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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*Please remember too, that prices quoted were those ruling on the days I wrote the reports.


We try Toyota’s entry level 2012 Etios 1.5 SD Xs

Published in Weekend Witness Motoring on Saturday August 18, 2012

All the basics and a service plan

Some of our colleagues have been unkind about Etios, using language like “cheap and plasticky” and “understeers like a pig on a roller skate.” Others have been even ruder, but they miss the point. Toyota’s Etios saloons and hatchbacks were developed for the Indian market in 2010 and migrated here this year. The idea was to bring motoring to more people; so much research went into creating suitable packages that could be sold at competitive prices.

One cost-cutting measure was Toyota’s new 2NR-FE motor, introduced for the Etios late in 2010. It was developed from the 1NR series but without intelligent variable valve timing. Other innovations included integrating exhaust manifold into cylinder head to reduce emissions and lightweight resin intake piping to cut mass. The resulting engine meets Euro2 emissions standards but, to be safe, requires servicing at old-school 10 000-km intervals.

This leaves us with cars priced closely to Polo Vivo, Renault Sandero, GWM Florid and Ford Figo, so we need to dial our expectations down from “Toyota” to “budget” and work from there. So what do we get in this R127 000 “upmarket” Xs version?

The package includes electric power steering, remote central locking, filtered air conditioning, power windows front and rear, manual headlamp levelling, a rear window demister, front fog lamps and tachometer. For safety’s sake there’s ABS with EBD, an immobiliser and a pair of airbags. Outside mirrors adjust by means of levers and you need to provide your own radio and CD player although aerial, basic wiring and four speakers are built in. Uncommon at this level is a two year/30 000 km service plan to accompany the standard three year/100 000 km warranty with roadside assistance.

Getting practical, the 595-litre boot is what Sicilian Uncle Luigino might describe as a “two-man trunk,” if you catch-a our drift… It opens by using the ignition key or a lever next to the driver’s seat. Under the floor is a fully sized spare in the usual well with handle and wheel spanner. The jack is under the front passenger seat. The rear seatback is fixed and passenger space gets 7/10 for headroom, with tens for knee space and foot room – because the driver’s seat cannot adjust up or down. Two shoulder belts, a lap strap and a pair of built-in head restraints are provided.

Up front, highback seats with built-in head restraints provide good support for long journeys, although they are utilitarian rather than sporty. Reach and recline adjustments are mechanical, as is the one for steering wheel height. There are plenty of odd stash places and the glove box, chilled by a vent from the air conditioner, is one of the biggest we have seen in a while. Toyota says your laptop will fit. We tried. The answer is 12” iBook yes; 15.6” Lenovo no.

Analogue speedometer and rev counter share an arched fitting in the middle of the dash, so it takes a quick flick of the eyes to take in what you need to know. One could get used to it, but in today’s world, where more cars offer heads-up displays, it seems retrogressive. Dashboard trim and fittings are of hard plastic, which isn’t necessarily bad, and general fit and appearance is up to the standard one can expect at this price level.

Despite fewer than usual adjustments, the seating position is comfortable enough, with parking brake and gear shift handily placed. The five-speed manual gearbox shifts smoothly and quickly and performance from the conservatively powered 1500cc motor is amazingly perky. It accelerates nicely and pulls strongly at cruising speeds in top gear. Vision outward is excellent, making the Etios easy to handle in traffic and to park. As for alleged understeer, people buying this car aren’t going to drive like the hooligans who would notice. It’s fine, actually.

Verdict: For a car saddled with as much negative comment as this one has had, it’s surprisingly good.

The numbers
Price R126 600
Engine: 1496cc, chain driven DOHC, 16-valve, four-cylinder
Power: 66 kW at 5600 rpm
Torque: 132 Nm at 3000 rpm
Zero to 100 km/h: 10,9 seconds
Maximum speed: 165 km/h
Fuel index: 7,1 l/100 km
Warranty and service: See text



What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that road test cars entrusted to me are driven only by me. Some reviewers hand test cars over to their partners to use as day-to-day transport and barely experience them for themselves.

What this means to you is that every car reviewed is given my own personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every car goes through real world testing; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

My articles appear every Wednesday in the motoring pages of The Witness, South Africa's oldest continuously running newspaper, and occasionally on Saturdays in Weekend Witness as well. I drive eight to ten vehicles most months of the year (press cars are withdrawn over the festive season - wonder why?) 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 I do actually exist.

I am based in Pietermaritzburg, KZN, South Africa. This is the central hub of the KZN Midlands farming community; the place farmers go to buy their supplies and equipment, truck their goods to market, send their kids to school and go to kick back and relax.
So occasionally a cow, a goat or a horse may add a little local colour by finding its way into the story or one of the pictures. It's all part of the ambience!

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