Ford Escape.
Toyota RAV4 Hybrid
It is the most popular SUV in Australia for a good reason. The Toyota RAV4 Hybrid is the modern family car.
The Ford Escape didn’t make the final cut. Despite the brilliant engineering behind its smaller Ford Puma sibling (and numerous other Ford vehicles), the Ford Escape misses the mark, according to the judges.
The Ford Escape has a perky turbo 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine which delivers brisk acceleration. But it’s thirsty and the throttle is overly sensitive.
The same can be said of the steering, which is so responsive it makes the Ford Escape feel nervous even when driving straight ahead.
The
Kia Carnival has won this segment for the past two years, but we couldn’t call ourselves good automotive journalists if we didn’t do an annual check-up on how the class-leader stacks up against its peers. After not much debate but with plenty of seats for us all, the judging team whittled the contender list down to three.
Our top three all offer spacious cabins designed to carry the whole tribe, plus baggage, but they each try to solve the perfect people-moving recipe in different ways – albeit without looking or being too much like a van. It’s interesting because this class is often shunned by the families that need it most, allured by low-slung SUVs only to find they need to comprise on third-row compatibility and cargo space, just so they cannot drive a ‘minivan’.
Given Australia’s penchant for SUVs, the large sub-$70K segment is a fierce battleground. Alongside the promise of roominess and fantastic cargo areas, there’s also the option of seven seats – as all three of our finalists have.
Whilst not as practical as the simple van-styled people mover they replace, Large SUVs do offer more as a whole. Some are great off-road, and some are created with performance in mind.
With that in mind, the
Ford Everest was a finalist but missed out on our top three due to its more off-road skew. A great multi-role car in many ways, but overshadowed by our other finalists.
Drive Car of the Year test.
Australians are asking more of their utes every day. While many buyers still rely on them as workhorses, they are increasingly being used for work and play.
To that end, today’s double cab utes must have a broad range of abilities. No other vehicles have as much asked of them.
Modern utes need to have car-like levels of safety, comfort and technology, drive like an SUV, carry up to one tonne, tow a heavy load and be capable off-road.
Trying to achieve all these goals often leads to compromises.
Best-in-class utes make the least compromises while excelling in the most areas.
They once ruled the driveways and roads of Australia’s wealthiest postcodes, a four-wheeled sign you had made it in life. Large sedans wearing badges, predominantly from Germany, sometimes England, oozed prestige, with big powerful engines matched only by large, comfortable interiors.
Times have changed, those same driveways now populated by large prestige SUVs, still predominantly wearing German badges with a smattering of Japanese and occasionally British. But, that change in consumer taste does not diminish what these three finalists in the
Large Luxury Car segment bring to the table – comfort, performance, prestige.
The trio is spearheaded by the standard-bearer for the segment, the