Star Rating

During the past few days I have been fortunate enough to be able to review the Nissan X-Trail DCI SVE, which was recently voted the best sub £20,000 4x4 by the 5th Gear program (a slightly cheaper version of the BBC Top Gear program).

Any one that knows me will be aware that I love 4x4s and I also believe that because of the nature of the work that I do, there is no vehicle better suited, most 4x4 (there are exceptions) have adequate load space to carry the equipment that I need to, and unlike many saloons, I can easily gain access to the kit without leaving the car.

The Nissan that I am testing is the 2.2 litre Diesel engine version which is turbo-charged and married to a six speed manual gearbox, the amazing thing about the engine is the amount of torque that it produces some 231lbft at 2000 rpm and it also develops some 130bhp, which was about the same as my old Mitsubishi Shogun 2.5 litre turbo, however because the bodywork and chassis is so much lighter it makes the Nissan a reasonably nippy car. The top speed is quoted as 112Mph, which I do not doubt for a second, as the Nissan sat very comfortably doing an indicated 100Mph on the M40 recently as I traveled back from Brize Norton.

I should start with my initial reactions when the Nissan was delivered, and I have to be honest, I didn't really have any, I thought it was just going to be a typical boring japanese lump of metal, however when my wife said that it "is prettier" than my usual vehicle, I did think, actually this is a bit of a girls car, not so much an Off-Roader as a "soft-roader" and to be honest I think my initial "none reaction" wasn't going "over the top". It is a bit girly.

The Nissan supplied was painted Black (Kuro Black according to the brochures) and sitting on a set of 16" 5 spoke alloy road wheels shod with Dunlop rubber. The most noticeable feature of the vehicle is the head lamp units, which houses the side lights and indicators also, is all clear lenses, except one bit which is blue (as for why? I have no idea), revealing the chrome of the reflective surfaces below, there are also some other chrome details including the radiator grill and the door handles.

The equipment levels in this vehicle are very high, supplied with DVD based Satellite Navigation (more about this later) with the DVD player installed in the glove box, multi function steering wheel (never been sure what that is about, I assume you can use it to turn corners, or to hang on to in the event of an accident), Leather Upholstered Interior, 4x Electric Windows, Immobilise, Keyless Entry with anti-Hijack feature (I am sure that I would actually realise that one of my passengers was a shoe-bomb carrying fundamentalist) and importantly for us snappers a load area cover, Climate Control, 4 cup holders, electric and heated seats, 12v Power sockets front and rear, a huge sunroof (about the same size as the old Webasto full length roofs in the 1980's).  

The first thing that you notice when you step into the cabin is how much room there is (well you do if you have spent the last 18 months driving a Grand Cherokee (a big car that works like the tardis in reverse) but after a while you realise that the sense of space is achieved by making compromises, for example the seats are very thin, and do not provide an awful lot of support (I may be being a little harsh as the seats in my usual car are like leather comfy chairs).

The adjustable lumbar support is absolutely hopeless, and may as well be absent. The leather trim is very thin, and not particularly luxurious. If this was my car and I was planning on using it for work I would immediately get the windows tinted to make it more difficult to see in, and with the dark leather upholstery it would work very well with something like an 80% tint behind the drivers door, and a 50% in the front side windows.

The leather upholstery is a must for a vehicle like this, as it is so much harder wearing and easier to clean (especially as I regularly climb from the front seats in to the back). There is one problem in doing that in the Nissan, because it is quite a narrow car the driver and front passenger seat are close together, now I am still relatively slim and it was a struggle for me.

The rear load cover is also a bit of a pain and very fiddly to open from the rear passenger seats. Also because it is in two parts with a support brace that goes across the top of the load area, means that it is impossible to open a Pelican Case (no matter which way it is facing).

The load cover is also not rigid enough to carry anything heavier than a couple of newspapers, so it really is neither one thing nor the other. Most of the glass is good enough to shoot through (although you will have to spend some time working out the best areas of the front windscreen to shoot through), the rear window is fine as long as you stay away from the edges (same with almost any car) and the side glass is no problem at all.

Now the front dash board is a little strange in that all the instruments are grouped around the middle of the board (rather like the original Mini) now call me cynical, but this isn't done for styling reasons, this is so that both left and right hand drive versions can use the same dashboard, I personally hate it, with a passion, it is a dangerous design practice, not for me, with over a million miles under my right foot, I can cope, however, there are a lot of numpties on the road that shouldn't take their eyes from the road just to glance at a conventionally placed speedometer, yet alone turn their heads through 45° to see the speedo.

Hell there are a lot of drivers who can't even manage to use their rear-view mirrors without veering across several lanes of traffic, and in traffic women don't need any more excuses to look towards the pavement instead of the road, it is bad enough that they window-shop whilst driving, or else stare at the reflection of their car in windows to see how cool they look. The Satellite Navigation in the Nissan is pants, no it really is pants, maybe I have been spoilt, but my sat-nav takes me from where I am to where I want to go via either the quickest or shortest route depending upon my choice, it doesn't send me past the roundabout I need to join the M3 northbound, to the southbound side and then back again to the northbound side. If I wanted to do that I would let the wife navigate for me. Most decent sat-nav systems will allow you to enter the postal code and house number of your destination, this one? No don't be stupid, however it will let you enter the telephone number of your destination, and then tell you it isn't in the database (I mean what is the point of that, bloody software engineers with too much time and not enough good ideas if you ask me). The speed and the tacho, fuel and temperature gauges sit in a binnacle on top of the dash, along with mileometer and a multi-function trip meter.

Now this multi function trip meter, how useful is that? the answer is not very, well that's not true, however it could be made a lot more useful, by pushing the trip meter reset button you can cycle through the following functions clock, outside temp, trip meter 1, trip meter 2. Now the clock, outside temp and one trip meter should be visible at all times as far as I am concerned. This was brought home to me today as I headed down to the south coast, when I left home at the crack of dawn the temperature was a reasonable 5°, however an hour into my journey I noticed that a number cars had had accidents and slid off the road, and a quick scroll through the multi function trip meter revealed that the temperature had dropped to below freezing, so I eased off, however had I been able to see the outside temperature I would have probably slowed down sooner. (Now you can see why they didn't use X-Trails in the "Day After Tomorrow").

Having clocked up some 550 miles in the last three days, I have been quite impressed with the X-Trail (believe it or not) whilst it is nowhere near as quick as my first choice 4x4 it is certainly a lot more economical, I managed some 400 miles on a £45 full tank, which compared with 200 miles from a £65.00 refill in the Jeep makes it good for the Bank Account, but not so good for the BP profits (you watch their share price dive as soon as this is published). Off road the X-Trail is a competent performer, although the suspension seems to be a little to hard for really heavy off-road use, and it bounces you around the cabin far more than the Mitsubishi Shogun, or the Land Rover Discovery, but that said it really isn't in the same class. On the road, it is quickish, quietish and reasonable refined, the cabin is a little boomy at motorways speeds and anything over 60 miles an hour and you can't hear the Sat Nav, the 4 speaker system is barely adequate (fine for my granddad, but no-one else), first choice would be to rip it all out and replace with a decent head unit, replace the OEM speakers with a set of amplified mid-ranges in the original apertures and tweeters on the dashboard and a Sub in the boot space.