Subaru Legacy 2.5 CVT
Quality is a very awkward thing. How does one develop a bulletproof reputation, and what does that mean? Toyota pulled it off in this country and recently Honda has been creeping up to that hallowed position in the South African motorists' minds.
Customer satisfaction indices? Doesn't seem to change things. What makes one suck and another shine? How is it that faults in certain brands are overlooked and taken as anachronisms, yet faults in another brand are taken as positive reinforcement of shoddy build quality? Build a gazillion lentil-powered Toyotas that have an unfortunate habit of occasionally refusing to stop and the shine on the brands reputation is still enough to give you a burn with insufficient application of a decent SPF suncream. Stuck accelerator pedals? Pfah! Big deal, at least in both cases they just keep on goin' I guess.
Recall fireball Hondas? Did that hurt sales? Well, in fairness only 3 apparently spontaneously ignited. As personally sad as the one incident was, Honda's reputation continues seemingly unblemished. Just building better, more reliable cars?
That is an interesting question. To certain niche buyers, lovers of the brand, that works. Take an incident with me and the Le gac y in que s t ion' s predecessor. A couple of years ago the engine of the one I was testing came to a shuddering meltdown just next to the big pink thing adjacent to the Labia in Cape Town. Being rescued outside the Mount Nelson was better than being stuck in the bundu by quite a large margin. . .
Anyhow I digress. The point was that a little engineering waste found its way into the oil galleys of this particular engine, resulting in a lack of lubrication and ultimately a severe loss off kilowatts. In fact, all of them. Actually that wasn't my point. The real point is that when I told those in the know about my mishap, the comments were “oh how unusual, must have been a bad day, their engines are so reliable” etc. Now were that some French / Chinese / Korean / (insert personalprejudice here) car, it would have been an instant aha moment of crap build quality.
Thing is, Subaru build truly great and reliable cars. Take their STi wanna-be rally champion drivers cars, complete with hideous teatray rear wing accessories. Instead of being Italian-esque fickle mistresses, insistent on regular maintenance to just keep them running, seem to go on forever. Even when the boys from Bellville and Benoni complete their citrus conversions.
Ok so great brand. Big sedan. Reliable. Their brilliant handling with their symmetrical all-wheeldrive system. Albeit with the ride tuned for comfortable on our bad roads. Big boot, loads of storage. HID headlights. Auxiliary in for i-pod. 0- 100 in 10 seconds, just quick enough for this type of car and gearbox. More about the gearbox in a second.
Traditionally these boxer engine cars (same layout as Porsche and Beetle), only had one true drawback, if one overlooks the uninspired interiors. Fuel consumption. This time they got it right. Averaging 9l per 100 km's their anathema is no more!
CVT gearbox? Constant velocity transmissions have had bad press, for being buzzy. In essence a non gearbox with a “belt” between two slant sided pulleys able to vary their effective diameter by opening and closing their width. I think they are just very misunderstood. In fact I wish that this one would behave less like an autobox, with fake stepped “gearchanges” and act more like the infinitely variable ratio designed, having the engine run at constant, optimum revs for maximum torque and efficiency while the gearbox does the clever stuff.
Sad that my profession is probably the only reason they aren't programmed to take advantage of their major design opportunity. All in all R345k for a true medium sized sedan with no pretention and a 3-year maintenance plan makes the Legacy a decent deal.
I do so wish Subaru would do something about their interiors though. Just too unsexy.
