SA Road Tests

Welcome

This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. We drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under South African conditions. It also just happens that most of the vehicles we drive are world cars as well, so what you read here possibly applies to the models you get at home.

Unlike most car reports, what you read in these pages will not be faithful reproductions, slightly reworded, of what appeared in the manufacturers' press releases. We look for background material, user experience and whatever else we can find that's beyond the obvious. Our guiding rule is that you will be able to tell that the car was actually driven. If we ever present a product rather drily and technically, you can be fairly sure we were underwhelmed for some reason but too polite to say so. That's because there's always someone who loves those things you or we might hate!

Finally, we do our best to not always present our findings in exactly the same way from one report to another. Variety keeps us interested, right?

*To read one of our archived road tests, just select from the alphabetical menu of manufacturers' names on the left. Hover your cursor over the manufacturer's name, then choose from the drop-down menu that appears.

*Please remember too, that prices quoted are those ruling at the time the reports were written.


We step out in the 2014 Renault Sandero Stepway 900 turbo

Again; but with attitude

Posted: 22 June 2014

The world is a strange place. The English are rather fond of Dacias and buy them as fast as they can import them. South Africans, on the other hand, are less keen. That's ever since an unfortunate couple of shipments of Renault 12-lookalike Dacia pickups made their way here in the mid-nineties.

I never got to drive one but they were, apparently, not magnificent. I heard later that some enterprising local businessman bought up all the second hand Dacias he could get, at bargain prices, and simply drove them to death. It was cheaper than buying anything new and they got the job done.

Renault bought the company in 1999 to use as a manufacturing base and stepping stone into Eastern Europe, and modernised the place while introducing its own technology. So it’s no longer Legacy-Dacia but Renault-Dacia; a whole different ball game. But it will take our folks a while to forget those early imports, so Renault SA wisely avoids the naming issue as far as possible.

Be that as it may, Renault Sanderos sold here are rebadged Dacia Sanderos (of the kind the English love) and are all fitted with Nissan or Renault engines. They are manufactured at two locations in Morocco and one at Mioveni near the Romanian capital, Piteşti. That’s where ours come from.

Apart from the local launch of the 2014 edition with new look and 900cc, three-cylinder motor, this is my third review of them if you count the 1500cc Nissan-engined diesel Duster. And I do because it is, after all, basically a Sandero behind the badge and killer image.

So how is the Stepway any different from a normal Sandero? Here’s a list: Ground clearance increases from 164 mm to 193 but part of that is thanks to 16” wheels rather than the plain car’s 15-inchers, it has roof rails to strap your surfboard onto, skid panels front and rear, wheel arch trims, black door handles rather than body-coloured, rear parking radar, and a leather gear knob to match the leather-covered steering wheel.

Items shared with the Dynamique (upper) version of Sandero include ABS brakes with EBD, EBA and ASR, four airbags, ISOFix anchors, front fog lights, alloy wheels, air conditioning, central locking with remote, powered windows front and rear, powered outside mirrors, radio and CD/MP3 player with Bluetooth and satellite controls, hill start assist and speed control with limiter. It costs R18 400 more, but the extras are probably worth it. It looks more macho too and perceived value is what it’s all about, non?

Let’s cover things I didn’t get to in previous reviews: Because it’s marketed as a crossover, I took it out onto a couple of dirt roads close by. To begin, its suspension seemed softer than that of the regular Sandero because the car felt slightly top-heavy under duress; not as severe as a recently-driven BMW with off-road pretensions, but noticeable.

The first road is pretty smooth apart from lots of washboard corrugations that can be tooth-rattlers if the car is wrong. This car is right, so that test was easily passed.

Then it was the turn of the road with miles of embedded small stones just sticking up above the surface. It has been truly painful in some fancy cars I have driven there, but the Stepway passed well; not as cleanly as a Jeep Cherokee costing three times as much, but very creditable.

Other driving impressions: As mentioned previously the little 900cc turbo-mill behaves much like a naturally aspirated 1.4-to-1.5 litre, except you don’t lose power at Highveld altitude and it also pulls much more strongly at medium revolutions. That makes it pleasanter to live with in daily use.
 
Next is ergonomics. The back hatchway opens using the ignition key or a lever inside the car - no remote, no rubber pad. Loading height is around crotch level, or 860 mm to be scientific, so some folk could find that rather high. The sill is 200 mm deep or about eight inches – not as easy to get stuff out of as the diesel Duster, but fair. The spare is a steel spacesaver and the tools are in a pair of notches moulded into the sides of the boot.

Our standard six-foot back seat driver rated head, knee and foot accommodations at nine, six and nine out of ten on a scale where seven is interference level. Three belts and three head restraints, no fold-down armrest, no cupholders, two seatback pouches, grab handles at all doors except right front, and small door bins are provided.

Up front it’s just like the regular Sandero with similar radio and air controls, small control panel screen and jeep-like window switches; no driver’s door override and central window management for instance. Steering wheel and seat adjusters are the same too. Storage is courtesy of the ”long” glove box mentioned in other reviews, fair door bins and an open dash-top tray.

The lever for the five-speed manual box is fairly long and a bit of a reach for first, third and fifth gears, but not excessively so. Pedals are fairly spaced but I found left-foot access to the floor a bit of a squeeze. Vision outward is good and it’s easy to drive and park.

Priced a smidgen below R160 000, the Sandero Stepway is actually quite a catch and possibly worth the extra over the regular model, even if only for the luggage rails, parking assistance beepers and hill hold function.

Test car from Renault SA press fleet

The numbers
Price: R159 900
Engine: 898cc, three-cylinder, turbopetrol
Power: 66 kW at 5250 rpm
Torque: 135 Nm at 2500 rpm (90-percent available from 2000 rpm)
Zero to 100 km/h: 11,1 seconds
Maximum speed: 168 km/h
Real life fuel consumption: About 7,0 l/100 km
Tank: 50 litres
Boot: 292 litres
Maximum trailer loads (unbraked/braked): 545/790 kg
Warranty: 5 years/150 000 km
Service plan: 2 years/30 000 km; at 15 000 km intervals

To read about the old Stepway click here

What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that every car reviewed is given my personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every test car goes through real world driving; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

I do my best to include relevant information like real life fuel economy or a close mathematical calculation, boot size or luggage space, whether the space is both usable and accessible, whether life-sized people can use the back seat (where that applies), basic specs of the vehicle and performance figures if they are published. In the case of clearly identified launch reports, fuel figures are of necessity the laboratory numbers provided with the release material. If I ever place an article that doesn't cover most things, it's probably because I have dealt with that vehicle at least once already, so you will be able to find what you want in another report under the same manufacturer's heading in the menu on the left.

Hope you like what you see, because there are no commercial interests at work here. As quite a few readers have found, I answer every serious enquiry from my home email address, with my phone numbers attached, so they can see I do actually exist.

Comments?
Want to ask a question, comment or just tell me you thoroughly disagree with what I say? That's your privilege, because if everybody agreed on everything, the world would be a boring place. All I ask is that you remain calm, so please blow off a little steam before venting too vigorously.