ROAD TEST ON A WORTHWHILE VEHICLE.

A large number of readers will agree that there is better use for printing ink and paper than filling four and more pages of a newspaper or magazine with the retail prices of every single model car, bakkie, SUV and Super car available in South Africa. Every time I express my concern about this, there are those who tell me that I am either behind or ahead of time. Newspaper and magazine readers apparently read this?

 

 

 

 

My question is, do people actually finger-follow the prices of cars before they decide to buy, or even worse do they simply do that to pass time or look at what they cannot afford?

Newspapers, magazines and anything else using trees, recycled or not, are wasting energy and money.

Wait a moment – this is not what I am supposed to be writing about, but have at least said it again!

What I am supposed to do is to write down my opinion of a vehicle I drove for a few days.

One of the advantages I have is that because of my involvement in Rallystar Motorsport Academy I am firstly in a great position to test cars and at the same time I can easily obtain the opinion of 20 and more people about such test car. This is probably why, albeit the first test in a long time, I love doing my bit to add to the already overcrowded business of car “tests”.

After taking delivery of this shiny almost brand new vehicle I simply drove around for a few kilometres to get a general feel of it ­- not really worrying about what to write.

Then after the second day, every time I fired it up, I thought, “Botha now you have to concentrate, you have to find something to write about, something that will either convince a few people to buy it, or put them off for life! You have to look for that “special quality” in this specific vehicle or you will do as so many other people do, write almost exactly what everyone else did.

Then I pull away again, fiddle here, press a button there and soon I am again engulfed in the art of driving, enjoying the vehicle instead of worrying too much about writing about it.

What I loved was that it was easy to pick up speed to where my grandpa would have fainted, not because he was scared, no sir, he fought in every possible war and battle – always against the Brits, but fought he did. Speed however was not war! Anything above 80km/h was speeding and made him hold his breath, which in turn would cause him to faint.

Traffic ahead – as usual someone interprets the “following distance” through a slightly skew pair of specs and brakes too hard about 126m too soon.

I smile – apply the Mitsubishi ASX’s brakes like a real gentleman. Not sudden and not harsh, the speed reduces as if the Mitsubishi ran into some of that cruel glue some perverts use to catch rats and mice with.

When it is fun to reduce speed while driving a car and everything that happens feels safe and predictable, then my friend you can pull out that limitless credit card and buy the specific car because South Africa has turned into the land of sudden darkness and short braking distances for various reasons.

I felt save behind the steering wheel and knew I would be OK as long as I remembered where the brake pedal was, so once again I decided to simply enjoy the ride and not worry too much about the writing part.

I did however wonder about those who do this for a living.

What if you were handed three or four cars with approximately the same looks, power, interior and loading space, gearbox and ratios, fuel consumption, performance figures and so on to evaluate? What do you write about?

Let’s face it, most cars are very much the same. It is therefore not easy to write about one not describing the other as well.

So to prove that I can also sometimes be clever, I decided to ask a few people I saw driving competitor’s vehicles in the same class as the Mitsubishi, what they thought of their cars.

The answer, almost without exception “Oh, it gives me good service!”

Why did you buy it? “I liked it at the time!”

Then most of them would either walk over to the Mitsubishi ASX or glance in its direction saying, “This is nice, what is it?” or “Oh I like this, I have and old Lancer and would love to get my hands on one of these. May I look inside? How much is it?”

No real excitement, but much more enthusiasm than when they looked back at what they were driving, not knowing why they owed it.

Nothing exceptional was mentioned by anyone about their current vehicles.

Strange how people “sell” cars to themselves when they “have” to buy them and then do not remember one single reason why they bought it, let alone any special feature it had.

The first week might still produce some excitement, but then the “newness” faded away as it started to smell more like the family than the factory.

That is if you are not lucky enough to own an Audi RS4 like I do. Then of course you need not say anything! Just hit the start button, select a gear, push the sport button and drive away leaving that rumbling drone hanging in the air behind you. No turbo, no nonsense just straight high-revving brute force and boerewors – solid as they come.

The last car I tested, was many, many years ago, and because I fell into the trap I set for myself to tell the honest truth – I did not get many more opportunities and when they came up I had to decline anyway because I could simply not fit test-driving-around-for-pleasure into my program.

Things have changed since then.

 

 

 

 

 

Keep in mind that there are not really “bad” cars on the market anymore – my generation had to cope with the Austin Marina, the Triumph Chicane — nogal fast and dangerous, the Chev Corvair, the Rambler Hornet and a few other very suspect forms of transport.

Manufacturers now seem to realise that they either have to deliver or be delivered on a plate.

The Mitsubishi’s suspension does everything a reasonable sober man or woman will expect it to do and to get it to react in a manner where you need to worry about not having been in church for a while, you need to push your luck slightly beyond the pearly gates.

I will go as far as to say that if you drive like a good citizen and add the 10km grace they (the Hide, Seek and Bribe brigade) allow you to do before they stop you, only to tell you the fine is around R1500 and then lean a bit closer with rolling eyes, to fix the problem because they are “hungry”, you will never have a “moment” in the ASX.

The family and “research group” all loved the panoramic view of the Milky-way you got at the push of a button and I promise you can feel and enjoy the noiseless freedom.

The slight tint of the glass blocks out the worse sunrays and it is truly easy to form a habit to drive with the panoramic roof fully open – permanently.

There will obviously be many opinions about the “looks” of the car, but I got many more “nice’s” than “OK’s” while no one said anything negative about the looks.

Add to that, the renowned Mitsubishi-reliability and the choice gets easier.

I do not see many reasons why it should not be a popular used car in future for a number of reasons – it will remain reliable for a long, long time and I have a feeling that 350 000km will be the high average while very few “family” drivers will see the end of the car. (Not something manufacturers will like in particular, if you are old enough to remember Borgward who managed to manufacture an indestructible car and closed down because of it.)

The Mitsubishi got an excellent European safety rating – something that usually also confirms that a car was well-built and will last for a long time. So far I could tick the boxes in my mind and have to mention that I was instrumental to the sale of two of these cars by this time already.

 INSIDE THE ASX

Four of us were driving to a meeting.

I looked in the rear view mirror and actually saw a gap between two of the biggest men I know – both called Dan. I believe that telling the weight of a man – except of course if it is pure muscle – is as bad as telling the age of a lady.

In this case you can take a guess who is biggest but together they weigh well over 200kg – that added to the well over 200kg friend Kevin and I made up on the two front seats, pushed the combined weight to close to that of one of the empty coal trucks running up and down past Eskom power stations.

We were on our way to see the boss of the Provincial Traffic Department in mid Jozi.

Dan the man and partner Kevin were both a bit late – sort of Africa Time late – just enough to have to run to the elevators after filling in a lot of false info on the form at security  – only joking so don’t worry about phoning the hawks.

Problem was that we were still a good few kilometres from where we were supposed to have this meeting.

I started pushing the ASX a bit and the two litre engine felt good. Not terrific, not neck jerking quality, but more than good enough to pick up speed and keep up a reasonably safe and responsible pace without having to change gears all the time.

“Hey Dan, what is she like at the back”, I asked both Dan’s more to see if the big men was uncomfortable with me behind the steering wheel, than anything else.

I expected a “no I am good”, sort of courtesy remark, but instead both Dan’s started describing the comfort at the back. My seat was quite far back – that is my normal – slightly old fashioned style of sitting behind the steering wheel – while I noticed that Kevin next to me was quite a bit forward to make sure that the bigger of the two Dan’s would fit in.

This car is very comfortable one said and the other agreed and then both appreciated the panoramic roof and I was so glad to hear other people also liked it.

Then Kevin, typical of my Portuguese friend, had to pee on our batteries by painting a hell of a bloody picture about what would happened if you roll a car with a panoramic roof!

He then described a horror scene of an accident where someone flew out of the sunroof of a car when the sunroof popped!

I closed the roof and when he said that would not help, I reopened it immediately again – I prefer to die while enjoying a great view.

After the meeting we stopped at a restaurant where we enjoyed a truly great steak – in Bedfordview (Kevin paid) – before we drove back to the office at Kevin’s Auto Aircon business in Edenvale.

At our arrival Dan Moyo wanted the key of the ASX to go for a test drive and I held on to them – knowing that Mitsubishi Marketing would kick my ass to Toyota and back if I let anyone – not that Dan is anyone – drive around without having done all the paperwork.

It then dawned on me that by that time I have lined up five prospective buyers for this car – to be honest from Worchester to Pretoria. Not that I have been all over – that was where my customers came from for driver training – fun drives and specialist training at Rallystar.

Rid of around 350kg of weight I was on my way back from Jozi to go drop dog food at the farm for three dogs of various breeds – not one definitely identifiable. (I have to find new owners for them – so if you know anyone who do not like firearms but wants protection – let me know! I am serious)

The Mitsubishi takes three 25kg bags of dog food, a small bag of what they claim to be extra special mealie meal, a 12kg bag of birdseed and two free copies of “Horse and small holding” magazines, as if it were nothing.

You can still see over all of this on in the middle rear-view mirror. The 100kg or so right at the back affected the handling slightly – until I realized that the tyre pressure was too low. My mistake!

With increased pressure we ran nicely once again all the way past the farm to drop off the dogfood, and then I was on my way to my house in Pretoria.

That night I read all I could find on “panorama roofs” looking for hundreds of names of people who died falling through the glass tops.

I found nothing except that it seemed if they dropped a building on a Smart – that little car in which you drive around when – well so it seems – when you are suicidal.

Not really – that little car pass safety tests much better than many other cars that look three times as tough.

Anyway – after my research I drove past building construction sites without looking up all the time. Fact was, you could look at heaven without necessarily going there prematurely. The modern panoramic roof is as hard and tough as you get.

 

 

 

 

TO THE RACING TRACK WE GO

Early Saturday morning – much too early for any sane person to be out of bed, I had to go to pick up my rally team engineer – a young man called Doctor at Rallystar.

Now Doctor is a youngster who started with me around five or so years ago. He has one exceptional characteristic – he wants to learn and know all he can about fixing a rally car and fix it well.

There is not much you can teach him about a Subaru – but today – this very Saturday he was going to service for me in the pits – working on a Ford Bantam 1600 racing bakkie with slicks, a non-functional rear suspension and a limited slip differential that, although I did not know it by then, would try to throw me out through the permanently open window.

Doctor stood ready, willing and very able to go – his box of tools, torque wrench and jack next to him at gate waiting for me. I glanced at the in car thermometer and it registered or indicated -2ºC.

An “old” duvet my wife did not know about protected the Mitsubishi interior against any damage the toolboxes and so on, may cause.

Off to Midvaal Raceway we went where I was supposed to prove that I was still world champion material!

What you are about to read has not been written to tell you about me. It is merely to tell you about the Mitsubishi ASX.

As we left the Rallystar farm I realized that we were going to be late. The GPS told us that we had to cover 112kms to get to the track. Then I had one of my Einstein attacks and pressed “recalculate” and selected “shortest route” on the GPS.

78kms – now that was doable and both Doctor and I sat slightly forward to pick up speed.

The ASX cut through the cold and I had to fine tune the aircon to get some warmer air on my retirement age feet.

Twisting through Benoni and the industrial areas of Brakpan, the kilometre count came down nicely and the GPS now predicted 08h09 instead of 08h34 as our estimated arrival time.

Suddenly we had to turn left – onto a gravel road. Doctor and I looked at each other – very much like that the two guys in that TV ad of the Isuzu where they came before the choice of tar and difficult gravel roads.

We had no choice – except take the gravel road or arrive late.

After making sure that the Mitsubishi has sufficient side protection against millions of small and bigger flying stones, I selected first and accelerated through the gearbox until the revs fell to around 3300 rpm which meant that I was traveling at an exact 130km/h – which of course is the acceptable speed it seems that everyone is travelling at – on highways and a bit too enthusiastic for the speed limit on gravel roads.

My eyes were locked to the road keeping a look out for sudden ditches and or potholes in the road.

I saw a ditch and at the same time, also realised that you had to take it from right to left to minimize the bounce.

Doctor whistled the first part of Nkhosi Sikilel Iafrica when he saw the ditch too late – then I could clearly hear that he was whistling an “F-word” while he grabbed his safety belt and a safety handle thinking that the Mitsubishi’s end had arrived.

“Du-dub” – were the only remarks we got from the suspension. Nice and smooth – no after bounce – no losing traction or direction and not a sound from the tools in the back.

Nothing wrong with this setup I thought by myself, looked at the watch and stole a kilometre or two more to make sure we would be at the track on time.

No dust inside the car, no excessive road noise – nice and steady handling without any unpredictable little tricks up its sleeve. That my dear friends was not what I could say about the Ford Bantam bakkie that waited for me at the track.

 

I kid you not – I have never before been to Midvaal race course. I had no idea of what the track looked like – except of course having a look at it on “Google Earth”.

You started about 200m before a tight lefthander – then you had to try and get more to the left in anticipation of a very long three point tightening right hander before you tackled the straight that stretched for about 800m before you had to step on the brakes a 100m before another right hander. Then another right and left, then a hairpin right waited before you took a tight left onto the “pit straight” – and the whole process as I described, repeated itself again.

I managed a reasonable qualifying time (no practise) – after losing the bakkie big-time as I came onto the main straight. The bloody thing did not have windows so all the grass and dirt landed on me inside the car.

Then the race started – as we did a warm up lap to go and line up I swerved the car left and right like all the other competitors – just to show that I knew what this was all about. I decided that is was essential to get some heat onto those rear-wheels.

So determined to get the temp up on the rear wheels I swerved harder than anyone around me. Then without warning – the Bantam’s ass simply broke lose like that of a very experienced prostitute. I spun out on the warm up lap! What a bloody fool!

In the race I did quite well and posted a time equal to that of the pole position driver earlier that morning – but in the race that counted for next to nothing. Then of course trying to make up for everyone that overtook me on the straight I pushed that unpredictable little monster a bit too hard again and I lost it two more times. A total disaster if you ask me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The second race of the day I decided to do my best but to keep the bakkie under control and except for almost losing control again on the penultimate lap, I managed to stay on the road and posted fairly good times. It came as a hell of a surprise to me when I was asked for my signature by three instant fans as I came off the track after the race.

Now that takes some doing!

I was a bit embarrassed thinking that they were sarcastic – the more I think about it, the more I believe they were – although I have to say that I did make a great “save”, tank-slapping in all directions for about what felt like an hour and then bringing it back under control as if I go through corners like that every time.

On our way back to Rallystar to drop Doc after a busy day, we chose to drive the gravel roads again. About 20kms of dirt because it was a lot shorter and we liked driving on dirt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next day the Mitsubishi took the family to a morning market and once again it drew attention from quite a number of people. Grandchild’s chair mounted safely in the rear and grandma strapped in beside me – a contrasting nice quiet and peaceful visit to buy things we did not really need – but in support of people who were not too lazy to make a living.

Can a lady change a flat wheel next to the road when she has to?

I forgot to check what it was like to change a wheel, let alone getting one of the opposite sex to give it a go. Who knows – next time I may remember to get that done as well.

FINAL VIEW

 

So what says I, will I buy it – yes or no?

Negatives:

My old fashioned side, which of course is the whole of me, do not like the fact that a car can start without you actually switching the bloody thing on. After at least 10 “starts” I still either “lost” the key, forgot the key in the car or on the kitchen table. Everyone else seems to think that starting a car that switches itself on when the key gets close to it, was cool. Yes I know this is almost the general norm these days, but still, I thought I should mention that I did not like it.

Then my biggest complaint – that shiny mid-section on the dashboard. Everything works out well and then for some silly reason they mount this shiny reflecting black plastic console into what would have been quite an acceptable dashboard. I simply did not like that as I felt it spoiled the look and reflects when you didn’t want it to reflect. I am sure one can make a plan to take the glare off or at least reduce it.

 

The handling of the ASX, to say the least, was unexpectedly good but while being spoiled by that, I would have liked to get even less body-roll when in a slight spot of bother. The body-lean I am talking about happened more due to the driver being half asleep behind the steering wheel when a corner sharper than it looked from a distance suddenly appeared. So if Mitsubishi does something about the black “mirror” dash – they might add a little bit of stiffness to the already good suspension.

Now I am on dangerous ground – and this may affect the price of the ASX.

I realise that the car uses only 3300rpm at a genuine 120 – but I would have preferred one more gear. That will improve fuel efficiency even more and will result in a nice silent drive through the Karoo up to where you go off the road after falling asleep.

THE POSITIVE SIDE OF THINGS.

After driving and experiencing the quality of the Mitsubishi ASX, I know it will have a long, long life without any major hiccups.

The fact that the vehicle looks good enough to draw attention – is a plus to owner ego. I often feel so sorry for the proud owners of cars that simply disappear between all else, funny enough this is also what most hijackers and bank robbers look for, something that is inconspicuous

The performance in general is excellent, but that panorama roof is my favourite and I loved driving around feeling quite free – that was after I made sure that the roof would withstand almost anything that can be lifted higher than a Jacaranda tree.

Kids and passengers all liked it.

You can truly fit four well-built adults and a kid into the car and no one will die driving from Pretoria to Cape Town and no one need to feel claustrophobic.

The car has above average radio sound quality, a rather average air-conditioner and good handling. Add to this better than average performance and being able to look at the moon through the panorama roof, the easy loading and unloading with ample space for long and broad things with the rear seats down and finally thinking about the general remarks of those I took around for a spin or short trip – the answer is without doubt “yes” I will indeed buy the Mitsubishi ASX and as I said already, I have a feeling that the second-hand value will not be too bad when the time comes to part with it in exchange for a later model Mitsubishi again.

To find out if present owners will enhance the value, I stopped two owners of ASX models (yes I realise is not a hell of a representative base for research, but it is not so easy to stop anyone these days) and I am very pleased for Mitsubishi’s sake to report that both owners convinced me that they did indeed not regret the purchase.

At a monthly payment of R3999 for a brand new ASX according the TV advert – one will hardly be able to do better.

Yes – I truly like the Mitsubishi ASX for all the right reasons.

To get to all the specifications and more functions, the colour range available and so on, click on this link: http://www.mitsubishi-sa.co.za/vehicles/asx/