After six months, 10,000km and one new tyre, sadly it’s time at hand the little Nissan Qashqai e-Energy again.
Simply as we mentioned it might in November, once we printed our long-term evaluate introduction a month after taking supply, the small hybrid SUV made dozens of journeys to the Lang Lang proving floor through the time we have been custodians of it, a circa-200km spherical journey every time.
Apart from the lack of a front-right tyre to one in all Victoria’s devious potholes, it proved itself to be a reliable and cozy freeway cruiser – one thing that got here as a shock given its on-paper credentials.
It additionally featured as our “police automotive” within the video the place we in contrast Waze, Google Maps and a automotive’s speedometer to a police-spec laser. Whereas it wasn’t seen in full very a lot, it was the proper automotive for the job.
With a completely charged battery, the Qashqai was capable of sit silently, working the heated seats (we’ve received to maintain Paul comfy, in any case) and powering the laser by way of its 12V inside outlet.
WATCH: Paul’s video evaluate of the 2023 Nissan Qashqai Ti
It was additionally the service of our car-to-car monitoring digital camera for dozens of movies you’ll have watched. Once we movie on the proving floor, we all the time do a lap of the monitor with a digital camera mounted on a monitoring automotive to get some shifting photographs for the video.
The Qashqai did a stable job, offering a clean base because of comfy suspension, and ample energy to have the ability to sustain with even a number of the sports activities automobiles we filmed.
The rear storage is one other shock with the Qashqai. Regardless of being classed as a small SUV, it has sufficient room within the boot for the entire filming gear we stock to a shoot.
Sometimes, that consists of a big suitcase (the notorious pink ‘Subscribe’ suitcase you’ll have spied in a reverse digital camera), a big Pelican case, tripods, a slab of water and a choice of different unfastened gadgets.
WATCH: Google Maps vs Waze vs speedo: Which finest avoids a dashing fantastic?
I’d usually put the rear seats down, simply to make accessing issues simpler as soon as a shoot begins. Nonetheless, you may match all of it behind the second row if stacked appropriately.
The not so good
That mentioned, now the unhealthy. The seats, whereas comfy, will not be good for Australian summers.
The leather-based on them turns right into a glue-like substance on a scorching day, and after working round filming on the proving floor with a digital camera within the components, the very last thing I need to do is sit in them as a result of I do know I’ll must peel myself off them.
They do have perforations within the inserts however there’s no cooling operate. Nissan if you happen to’re studying this please add cooling. Actually, for any producer studying this, ventilated seats needs to be commonplace in Australia.
The opposite destructive is the infotainment system. Its touchscreen is giant at 12.3 inches, however the digital camera imaginative and prescient is sort of ineffective except you’re in good lighting circumstances. Mounting a GoPro on the again and connecting to my cellphone for reside viewing would supply a greater digital camera.
In my long-term introduction concerning the Qashqai, I spoke about Apple CarPlay points. This appears to have solely gotten worse; past the drop-outs via toll gantries that causes prolonged lag, a brand new difficulty has developed…
Should you get into the automotive and switch it on and drive, wi-fi Apple CarPlay will join and work fantastic. Nonetheless, if you happen to do a few brief drives – for instance working errands – and you end up out and in of the automotive, CarPlay will usually disconnect and never come again, no matter what you do. Even plugging in by way of a cable doesn’t work.
I discovered the one strategy to repair it was to fully disconnect and delete the automotive from my cellphone and my cellphone from the automotive, then reconnect to rectify. This isn’t one thing I’ve had with different long-term automobiles I’ve hung out in.
Finally, I gave up on wi-fi CarPlay and simply reverted to wired, which principally solved the problems. However generally the ghost gantries nonetheless trigger drop-outs.
It might appear to be a minor factor, however when your cellphone drops out and you may’t reconnect, and also you’re travelling via a brand new place, it may be a catastrophe.
Journey high quality and dealing with dynamics are nice, however 95 per cent of the time I used to be on cruise management on a motorway anyway, so getting the infotainment proper issues to me.
Hopefully that’s one thing Nissan has fastened with the lately launched Qashqai facelift. Sure, you’ll discover our take a look at car right here is the pre-update MY24 Nissan Qashqai Ti e-Energy, however the drivetrain and underpinnings stays the identical.
Travelling with the Qashqai
I’ll preface this part by saying this journey wasn’t an enormous journey, but it surely was insightful for the way the Qashqai e-Energy behaves on the open street.
On a weekend journey from Melbourne to Ballarat, a spherical journey of about 400km from my home, I anticipated the gas economic system to be horrible. It isn’t an extended drive, however it’s tortuous on a motorcar. A variety of hills, numerous elevation adjustments and, sure, numerous velocity zone variations – good gas economic system’s worst nightmare.
However I used to be very stunned by the end result. On the finish of the journey it had averaged 4.9L/100km. Given you may’t management the engine velocity within the e-Energy and the small 2.1kWh battery isn’t designed for lengthy distance journeys, it is a nice end result.
One of the best distance I ever received from a full tank was 981km, when my common velocity was 67km/h and the automotive indicated consumption of 5.2L/100km, which continues to be excellent. So masking greater than 1000km a tank is properly throughout the realms of chance.
Nonetheless, the ergonomics of the Qashqai automotive aren’t fairly as properly designed for long-distance driving. The seats begin to turn out to be a bit stiff and sticky after a few hours – one thing that may very well be fastened with a air flow operate…
And the tyres, whereas designed to be economical, are noisy. When you hit coarse-chip roadways outdoors of the town, they turn out to be very droney and require a quite dramatic enhance in music quantity to drown the sound out.
Conversely, the suspension is surprisingly comfy. The Qashqai rides the bumps and dips of regional roads properly and all the time feels prefer it’s sustaining its composure. Cruising at 110km/h on the open street isn’t its pure habitat, however the Nissan will gladly do all of it day.
It have to be mentioned that if you happen to loaded the Qashqai up with 4 adults, this may be a distinct story – however for 2 folks and their baggage, this automotive actually hits the mark. It additionally seems to be nice in blue!
General, nevertheless, I believe the e-Energy system may use some work. It’s an incredible, distinctive powertrain idea, and with some growth it may very well be a correct Toyota Hybrid rival. Nevertheless it wants a much bigger battery and a extra refined, and extra economical, engine to make it work rather well – maybe the next-gen e-Energy system due in 2026 will repair that too.
Nonetheless, any automotive that may journey 1000km between fills is doing fairly darn good.
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