Luxury Small Cars
Discussion
Mark Benson said:
sealtt said:
Mark Benson said:
Or as someone suggested earlier, a Lexus CT, which is an Auris hybrid with a Lexus badge and a bit more bling. Not that highly rated, but certainly does the 'Luxury Small(ish) Car' thing.
Sorry MB, but that is a very bad suggestion. I was given one as a courtesy car and they are TERRIBLE!!! Harsh ride and a horrible place to be. Regardless, try one and make up your own mind.
Dracoro said:
Mark Benson said:
sealtt said:
Mark Benson said:
Or as someone suggested earlier, a Lexus CT, which is an Auris hybrid with a Lexus badge and a bit more bling. Not that highly rated, but certainly does the 'Luxury Small(ish) Car' thing.
Sorry MB, but that is a very bad suggestion. I was given one as a courtesy car and they are TERRIBLE!!! Harsh ride and a horrible place to be. Regardless, try one and make up your own mind.
But obviously go and see for yourself, as I say I drive a very different type of car, so maybe my expectations are off.
sealtt said:
Dracoro said:
Mark Benson said:
sealtt said:
Mark Benson said:
Or as someone suggested earlier, a Lexus CT, which is an Auris hybrid with a Lexus badge and a bit more bling. Not that highly rated, but certainly does the 'Luxury Small(ish) Car' thing.
Sorry MB, but that is a very bad suggestion. I was given one as a courtesy car and they are TERRIBLE!!! Harsh ride and a horrible place to be. Regardless, try one and make up your own mind.
But obviously go and see for yourself, as I say I drive a very different type of car, so maybe my expectations are off.
When the VR6 was first launched, VW were adamant that it was not intended to be a sort of "super GTi" - it was meant to be a "luxury Golf" rather than a "sporty Golf". Didn't stop the journalists panning it for not being what VW said it wasn't meant to be, though, and subsequent generations of V6 Golf abandoned the concept.
I agree with the conclusion that you can fit a large engine, automatic transmission and every option on the list, but interior space, ride quality and the absence of NVH are another matter. Not much you can do about wheelbase or space, but I think you could probably do a lot better than has been done if your starting point was not a car intended to be inexpensive to buy and economical to run.
I agree with the conclusion that you can fit a large engine, automatic transmission and every option on the list, but interior space, ride quality and the absence of NVH are another matter. Not much you can do about wheelbase or space, but I think you could probably do a lot better than has been done if your starting point was not a car intended to be inexpensive to buy and economical to run.
I think one issue would be that a small luxury car would end up costing damned nearly as much as a big luxury car. Buyers associate "small" with "cheap" but in reality I think the size of the body is only a tiny factor in what a car costs to produce. If VW produced a Golf with the NVH of an S-class for 10k less than an S-class, everyone would laugh at it.
kambites said:
I think one issue would be that a small luxury car would end up costing damned nearly as much as a big luxury car. Buyers associate "small" with "cheap" but in reality I think the size of the body is only a tiny factor in what a car costs to produce. If VW produced a Golf with the NVH of an S-class for 10k less than an S-class, everyone would laugh at it.
Mark Benson said:
Well she currently drives an Up, which actually rides very well and feels bigger than it is (I really didn't want to like it, but a test drive converted me). We also have an XJ, so we're not expecting the small car to rival that, but a pet hate of ours is a harsh ride (the main reason the Up won me over, it's very compliant; low kerb weight I suspect) so the CT may not be a contender, we'll certainly give it a go though.
Yes, give it a go, but I'd be very surprised if the CT is for you. If you are looking for something a bit different to the usual (german) suspects, do take a look at the Alfa models. I bought my fiancee a MiTo (1.4 entry model) as her first car and I am very impressed with how nicely it drives for such a small & relatively low price car, it's not luxury but it's comfortable and build quality is more than adequate. Your wife might like the model up from the MiTo - or even the MiTo itself if she likes super compact cars.kambites said:
I think one issue would be that a small luxury car would end up costing damned nearly as much as a big luxury car. Buyers associate "small" with "cheap" but in reality I think the size of the body is only a tiny factor in what a car costs to produce. If VW produced a Golf with the NVH of an S-class for 10k less than an S-class, everyone would laugh at it.
Sure, though think how much less materials would be used for a Golf sized car than an S class. I mean you are talking hundreds of kilos less of materials.I don't know how much of the difference between NVH of the S-class and the C-class for example is down to cost restraints and how much is down to ensuring a notable quality gap between the models. I wonder how much extra it would cost Merc to build a C-class to the same NVH spec as the S-class? Is it a case that they could easily do it for just say a 10% increase in car cost, but don't want to as they want to preserve the desirability of the top models... would be interesting to know.
sealtt said:
Sure, though think how much less materials would be used for a Golf sized car than an S class. I mean you are talking hundreds of kilos less of materials.
But the materials costs are mostly trivial; I doubt the total materials bill for a car the size of an S-class is more than a few thousand pounds less than that for a Golf-sized car of equivalent quality. Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff