-
Nissan Micra
May 6, 2011
Nissan’s Marmite car (some adore it, some abhor it) returns to take on the B Segment with an all new skin. It’s a good thing too as the outgoing model struggled to make an impact – not that the new one is much of an improvement. It’s not a handsome car, but it is wholly inoffensive, a trick mastered by its more successful rivals and likely to endear it more closely to its intended buyer. More importantly, it’s affordable – even more so this time around with a base model coming in at a modest R108 400 with the Tekna range topper maxing out at R143 500. It’s a bigger car too, 5mm wider and 61mm longer than the old car, with a sportier profile thanks to a roof height 10mm lower than the old car. Weight has decreased too by 35kgs thanks to clever reduction in part count and material mass. Boomerang-shaped impressions in the roof has a double whammy impact of reducing wind noise and stiffening the metal above your noggin, so no added (heavier) roof stiffener is needed either. Clever, very clever – just a small example of many clever weight saving gimmicks that endow the new car with an excellent power to weight ratio and that means better efficiency in terms of performance, consumption and lively handling. We managed to drive the 1.2 and 1.5 litre models, and whilst the prior lacked puff the latter impressed with great tractability on our night time 200km meander around the Cape. The new car is Nissan’s first of three vehicles to use their V Platform. See below for more detail on the complete range of Micra.
Model Range:
Micra 1.2 Visia (56kW/104Nm) R108 400
Micra 1.2 Visia+ (56kW/104Nm) R117 500
Micra 1.2 Acenta (56kW/104Nm) R127 500
Micra 1.5 dC1 Acenta (47kW/160Nm) R140 400
Micra 1.5 Tekna (73kW/174Nm) R143 500
-
Popular Posts
-
Audi A3 1.8 TFSI quattro vs BMW 125i
May 6, 2011
-
SA's Best Driving Roads: Part One
May 6, 2011
-
SA's Best Driving Roads: Part Two
May 6, 2011
-
Wheels24
-
Citroen's DS3 drops its topFrench automaker Citroen has just launched the Cabrio version of the DS3 in South Africa. JANINE-LEE GORDON wants to like it but it’s so impractical.
-
Video: Worst scoot driver yet?We may have found the worst rider yet. Watch as a scooter rider hits four vehicles then plummets into a huge hole. VIDEO
-
