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By
EWAN KENNEDY
18 February 2008
The new 308 looks like a Peugeot; a blindingly obvious
statement you might say if you’re not into cars. But to those who do
admire style, style in any item, not just automotive items, the shape of
the 308 is oh, so right and a spectacular expansion of the famed French
theme that began at the start of the 21st century.
A theme that continued into the 407 and, most recently evolved
to give us the pretty little 207 (Europe's best selling car, so it
must be doing something right). Now we see the 307’s
replacement, logically carrying the tag of 308, taking the
excellent shape a further step forward.
From the huge single-opening grille flanked by elongated
headlights, over the domed roof and finishing at the swooping
tail, the Peugeot 308 is all class.
If you think the outside looks special, drop into your local
‘blue-box’ Peugeot dealer to have a look at the interior.
The name ‘blue-box’ has been coined for the stylish new
exterior direction taken by the dealerships. Australia has
embraced this new showroom design with a passion, so much so that
our country is the first on Earth to have nothing but blue-box
dealers.
Despite its styling flair the new Peugeot 308 manages to
maintain a solid element of functionality. Unlike some competitors
who have gained fashion at the expense of function, the guys and
gals at Peugeot have given us a car with a good-sized rear seat
and a sensible luggage area.
Cleverly, the interior space has been maintained despite that
the fact that the 308 is lower than the 307 it replaces. Seems
that not everyone was entranced by the tall look of the superseded
car, hence the adoption of what Peugeot designers call a ‘semi-high’
body. That is, one with both space and style.
The boot, at 430 litres is one of the biggest in its class and
comes with a fascinating rear shelf that has an inbuilt stowage
area that can cope with an umbrella or tennis racket.
In the modern manner, the new Peugeot 308 is set up as a
lifestyle vehicle, having an audio system that can be optioned up
to include a 30-Gigabyte hard drive capable of holding 180 hours
of music.
Handling and comfort, not an easy combination to score well on
both counts, has long been a feature of Peugeot cars. In the 308
the ride comfort that was loved in the 307 has been retained, but
the handling has been sharpened up. Sharpened to the extent that
it can be difficult to pick this as being a front-drive car unless
you push it very hard at corners. And even then the understeer
that eventually starts to dominate is never objectionable.
Peugeot, well into its sixth continuous decade in Australia,
continues to push hard in the turbo-diesel stakes. Buyers in our
country may only specify four per cent of passenger vehicles with
diesel engines, compared to 79 per cent in France, but the market
here is rapidly expanding and Peugeot has long been at the
vanguard of the move towards cleaner, greener engines.
Thus the 308 comes with a choice between a pair of
turbo-diesels, with capacities of 1.6 and 2.0 litres, producing 88
and 100 kilowatts respectively. More importantly, they manage top
torque figures of 240 and 320 Nm.
Peugeot made the interesting move of importing the 308 with
petrol engines having displacements of just 1.6 litres. A small
number by our standards, but one that’s very much understood by
the Europeans. These people are more interested in clean,
economical engines than in blasting away from the traffic lights.
In any case, one of the 1.6-litre units is a turbo-petrol unit
(designed in conjunction with BMW) that produces a handy 110 kW,
and 240 Nm at a ridiculously low 1400 rpm, so there's no shortage
of urge in the way it performs, both in acceleration and in hard
hillclimbing.
We have sampled the turbo-diesels, as well as the turbo variant
of the petrol engine, but Peugeot apparently elected not to bring
a non-turbo petrol to the press launch of the cars in Canberra. It’s
not likely to be an engine for the revheads (and motoring journos
do tend to fall into that category!) but the 88 kW petrol unit may
have enough power for the sensible Australian driver.
All the engines tested displayed good characteristics, with
turbo lag that never becomes too irritating. The five-speed
manuals (six in the 2.0 turbo-diesel) were light and easy in use.
The four-speed automatic transmission provided decent, if not
sparkling, operation though an extra ratio would have been nice.
With a price list beginning at only $25,490 thanks to some
heavy-duty negotiation with head office in Paris, the new Peugeot
308 seems certain to be a hit in Australia.
The complete Peugeot 308 range, with prices (excluding on-road
costs) is:
XS 1.6-litre petrol: $25,990 (manual), $27,990 (automatic)
XS HDi 1.6-litre turbo diesel: $29,990 (manual)
XSE 1.6-litre petrol: $30,390 (automatic)
XSE Turbo 1.6-litre turbo petrol: $30,590 (manual), $32,590
(automatic)
XSE HDi 2.0-litre turbo diesel: $33,590 (manual), $35,790
(automatic)
XTE 1.6-litre turbo petrol: $34,790 (automatic)
XTE HDi 2.0-litre turbo diesel: $37,990 (automatic)
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Marque Publishing Company
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