the very point of the newly-fitted 18d diesel engine though. In spite of the name, it’s actually a de-tuned 2.0-litre (1,995cc to be exact) and pumps out 143bhp and 320Nm of torque. Those aren’t exactly ground-shaking figures, but actually the X1 feels plenty brisk and only starts to struggle when you get into the upper reaches of the rev band. Happily, with that much low-down torque, you won’t need to do that very much, so progress is swift and relaxed.
Thanks to BMW’s clever EfficientDynamics systems (a battery of fuel-saving tech including stop-start, brake energy recovery, a low-drain air conditioning compressor and more) the X1 18d returns impressive official figures of 5.4-litres per 100km (that’s 52mpg) and 143g/km of Co2. Impressively, those figures are attained with the optional 8-speed automatic gearbox fitted, as it was to our test car. It costs a whopping €2,191 but it’s so smooth, unobtrusive and effective that it just might be worth it. An auto that genuinely calls the need for a manual into question.
BMW has also clearly been at work on its suspension setups. A few years ago, a large-wheeled (17” alloys), stiffly-sprung BMW SUV in Sport spec would have been a recipe for loosened fillings and shattered spines. This time around though, although Germanic firm-ness is still the name of the game, there is a subtle suppleness that makes everything much more relaxing. And yet the BMW traditions of sharp handling and a balanced chassis are still there in spades. Meanwhile, the X-Drive all-wheel-drive system gives you terrific confidence in changing conditions. Or just when it’s chucking it down with rain. You can get a cheaper S-Drive version with rear-wheel-drive, but if you’re buying an SUV, shouldn’t it be 4wd?
One caveat though; the steering, which although communicative and brilliant at speed just weights up too much around town and at lower speeds. It’s just too darned heavy and surely that’s not good for the likely target market for these cars.
Still, with that one small flaw in the diamond, I’ve come away from the X1 really rather liking it. No, it’s not perfect and yes, I’d still overall have a 3 Series Touring for similar money, but if you’re into the whole SUV thing (and many, many of you are) and you fancy the famed Blue and White flag of Munich on your driveway (again; many, many) then this is a good place to start.
BMW X1 X-Drive 18d SportPrice as tested: €47,670Price range: €35,160 to €49,010Capacity: 1,995Power: 143bhpTorque: 320NmTop speed: 195kmh0-100kmh: 10.1secEconomy: 5.4l-100km (52.3mpg)CO2 emissions: 143g/kmRoad Tax Band: C. €330Euro NCAP rating: 5-star; 87% adult, 86% child, 64% pedestrian, 71% safety assist
Price as tested: €37,785+ Space, quality, comfort, steering, off-road ability, styling– Cabin too plain for this price level, some refinement issues= A solid SUV from Honda, but will find life tough against sharp competitionIt seems almost crazy to think of it now, but back when the original Honda CR-V was launched, the Japanese brand controlled one quarter of the Irish SUV market. Back in 1998, it seemed, we just couldn't get enough of one of the original soft-roaders.
Spool forward to 2012 and things have changed rather a lot, not least of which, the CR-V itself. The outgoing generation was larger than before, and centered around a Diesel engine rather than the petrol-focused original. High in quality and comfort, it was a rival to the likes of the BMW X3 and Audi Q5 as much as its more obvious sparring partners, the Toyota RAV 4 and Ford Kuga. But good car though it was, the outgoing CR-V had to content itself with a much smaller slice of the market, not least because instead of the mere handful of rivals the 1998 original had to contend with, now there is an army of them.
With this new generation model of CR-V, Honda will be trying to claw back some of that original sales dominance and it's going about that in three distinct ways.
For a start, the new CR-V carries over the previous models' two most successful features; its cabin space and its 2.2-litre 148bhp diesel engine. The spacious interior and cavernous boot mark the new CR-V out as one of the few SUVs that can actually boast proper Utility; you can really cram it full of people and cargo, not something you can say for all of its rivals.
Meanwhile, the still-excellent 2.2-litre iDTEC engine, while it lacks outright power compared to such rivals, is still smooth, punchy and impressively economical. It has even managed to drop a tax band, from Band D to Band C, saving owners a significant amount in annual motor tax.
The second strand to the CR-V's strategy is its styling, which looks much bluffer and more striking than it did before. The old CR-V always looked a touch apologetic. This new one is much more assertive, and all the better for it.
Finally, Honda has realised that it must compete on price, and the most affordable version of the new CR-V clocks in with a €37,795 price tag – within €1,000 of its most significant new rival, the new Hyundai Santa Fe.
The CR-V can even trade equipment and specification blows with the Hyundai, for while it lacks some toys as standard (such as Bluetooth phone connection, and it also lacks the Hyundai's seven seat layout) the CR-V comes with four wheel drive as standard.
And that all-wheel-drive is not just there for show. Honda was quite happy for us to take our test car off into the muddy outback, slipping and sliding over surprisingly tough terrain. Few owners, if any, will put it to the test, but the CR-V can certainly tackle the rough stuff.
On the smooth, it's as good as ever, retaining the old CR-V's combination of tidy handling, a comfortable ride quality and sharp, alert steering. Again, it's very close to the Hyundai in dynamic terms, and that's a good ball park to be in.
There are two let-downs to the CR-V though, and both of them are inside. We've already mentioned the excellent space, and the seats, both front and rear, are comfy and supportive. But there's a lack of flair to the cabin design and layout, a sense of plain-ness that disappoints, especially given Honda's premium-status aspirations.
That's not helped by a distinct, bassy boom that comes up from under the boot floor, and makes its presence known throughout the cabin from speeds as low as 70kmh. It's a black mark against the CR-V's refinement, which is a shame.
Those two issues apart, though, it's hard not to like the CR-V. The new styling is pleasingly distinctive, the engine and chassis as good as ever and the cabin and boot as spacious as you could hope. We can't think of a good reason why it wouldn't be close to the top of your SUV shopping list.
Well, actually, there is one good reason. It's that this 2.2-litre, 4WD CR-V might not be the best CR-V to buy. Later in 2013, there will be a front-wheel-drive CR-V, using Honda's all-new 1.6-litre Diesel engine, that will be more affordable again and will, apparently, boast astonishingly low 99g/km Co2 emissions, putting this large, spacious SUV on a tax band par with the likes of a Volkswagen Golf and Ford Focus. So while we like this new generation of CR-V, it might be worth holding off on buying one for a while yet...
Honda CR-V 2.2 iDTEC SE
Price as tested: €37,795
Price range: €37,795 to €50,095
Capacity: 2,199cc
Power: 148bhp
Torque: 350Nm
Top speed: 190kmh
0-100kmh: 9.7sec
Economy: 5.6l-100km (51mpg)
CO2 emissions: 149g/km
Road Tax Band: C. €330
Euro NCAP rating: Not yet tested
