Ext User(Marco)
23-03-2006, 01:53 AM
As promised last week when we were having the people mover debate, I
coincidentally spent the last few days as both driver and passenger
(not simultaneously) in a just-superseded Tarago so I'm more qualified
to comment on whether or not these things have enough engine for the
job they're designed to do. This was a 9/05 build car with about
7500km on it, in the most basic GLi spec.
I'm actually of the opinion now that the Tarago has adequate power for
the job. I suspect that this is due to gearing for the most part,
because on paper the figures aren't impressive - I think it's something
like 1700kg and 120kW or thereabouts. We were driving around Sydney
with seven adults on board and the only time that I was caught out by a
lack of power was when I needed to get in front of a Territory from the
lights to put myself in the left lane for a turn I needed to take.
There was no chance of that happening. The rest of the time - merging,
climbing hills, freeway work and just generally getting about in
traffic - it seemed to do well enough. I didn't try it outside the
city, so I'm not sure what it would be like on a country road on the
family holiday.
There might be an element of deception here though, because I noticed a
few times that while I thought I was setting a decent pace away from
the lights, I would then look at the speedo and see that we were only
doing about 40km/h when it felt like about 60. It could be that what I
presume is tall gearing leads to lots of revs and therefore a feeling
of decent acceleration when that isn't actually true. Having said
that, I didn't find a lot of drama in getting up to the speed limit at
an acceptable pace - I wasn't holding up traffic anywhere - and if
there was a hill to be climbed then the transmission seemed very good
at picking the right gear for it. If need be, it would just drop back
to second and away you went.
In fact, overall the engine and transmission were impressive. Smooth,
quiet, seemingly powerful enough and almost always in the right gear at
the right time. Whoever designed and developed the combination did
well.
Part of the reason why I feel that the Tarago has enough power for the
job, though, is that it's not the sort of car that you really want to
drive all that quickly even if you could. The handling was decent in
parts - not as much body roll as expected - but understeer was never
too far away, and combined with a total lack of steering feel to
completely destroy your confidence in its ability to go around corners.
It seemed like a case of turning the wheel and hoping it would go
where you wanted it to, because there was absolutely zero feedback and
no road feel whatsoever. Frankly, even if it had double the power I
wouldn't have felt up to going any quicker than I did, because you just
don't have that feeling that it can deal with anything difficult that
might crop up such as a swerve-and-recover.
Being that high off the ground has its ups and downs - the good part is
being able to see further ahead than most people, but the bad part is
that being so high contributes to the lack of confidence in the car's
handling, because there's always that nagging feeling that the thing
might fall over if you push it too hard. Seeing as there was headroom
to spare, it would probably be a better car if it was about 5cm closer
to the ground and with a 10-15cm lower roof.
Interior was reasonably well made, but the materials used are
incredibly cheap. Hard plastic everwhere, cheap seat fabric, cheap
carpeting that was already wearing badly. I've seen Korean cars with
better interior materials than this, and frankly I would have been
disappointed to see that standard of materials in a $15k car. Fit and
finish were good though, living up to Toyota's reputation. The
standard of materials used, and the very meagre level of standard
equipment (no ABS, no cruise control for example) makes me think that
at $46k-odd, this car is about $5k too expensive, maybe even closer to
$10k overpriced. Looking at the spec sheet for the just-released new
Tarago though, Toyota seems to have done something about it and it now
comes with a lot more for about the same money.
Unforgivable, though, is the fact that two of the eight seatbelts were
lap-only - in a vehicle designed for family work, I find that
completely unacceptable.
Overall? Not bad, enough get up and go to move people around the
place, reasonable cabin storage apart from bugger-all luggage space and
versatile enough, albeit with no really clever design ideas or neat
touches. The dismal handling and cheap interior quality, though, would
make me look seriously at its competitors - I doubt very much that the
Tarago is worth the price premium over the Honda Odyssey or Mitsubishi
Grandis, unless you desperately need the eighth seat.
coincidentally spent the last few days as both driver and passenger
(not simultaneously) in a just-superseded Tarago so I'm more qualified
to comment on whether or not these things have enough engine for the
job they're designed to do. This was a 9/05 build car with about
7500km on it, in the most basic GLi spec.
I'm actually of the opinion now that the Tarago has adequate power for
the job. I suspect that this is due to gearing for the most part,
because on paper the figures aren't impressive - I think it's something
like 1700kg and 120kW or thereabouts. We were driving around Sydney
with seven adults on board and the only time that I was caught out by a
lack of power was when I needed to get in front of a Territory from the
lights to put myself in the left lane for a turn I needed to take.
There was no chance of that happening. The rest of the time - merging,
climbing hills, freeway work and just generally getting about in
traffic - it seemed to do well enough. I didn't try it outside the
city, so I'm not sure what it would be like on a country road on the
family holiday.
There might be an element of deception here though, because I noticed a
few times that while I thought I was setting a decent pace away from
the lights, I would then look at the speedo and see that we were only
doing about 40km/h when it felt like about 60. It could be that what I
presume is tall gearing leads to lots of revs and therefore a feeling
of decent acceleration when that isn't actually true. Having said
that, I didn't find a lot of drama in getting up to the speed limit at
an acceptable pace - I wasn't holding up traffic anywhere - and if
there was a hill to be climbed then the transmission seemed very good
at picking the right gear for it. If need be, it would just drop back
to second and away you went.
In fact, overall the engine and transmission were impressive. Smooth,
quiet, seemingly powerful enough and almost always in the right gear at
the right time. Whoever designed and developed the combination did
well.
Part of the reason why I feel that the Tarago has enough power for the
job, though, is that it's not the sort of car that you really want to
drive all that quickly even if you could. The handling was decent in
parts - not as much body roll as expected - but understeer was never
too far away, and combined with a total lack of steering feel to
completely destroy your confidence in its ability to go around corners.
It seemed like a case of turning the wheel and hoping it would go
where you wanted it to, because there was absolutely zero feedback and
no road feel whatsoever. Frankly, even if it had double the power I
wouldn't have felt up to going any quicker than I did, because you just
don't have that feeling that it can deal with anything difficult that
might crop up such as a swerve-and-recover.
Being that high off the ground has its ups and downs - the good part is
being able to see further ahead than most people, but the bad part is
that being so high contributes to the lack of confidence in the car's
handling, because there's always that nagging feeling that the thing
might fall over if you push it too hard. Seeing as there was headroom
to spare, it would probably be a better car if it was about 5cm closer
to the ground and with a 10-15cm lower roof.
Interior was reasonably well made, but the materials used are
incredibly cheap. Hard plastic everwhere, cheap seat fabric, cheap
carpeting that was already wearing badly. I've seen Korean cars with
better interior materials than this, and frankly I would have been
disappointed to see that standard of materials in a $15k car. Fit and
finish were good though, living up to Toyota's reputation. The
standard of materials used, and the very meagre level of standard
equipment (no ABS, no cruise control for example) makes me think that
at $46k-odd, this car is about $5k too expensive, maybe even closer to
$10k overpriced. Looking at the spec sheet for the just-released new
Tarago though, Toyota seems to have done something about it and it now
comes with a lot more for about the same money.
Unforgivable, though, is the fact that two of the eight seatbelts were
lap-only - in a vehicle designed for family work, I find that
completely unacceptable.
Overall? Not bad, enough get up and go to move people around the
place, reasonable cabin storage apart from bugger-all luggage space and
versatile enough, albeit with no really clever design ideas or neat
touches. The dismal handling and cheap interior quality, though, would
make me look seriously at its competitors - I doubt very much that the
Tarago is worth the price premium over the Honda Odyssey or Mitsubishi
Grandis, unless you desperately need the eighth seat.