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By
EWAN KENNEDY
9 October 2006
Nissan's Tiida is finally starting to get itself
moving in the sales race after a disappointingly slow start. The biggest
problem seems to have been buyer confusion. After selling Pulsar so
successfully for decades, Nissan opted to give the new model a different
name.
This name change seriously upset many Nissan
dealers, some of whom set up a campaign saying that "Tiida =
Pulsar" to try to bring potential customers back into the
showrooms.
And I’m not sure that an advertising campaign
featuring a ditzy blonde American TV star did the Tiida any
favours…
Head office in Melbourne has hit the Tiida’s
slow-sales problem with a tried and proven solution – price
cuts. It has slashed prices by as much as $2500. The entry level
Tiida ST’s price tag dropped $2000 to just $17,990. That’s an
amazingly low price for a fully-imported Japanese car in this
class.
Buyers are finally starting to pay attention –
and are discovering a most competent car that provides a lot of
interior space in an attractive body.
The Tiida has as much legroom and headroom in
the back seat as you will find in many six-cylinder family cars.
That’s because it’s considerably taller than most cars in this
class, however, clever design means it’s not aggressively tall
in appearance.
Indeed, Nissan's Tiida has modern lines that
could easily be mistaken for those of a much more expensive
European car.
The front seats are large, which is partly due
to a clever design that sees the seat adjustment levers being
placed in the normally unused space between the two seats. Thus
allowing them to spread further in width towards the doors.
The boots of both the sedan and hatch are large,
with the topline Tiida hatch having sliding rear seats that lets
you increase the boot size if you don’t need stretch-out legroom
in the back seat. When you push the legroom down to what would be
considered normal in other cars in this class, Tiida has a huge
boot.
This car has the sort of refined feeling you
would normally find in a car of the next size upwards. Ride
comfort is very good on all but the roughest of roads and even
then is generally acceptable.
Handling is good without attempting to push the
Tiida into the sports sedan category. Typical buyers will be more
than happy with the safety and stability it offers.
The electrically-assisted system is rather light
and vague for our tastes, but most will soon adapt to the way it
feels.
On the downside, the front windscreen pillars
are thick and pushed a long way forward. They can create blind
spots at some intersections, as well as on winding roads.
Nissan's Tiida was affected by the strong, gusty
crosswinds present during our original testing at the time of the
car’s launch out of Melbourne. This isn’t unusual in taller
than average vehicles, but was more than we had anticipated and
could be disconcerting at times. We didn’t strike similar
weather conditions during our latest week’s test driving in our
home area on the Gold Coast.
Power for the Tiida comes from a new 1.8-litre
twin-cam engine that’s shared with Nissan's French partner
Renault. Our road-test car had an automatic transmission. An old
style four-speed unit, it doesn’t have any sequential features,
but you can lock out fourth gear if that’s necessary in some
hilly or winding-road conditions. The automatic works well enough,
though there are times when the car feels sluggish off the line
when it is carrying a heavy load.
Nissan has provided a six-speed manual gearbox
for the first time in its class. We found the shift surprising
noisy as it makes a real clunk-clunk sound with every gearchange.
We found it irritating, but at least one owner we have spoken to
loves the sound of the gearshift. Perhaps we would have come to
like it in time.
Fuel consumption was about average for this
class, typically being about nine to ten litres per hundred
kilometres in country and motorway driving. Rising to 11 to 13
litres per hundred in heavily-trafficked city and suburban use.
That’s for ‘our’ automatic, a Tiida with a manual gearbox
would probably use about five to ten per cent less fuel depending
on the way the two cars are driven.
Nissan Tiida is exceptionally smooth and quiet
and a spacious interior that will make it worth checking if you
are thinking about moving down from a large family car to cut your
fuel bills.
With the recent price cuts it’s a bargain that
many will find hard to pass up.
AT A GLANCE
MODEL RANGE
ST 1.8-litre four-door sedan - $17,990
ST 1.8-litre five-door hatch - $17,990
ST-L 1.8-litre four-door sedan - $19,990
ST-L 1.8-litre five-door hatch - $19,990
Q 1.8-litre five-door hatch - $22,990
Ti 1.8-litre four-door sedan - $24,990
FEATURES
ABS Brakes: Not offered in ST, standard in all other models
Air Conditioning: Standard in all models
Automatic Transmission: Standard in Ti; $2000 option on all other
models
CD Player: Standard in all models
Central Locking: Standard in all models
Cruise Control: Not offered
Driver Airbag: Standard in all models
Passenger Airbag: Standard in all models
Front Side Airbags: Not offered in ST, standard in all other
models
SPECIFICATIONS (Nissan Tiida ST-L 1.8-litre
four-door sedan)
ENGINE:
Capacity: 1.797 litres
Configuration: Four cylinders in line
Head Design: DOHC, four valves per cylinder
Compression Ratio: 9.9:1
Bore/Stroke: 84.0 x 81.1mm
Maximum Power: 93kW @ 5200rpm
Maximum Torque: 174Nm @ 4800rpm
DRIVELINE:
Driven Wheels: Front
Manual Transmission: Six-speed
Automatic Transmission: Four-speed
Final Drive Ratio: 3.933:1
DIMENSIONS, WEIGHT AND CAPACITIES:
Length: 4395mm
Wheelbase: 2600mm
Width: 1695mm
Height: 1535mm
Turning Circle: 10.4 metres
Kerb Mass: 1104kg
Fuel Tank Capacity: 52 litres
Towing Ability: 600kg (1000kg with braked trailer)
SUSPENSION AND BRAKES:
Front Suspension: Independent, MacPherson struts, anti roll bar
Rear Suspension: Torsion beam, coil springs, anti roll bar
Front Brakes: Ventilated disc
Rear Brakes: Drum
PERFORMANCE:
0-100 km/h Acceleration: 10.7 secs
Standing 400 Metres: 17.4 secs
FUEL CONSUMPTION:
Fuel Type: Petrol 91RON
Fuel Consumption - Combined Cycle (ADR 81/01): 7.6 L/100km
STANDARD WARRANTY:
Three years/100,000 km
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Marque Publishing Company
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