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2011 Chevrolet Cruze LT vs. 2012 Ford Focus SEL, 2011 Hyundai Elantra Limited, 2011 M
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Even if two weeks’ worth of Maruchan ramen drains your savings account, there’s something about a rusting mid-’90s Accord on sagging springs that fails to inspire confidence among financial backers or real-estate agents. And when you and the missus are just starting out, you feel that need to be taken seriously more acutely than most. There are certainly cheaper new cars than the group gathered here, but—wrong as it may be—“cheap” is the only reputation many B-segment cars have.
Fortunately, respectability is booming among compact sedans as the class itself matures alongside its target customers. All five of the cars gathered here are new within the last two years, with the Hyundai Elantra, the Ford Focus, and the Volkswagen Jetta fresh off their debuts. And, while all five have entry prices of less than $17,000, an essential part of the startup mind-set is pretending you’ve already made it. We therefore checked out an example of each car possessing a sticker fiddled appropriately upmarket, with optional engines, automatic transmissions, and uplevel trims, landing them in the $23,000-to-$26,000 range. (Regrettably, there was no way to achieve stick-shift parity in this group.)
The elephant not in this room is the Honda Civic, a bestseller and all-around nice guy. Generation nine of Honda’s compact wonder was on the verge of introduction as this was written and thus unavailable for our testing, but watch for a mano a mano between the Honda and the winner of this comparo in an upcoming issue.
For now, our reigning segment champion is the Mazda 3, which prevailed over a Kia Forte and a Volkswagen Golf in a previous
comparo [“Three Ducks Not in a Row,” April 2010]. Newish last year, the 3 rides on a platform largely unchanged from the car that was introduced in 2004. Not a problem, we said, naming it to our 10Best list for 2010.
On sale in Europe for two years already, the Chevrolet Cruzeis actually older than the 3, but it is newer to the U.S. market. It rides on a platform that shares virtually nothing with its predecessor—a good start. In replacing the Cobalt, the Cruze had small shoes to fill, and it has positively exploded their seams. In our first test [January 2011], we said, “a Cruze, in a comparison test right now, might very well win.”
Ford’s 2012 Focus, like the Cruze, is the result of a domestic automaker exploiting a global platform. In this case, “global” means the Focus was developed by a crew in Germany and will be sold, with only minor variations, just about everywhere but the International Space Station (the destination and delivery charge would be prohibitively steep). The car’s underpinnings are similar to those of the European Focus for which we’ve pined ever since our last-gen Focus was haphazardly warmed over in 2005 (and again in 2008). A hatchback is available, but we tapped a sedan for this test.
Hyundai’s Elantra is also brand-new. Once a tinny, cheap emblem of automotive desperation, the 2011 Elantra arrives on the scene with a glut of features and a sense of style that hardly existed anywhere in the sedan market 10 years ago, let alone in such an affordable class. Whether or not we like the look (most of us do), we respect that Hyundai dove into the deep end; with the exception of the Focus, nothing else here comes even close to having such a cohesive look.
Rounding out the roster is the VW Jetta. Having failed to attract a suitable sales base as a semi-premium car—with pricing and content halfway between the compact and mid-size classes—the Jetta is now embracing the austerity it once tried to live above. Alongside a big bump in interior volume, the 2011 VW gets a substantial price cut, thanks to the addition of a don’t-go-anywhere-near-it base model with an overmatched 115-hp, 2.0-liter four-cylinder. But any Jetta equipped with the more desirable 2.5-liter inline-five still carries a premium of at least a thousand bucks more than the entry-level prices of the four other cars here. The enlarged Jetta now takes direct aim at the heart of the segment. But that heart is beating stronger than ever.
At its entry point of $15,765, the Jetta is the vehicular equivalent of a studio apartment with just enough room to stack a mini fridge and a hot pot at the foot of your futon. In addition to being saddled with the aforementioned 2.0-liter embarrassment, the starter Jetta doesn’t even include a CD player or air conditioning. By the time you hack your way through the trim levels to the $24,165 automatic-equipped SEL (with sunroof), you’ve rectified those wrongs and also upgraded to the 2.5-liter inline-five with 170 horses. The SEL also includes scattered chrome trim, a touch-screen navigation system, heated front seats, and more.
But no matter how many options you pile on, the Jetta feels cheap inside; a hard, hollow, black-plastic casket. Unfortunately for Volkswagen, the timing of its cost-saving approach could not have been worse. The Jetta has regressed to a once-common cheapness just as the longtime champions of that school—notably Chevrolet and Ford—have deemed that gambit obsolete.
While we found the steering too heavy at parking-lot speeds, once we ascended into the hills, the Jetta proved that German dynamics are hard to engineer out of a car. The VW has a welcome immediacy off-center, and its directness inspires a lot of confidence. The ride, though pleasantly damped, falls to the sporty side of soft, with nicely restrained body motions and minimal roll.
We were less pleased with what we felt through our feet. Stepping on the Jetta’s accelerator feels a little bit like breaking through a thin layer of ice: It is unyielding at the first touch but then gives way to more fluid travel. The pedal to the left exhibits the opposite, yet still annoying, behavior. For the first increments of travel, the brake pedal is squishy enough to give the impression that it is doing something, but the car doesn’t actually slow. We also gave the transmission a couple of demerits. While quick and smooth, it needs a heavy kick to downshift. As a result, getting a one- or two-gear drop is nearly impossible, and we found that we were either groaning along in sixth or screaming in third.
For those bent on transporting the Packers’ defensive line, the Jetta’s spacious interior received the highest rankings from rear-seat passengers, including the only passing grade with three abreast. Ultimately, though, while the Jetta might be the most accommodating car here and meet VW’s new, lower price point, its cheap aura made it feel out of step with the rest of the segment.
When we wrote that the Cruze might win a comparo, we qualified that statement by saying, “if the Cruze in question were a $21,395 2LT or maybe even the $16,995 starter kit.” Well, the Cruze participating in this comparison test is a 2LT. And its higher-than-base price of $22,910 shouldn’t have put it at a disadvantage in this group. Problem is, when we wrote that premature conclusion, we hadn’t yet driven the new Elantra or Focus.
We were seduced by this Cruze’s two-tone interior, its brown-and-beige scheme a refreshing change of pace from the black in every other car here. We were disappointed, however, with the fat-pixel displays situated in the middle of the instrument cluster and atop the center stack, particularly after seeing the high-resolution screens in the Focus. As pleasant as it is inside, though, the Cruze isn’t a jaw dropper like the Ford and the Hyundai are.
That interior is a serene place to pass the miles. The Cruze was the Buick LaCrosse of the group, its solid structure and soft suspension keeping it supremely isolated on freeway slogs. Unfortunately, the combo also kept it isolated when the wending began. Logbook comments following our mountain loop ranged from “soft and floaty” to “soft and rolly.” The brakes also came under fire—and nearly caught on fire, judging from the smoke pouring off of them—after the pedal turned to mush.
That’s not to say the Cruze can’t handle. It tied for the top spot on the skidpad and was the lane-change champ by a significant margin. The avoidance-maneuver heroics were in large part due to the immediacy of the steering, but otherwise, we had little positive to say about the tiller. It is too light, with very little feel. Competent, the Cruze is. Fun, it is not.
The Chevy’s 1.4-liter is the smallest engine here and the only one with a turbo. Unlike many boosted engines, though, it doesn’t require premium fuel. Even with a curb weight more than 400 pounds heavier than the Elantra’s, the turbo four pushed the Cruze to a midpack quarter-mile sprint of 16.4 seconds at 85 mph.
As comfortably as the Cruze rides, its seats are too hard and flat. They offer very little support, and the rear compartment proved tightest of the bunch. We tried to put three adults back there, but the middle passenger couldn’t even get his butt on the cushion; instead, he had to hover above the seat with the back of his neck pressed against the ceiling.
When we made that prediction about the Cruze winning a comparo, we did say we were “out on a wobbly limb, here, with Wile E. Coyote hoisting the chain saw.” And everyone knows how that endsContinued...
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