Ahoy! It's the Chevrolet Cruze - Wheels Within Wales

On sale now the all new Korean built Chevrolet Cruze four-door lower medium saloon joins the new car market and 700 of the 1,500 units available this year are already sold.

Chevrolet UK said this week that in a full year Cruze saloons should achieve 2,500 to 3,000 sales and when the range is complete this figure should double.
Cruze saloon budget prices range from £11,995 to £15,195 and there are three engine options, 1.6-litre 113PS, a 1.8-litre 141PS petrol and 2.0-litre turbodiesel available with two power outputs of 125 and 150PS. The best selling model will be the 1.6-litre taking an anticipated 50% of Cruze saloon sales, mainly to retail customers. The 1.8-litre unit should account for 35% of sales and the diesel units 15%.
Craig Cheetham, product communications manager for Chevrolet in the UK said, the Cruze is the brand’s first proper fleet and business user-chooser proposition because they offer a high level of specification at low prices and that means significant advantages for company car tax P11D payments. As a brand 60% of our sales are currently to retail customers but adding Cruze to the line-up will give us a 50/50 split between retail and fleet business. We have also been seeing an increase in demand from Motability customers, particularly for the Lacetti estate with its automatic transmission option.
The offerings from the new Cruze are high specification and attractive pricing but the main headline is to be found under the skin and the real core of this new car. The Cruze from Chevrolet is the first product to enter the market from the GM parent company using their new Delta2 global platform which will also be used by the forthcoming new generation Vauxhall Astra due on sale in January 2010.
Initially the Cruze is available as a four-door saloon but the more popular five-door hatchback version will join the line-up next year. The Cruze eventually will be the replacement for the slightly smaller Chevrolet Lacetti hatchback and estates which remain on sale. There are no plans for a Cruze estate; this offering will be the seven-seat Orlando MPV/estate due out next year.
Commenting on the future of the Chevrolet brand Cheetham said the future of GM in the USA looks settled but Europe still has to be decided. Whatever the outcome for Chevrolet it will be business as usual. The brand is so entwined with GM technology that whoever the new owners are GM will retain a share holding so for the long term it will be business as usual.
In the UK Chevrolet has 96 dealerships, 50% of them shared with Vauxhall and 50% standalone outlets, many of them family run dealerships and many of them former MG Rover dealers. He added that owners of old Rover400s had made the most trade-ins so far for advance sales of Cruze.
Boosted by the scrappage sales programme Chevrolet’s UK sales rose by 30% in June over the same month last year, the third month in a row UK sales had increased. Last year UK annual sales were 18,372 units, 16 more than 2007. Their target this year is to exceed 18,500 UK registrations. Chevrolet sales in Europe last year exceeded 50,000 units
The Chevrolet brand in Europe started in 2005 following the takeover of the budget Korean Daewoo marque in 2002.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

The aptly named Cruze from Chevrolet has cruised its way to the UK’s new car market to eventually replace the Lacetti models.

Initially the Cruze is available as a four-door, lower-medium, C-sector sized saloon but five-door hatchback models arrive next year. Whilst the hatchback body style is more popular in this segment than saloons, this only applies to the UK and France. For the rest of the world four-door saloon body styles are more popular.

The Cruze is built in Korea and it is a global product. Production will also take place in the USA for that market and in the future the Cruze will also be built in Russia.

One of the core appeals of the Chevrolet range is value for money, and the Cruze is no exception, with comprehensive levels of standard equipment across the entire range including electronic stability and traction controls.

The line-up kicks off with the 1.6 S, which enjoys a comprehensive list of standard equipment despite its value price tag of £11,995. As well as air conditioning and remote central locking, the model features follow-me-home lighting, a feature normally reserved for premium cars, a quality CD-radio system with auxiliary input socket, electric front windows, a fully-adjustable drivers’ seat and steering wheel, upmarket, soft-touch cabin materials and premium blue-backlit dashboard dials.

The LS model, expected to be the best-seller in the range, starts at only £12,595 for the 1.6 manual variant and includes air conditioning as standard, plus other upmarket features such as 16-inch alloy wheels, a chrome edged radiator grille, front fog lights, body coloured bumpers and mirrors, a leather covered gearknob and steering wheel, trip computer, electric rear windows, steering-wheel mounted audio controls and reverse parking sensors. For an extra £1,100, customers can specify the 1.6 LS with a state-of-the-art six-speed automatic gearbox.

Flagship of the range will be the LT, which comes in 1.8 petrol or 2.0-litre diesel guises, starting at £13,595. For that, you get a list of specification that’s truly befitting of a luxury car, including cruise control, climate control, rain-sensing wipers, anti-dazzle rear view mirror, an upgraded high-output stereo with 6-CD changer, chrome detailing and 17-inch alloy wheels, plus the option of an integrated satellite navigation system.

So the price is low and the specification high but that means nothing if the product doesn’t look good. Well that battle has been won as well because the new Cruze looks very smart indeed and well able to compete against the latest Kia, Hyundai and Skoda models of a similar size.

The Cruze is currently a four-door saloon but it has a coupe side profile and the only drawback to that is a shortfall of headroom for rear seat passengers. In all other respects the car is roomy being 4,597mm long with a large 450-litre boot and this can be increased because the rear seats split and fold. The boot lid access, although wide, is not very deep.

The interior is crisp in design with a front twin-cockpit layout where the dashboard has a centre console and then wraps around the driver and front seat passenger. Horizontal cloth bands across the dashboard flowing into the front doors complete a very pleasant interior appearance.

As the specification is high there are lots of controls and instruments but the centre console controls operating the sound system and air conditioning are fiddly to use. The steering wheel design looks as though it comes straight from the highly rated Vauxhall Insignia range which is a bonus and indicates the value the Cruze offers budget buyers.

In terms of handling and performance. The new GM platform has been highly rated during pre-launch testing of the new Astra and indeed the Cruze performs pretty well with good grip and composed handling – much better than the Lacetti.

It is softly sprung so there is evidence of wallowing but generally the ride is flat with little body roll. The harder sprung diesel model with its heavier engine is the most composed of the three versions I tried.

The steering is precise enough but lacks feedback to the driver. Pitched at the budget end of the market I’d class it as a capable rather than sophisticated, but it gets the job done as it is roomy and will give loads of driving pleasure to value-for-money customers.

As for the engines? Well the 1.6-litre 113PS petrol unit, the expected best seller, is pretty sluggish during acceleration but once on the move it cruises happily at motorway maximum speeds and returned 35.4mpg during my brief test which include A, B and motorway driving. Officially this unit will return 41.5mpg and the CO2 emissions of 159g/km give it a road tax bill of £150.

The 1.8-litre 141PS petrol engine is an improvement over the 1.6-litre unit giving another 9mph top speed at 124mph and the 0-62mph of 10 seconds is faster by 1.8 seconds. Fuel economy, CO2 emissions and road tax are the same as the 1.6-litre unit and my test car returned a realistic 34.4mpg.

Best of all is the 2.0-litre VCDI turbodiesel unit with 150PS and the extra torque of 320Nm makes it far more responsive and faster. Top speed is 130mph and 0 to 62mph takes just 8.7 seconds. Official the average fuel economy is 50.4mpg, my test car returned 44.9mpg. Emissions are 149g/km meaning a road tax bill of £125.

The 125PS version of this engine was not available at the media test drive. Not only is this 150PS turbodiesel engine the best option the car also feels better balanced and offers a more controlled ride thanks to firmer suspension rates.

It is the pick of the bunch but it does cost more to buy and being a budget brand I can understand why cash-strapped but sensible customers will go for the 1.6-litre engine and the LS specification making it an attractive financial package at £12,595.

Both petrol engines have the £1,100 option of a 6-speed automatic transmission and so will the diesel models later this year. All manual gearboxes are 5-speed units.

MILESTONES.
Chevrolet Cruze 1.6i LS manual £12,595 (Best selling model).
Insurance group: 4E.
Engine/transmission: 1.6-litre, four-cylinder petrol, 113PS, 153Nm from 4,200rpm, 5-speed manual.
Performance: 115mph, 0-62mph 11.8 seconds, 41.5mpg (35.4mpg actual), CO2 159g/km, VED £150, BIK tax 19%.
For: A well proportioned, smartly styled four-door saloon with a hint of coupe styling, extremely well equipped for the money.
Against: Petrol engines need to be improved for acceleration performance, diesel unit is better, needs to be a five-door hatchback for the UK market, comfortable but soft ride, uninvolving to drive.