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Nearly a year behind the rest of Europe, thanks to problems in engineering the right-hand drive version, the Captiva is ready for the UK, meaning Chevrolet's long wait to take step one toward an all-new, more competitive product line-up is finally over.
There are two engine options and though the manual 2.4-litre petrol is only expected to account for 5% of sales, it is worth a look because its CO2 and mpg figures aren't that far off the manual diesel's, while the P11D is £3000 lower than the equivalent diesel trim. That's because the kit is comparatively sparse, and outside of colour Chevrolet isn't offering a single tick-box option, with satnav listed among the dealer-fit accessories.
The second engine option is the new 150PS 2.0 diesel, the Captiva being its first outing. Company bosses think that it, in mid-spec LT trim and with an auto gearbox, will be its best seller, but among fleet buyers the manual is probably going to be more attractive thanks to a £1180 price advantage and a heavily-reduced BIK tax bill -the auto falls into the maximum 35% bracket while the manual is nine bands lower at 26%.
Chevrolet is also expecting the majority of buyers to opt for the seven-seat version over the five-seater despite the extra two seats costing a mammoth £1145. BusinessCar's whole-life costs provider Topcalc reckons that price difference will make the five-seater 0.7 pence per mile cheaper to run over three years, coming out at 37.7p. However, the five-seater wasn't available on the launch event in southern Ireland, so we tried the manual seven-seater with the 2.0-litre diesel engine and found that over the only roads in Europe worse than our own, it is completely let down by its ride quality. It wobbles over bumps invisible to the driver, and never settled down over A and B roads that felt as if they had thousands of tiny pimples set into them. It did settle down on short dual carriageway runs, but if it's no better on the UK's pretty poor asphalt then be prepared for a queasy passenger or two along the way. We'll reserve final judgement till then.
BusinessCar magazine ©2019
Business Car Magazine © 2020 | Business Car is part of NS Media Group.
