SA Road Tests

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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 probably applies to the models you can get at home.
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We learn something new in the 2013 Suzuki Grand Vitara Dune m/t

Outside pics by Suzuki@Motorpics

Interior by author

Unstoppable compact personnel carrier

Published in The Witness Motoring on Wednesday February 20, 2013

In the course of learning something new every day, you sometimes realise that it’s just stuff you could have worked out for yourself, had you ever thought about it.  Let us explain.

There’s this hill somewhere close by. About halfway up, you find a pair of deep wash-aways with a really skinny strip of roadway between them. There are narrow pathways to left and right, so you have to decide whether to place your left- or your right-side wheels on the central strip. Either way, you need to be very careful. When the trail was first shown to us by its minder, we chalked it up as suitable for competent 4x2 pickups or reasonable soft-trailers. Low range? Never!

Until we tackled it the other day in a Suzuki Grand Vitara Dune with manual transmission, that is. Car-like gearing is great for the open road where most SUVs spend their lives, but even with on-demand all-wheel drive, there comes a time when a stump-pulling first gear, as on most pickups, is really nice to have. After clearing the obstacle, we found that there simply wasn’t enough momentum to climb the rest of the hill. Reversing more than a metre or two wasn’t an option – deep wash-aways, remember? Four-low-lock, using the electronic selector, solved the problem. Lesson: not just any soft-roader will tame this trail, but Grand Vitara is one of those that can.

This car has been around for a few years, using a variety of engines, but the local range was rationalised in October 2012 to just four choices. All use Suzuki’s 2.4-litre J24B petrol engine but buyers are offered two trim levels; basic Dune or smarter Summit, with five-speed manual or four-speed automatic transmissions. It also had a mild face lift with new wheels, grille and front lights.

Even in Dune guise, equipment levels are pretty comprehensive; look for six airbags, full-time awd, powered windows and mirrors, ventilated disc brakes front and rear with ABS, EBD and brake assist, McPherson strut suspension in front and multilink at the back, monocoque construction with a built-in ladder frame for structural stiffness, ISOFix anchorages and child proof locks, energy absorbing trim, side beams, radio and CD player, filtered automatic air conditioning, central locking and an onboard computer. Wheels are 17” alloys with 225/65 tyres.

Summit trim adds HID headlamps with washers, cruise control, 18” wheels with 225/60 tyres, a sunroof, combination vinyl and leather upholstery, keyless starting, ESP, hill hold and hill descent control. Its CD player is a six-discer, but neither can accept USB or auxiliary plug-ins.

In everyday driving, the Grand Vitara is like a good boy scout; solid, dependable and willing. Forget flash, fire or passion – this one is for moving your people over a variety of roads and tracks safely and securely. Having proved its worth on the eroded hill, it went on to show that it was comfortable and stable on ordinary rough provincial dirt roads as well. As for inanimate cargo, the rear door opens sideways at mid-thigh height to reveal a decently sized luggage area with a shallow stash tray underneath. The rear seats fold and tumble forward, expanding the initial 398 litres VDA, to 750 and as much as 1386 litres to roof height with the cargo cover removed. Four lashing rings, two bag hooks and a 12-volt socket are provided. Jack and wheel spanner are behind a clip-off panel on the left.

Passenger accommodations in the rear are more than adequate, with the tall passenger awarding 10/10 for both headspace and knee room and 8/10 for foot space. Entry and exit, thanks to sill-less doorways, are easier than on most SUVs although tall people still need to mind heads, hips and thighs on the way. In front, the driver’s chair adjusts for height while the steering wheel offers vertical movement only. Overall ambience is pleasantly conservative with its blend of matt black surfaces and satin silver trim.

It’s compact; only 4,5 metres long, has plenty of space for passengers and cargo, it’s manoeuvrable with a fairly tight 11-metre turning circle, full time awd gives it full time stability and it’s solid and comfortable. Put it on your shopping list.

Test unit courtesy of Suzuki SA press fleet

The numbers
Price: R298 900
Engine: 2393 cc, DOHC, 16-valve four-cylinder
Power: 122 kW at 6000 rpm
Torque: 225 Nm at 4000 rpm
Zero to 100 km/h: 11,7 seconds
Maximum speed: 180 km/h
Real life fuel consumption: About 10,5 l/100 km
Tank: 66 litres
Ground clearance: 200 mm
Approach/departure/breakover angles: 29/27/19 degrees
Warranty: 3 years/100 000 km
Service plan: 6 years/90 000 km



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.

My reviews and launch reports appear on Thursdays in the Wheels supplement to The Witness, South Africa's oldest continuously running newspaper, and occasionally on Saturdays in Weekend Witness as well. I drive eight to ten vehicles each month, most months of the year (except over the festive season) so not everything gets published in the paper. Those that are, get a tagline but the rest is virgin, unpublished and unedited by the political-correctness police.

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.


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