SA Road Tests

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This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. I drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under real-world South African conditions. Many of the vehicles driven are world cars as well, so what you read here possibly applies to the models you get where you live.

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Compact, not tiny: 2021 Suzuki Vitara Brezza GLX manual

Little legs

Pics by Motorpress
Posted: 19 May 2021

The numbers
Price (GLX manual): R289 900
Engine: 1462 cc, chain driven DOHC, 16-valve four-cylinder with VVT
Power: 77 kW at 6000 rpm
Torque: 138 Nm between 4000 and 4400 rpm
0 to 100 km/h: 12.06 seconds
Top speed: 160 km/h (est.)
Real life fuel consumption: About 7.2 l / 100 km
Tank: 48 litres
Luggage, seats up: 328 litres
Ground clearance: 198 mm
Turning circle: 10.4 metres
Towing capacity, unbraked/braked: 400 / 1100 kg
Standard tyre: 215/60R16 Apollo Alnac
Spare: full size on steel rim
Warranty: 5 years, 200 000 km
Service plan: 4 years, 60 000 km    

The quick view:
•    Made in India and built short to squeeze into a favourable tax class,
•    Time-proven K15B engine and choice of two gearboxes; four-speed automatic and five-speed manual,
•    Two equipment grades; GL and upmarket GLX,
•    That means a choice of four models,
•    Grand Vitara remains Suzuki’s flagship range while Vitara Brezza joins other offerings in the entry-level market.

Common to both grades are two airbags; ABS brakes with EBD; ISOFix anchors; steering wheel remotes; automatic, filtered, single-zone air conditioner; electric windows all around; folding electric mirrors; seven-inch touchscreen with screen mirroring, Bluetooth and accessory sockets; fabric covered seats with mechanical adjusters; rear parking sensor and reversing camera. It’s also safely built with high-strength steels, crumple zones and impact dissipation pathways.

Glitzing the GLX are 16” alloy wheels, front armrest with storage box, leather covered steering wheel, cruise control, a chilled (second) cubby on the dashtop, keyless entry and starting, automatically folding wing mirrors, extra interior lights, automatic LED headlamps, LED daytime running lights and front fog lamps, and automatic wipers.

Suspension is by means of McPherson struts in front and torsion beam axle at the back. Brakes are ventilated disc in front and drums behind. It’s all very conventional, well-proven and effective; doing their respective jobs without being too expensive to manufacture.

Getting back to “compact, not tiny,” backseat headroom earned nine out of ten on my personal space scale. For almost any car, that’s excellent. Kneeroom scored eight points thanks to cutouts on the backs of the front chairs while foot space, with the driver’s seat fully lowered, snatched an excellent eight. Very few cars manage that.

Convenience items include a fold-down bag hook behind the driver’s seat, panic handles, an armrest with cup holders, small bottle bins, map pockets, top tethers for the ISOFix mountings and a central courtesy lamp supplementing the one in front. Safety kit includes two head restraints, two full belts and a lap strap.

The boot is pretty big for a little car, measuring 328 litres despite cramming everything into a total vehicle length of 3995 mm. Informal measurements put the space at 700 mm long, 1020 mm across the narrowest part and 480 mm deep. The 60:40-split rear seatback folds almost flat to add about 650 mm to its length. Despite a head-numbing search, I could not find any figures confirming the total load volume, but it’s decently large. Maruti Suzuki provides a light and 12-volt socket on GLX versions. Wee wells on either side keep small and delicate cargo items from shifting in transit.

Moving forward: There is, once again, loads of headroom so drivers with little legs can, hopefully, lift the seat as high as they need to; the trip meters (two stalks) are easy to work with, as are the HVAC controls; the passenger rates a lit vanity mirror and there’s a specs box up above the auto-dipping rearview. Main dials are big and clear – ringed in orange, not quite round, not quite square and look rather like those on smaller Jeeps - functional and rather cute.

The engine revs willingly, shifting is slick and positive and the car is quite perky but, unfortunately, the “little legs” label also applies to the gearbox. Revs at 120 km/h in top are around 3600 and make the car sound rather busy. It’s happier cruising at between 100 and 110. Suzuki’s engineers might want to look at adding an overdrive gear to the ‘box or lengthening the final drive ratio. A local press fleet manager is trying to organise me an automatic version of the badge-engineered Brand T car with “overdrive” top gear, so let’s see what that’s like.

Until then this is a diminutive, yet spacious, family bus that only its little legs hold back from being great.

Test unit from Suzuki Auto SA press fleet                                                      

Read the launch report 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 or goat tracks as well. As a result, my test cars do occasionally get dirty. It's all part of the reviewing process.

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 ever I place an article that doesn't cover most things, it's probably because I have dealt with a very similar vehicle 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. There are no advertisers and no “editorial policy” rules. I add bylines to acknowledge sponsored launch functions and the manufacturers or dealerships that provide the test vehicles.  And, as quite a few readers have found, I answer every serious enquiry from my home email address, with my phone numbers attached, so you can see I do actually exist.

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