DIMENSIONS (inches) - Car and Driver
COMPARISON TEST
FAMILY VALUES
volumes that would ensure family-haul ing nirvana. The Honda Pilot and the Toyota High lander have recently been comprehen sively refurbished, inside and out. Chevy’s Traverse is the latest flavor of the platform shared with Buick’s Enclave, GMC’s Aca dia, and Saturn’s Outlook. The Traverse is the first we’ve tested with the direct-injec tion V-6, but the other three also get it for ’09. Hyundai’s Veracruz isn’t brand-new but has never competed in a C/D comparo. Having secured a position on our ’08 5Best Trucks list, Mazda’s CX-9 simply had to be in the mix. And although a Ford Taurus X might have looked a better fit in this group,
we opted for the brand-new Flex. Both rely on the same drivetrain, and the Taurus X is soon to be discontinued. Unibodies were the order of the day, so body-on-framers, such as Nissan’s Path finder, were excluded. Ditto a couple of crossovers with notably smaller interior volumes—Subaru’s Tribeca, for instance. We had hoped that with AWD and a nice load of options our vehicles would all max out at about $38,000. Alas, the only Highlander that Toyota could offer, at least with a third-row seat, was a loaded $42,799 Limited, so we used it for back-seat tests only. The Highlander Sport we drove to the island had no third-row seat and
REAR
58
60
36
44.2 4500 4500 21.0
58
55
40
56.0 44.0 3500 3500 20.6
60
53
35
44.0 3500 2000 20.1
54
53
35
57.6 42.4 5000 5000 19.2
59
53
32
$34,620 $40,180 201.8 75.9 68.0 117.9 65.4
65.4 4778
$35,865 $35,865 190.9 78.5 71.0 109.2 67.7
67.5 4538 55.8
$36,645 $38,520 190.6 76.6 68.9 110.4 65.7
65.7 4613
$35,290 $40,220 199.8 76.2 68.0 113.2 65.1
64.7 4600 56.0
$32,345 $34,433 188.4 75.2 68.1 109.8 64.0
64.2 4401
AS TESTED
41
67.4
MAX
51
$35,545 $41,385 205.0 78.4 69.7 118.9 67.8
% REAR
57
% FRONT
MIDDLE
INTERIOR VOL (cu ft) FRONT
TOWING (lb)
4954 56.5 43.5 5200 2000 22.0
CURB (lb)
REAR TRACK
FRONT TRACK
WHEELBASE
HEIGHT
WIDTH
WEIGHT
FUEL TANK (gal)
CHEVROLET TRAVERSE LT † FORD FLEX SEL † HONDA PILOT EX-L † HYUNDAI VERACRUZ LIMITED MAZDA CX-9 GRAND TOURING TOYOTA HIGHLANDER SPORT †2009 model year.
DIMENSIONS (inches) LENGTH
VEHICLE
PRICE ($) AS TESTED
BEST IN TEST
BASE
*EST
C/D RESULTS
was sparsely outfitted—cloth seats, for instance—but was a whale of a bargain at $33,648. Adding a third row to our car would bump its price to $34,433, which is the number we used in the chart and for scoring purposes. We were disappointed that our six cross overs managed an observed average of only 19 mpg. Sign of the times: On the way north, we observed a man riding a Schwinn. With a bag of golf clubs slung over his shoulder and a full-size Igloo cooler in his left hand, he was a candidate for a closed head injury. “What you got there,” observed associate editor Tony Quiroga, “is a guy with an SUV parked in his garage.”
55.5 44.5 4500 4500 18.6
6
122
NOV 2008
CARANDDRIVER.CO M
FAMILY VALUES
volumes that would ensure family-haul ing nirvana. The Honda Pilot and the Toyota High lander have recently been comprehen sively refurbished, inside and out. Chevy’s Traverse is the latest flavor of the platform shared with Buick’s Enclave, GMC’s Aca dia, and Saturn’s Outlook. The Traverse is the first we’ve tested with the direct-injec tion V-6, but the other three also get it for ’09. Hyundai’s Veracruz isn’t brand-new but has never competed in a C/D comparo. Having secured a position on our ’08 5Best Trucks list, Mazda’s CX-9 simply had to be in the mix. And although a Ford Taurus X might have looked a better fit in this group,
we opted for the brand-new Flex. Both rely on the same drivetrain, and the Taurus X is soon to be discontinued. Unibodies were the order of the day, so body-on-framers, such as Nissan’s Path finder, were excluded. Ditto a couple of crossovers with notably smaller interior volumes—Subaru’s Tribeca, for instance. We had hoped that with AWD and a nice load of options our vehicles would all max out at about $38,000. Alas, the only Highlander that Toyota could offer, at least with a third-row seat, was a loaded $42,799 Limited, so we used it for back-seat tests only. The Highlander Sport we drove to the island had no third-row seat and
REAR
58
60
36
44.2 4500 4500 21.0
58
55
40
56.0 44.0 3500 3500 20.6
60
53
35
44.0 3500 2000 20.1
54
53
35
57.6 42.4 5000 5000 19.2
59
53
32
$34,620 $40,180 201.8 75.9 68.0 117.9 65.4
65.4 4778
$35,865 $35,865 190.9 78.5 71.0 109.2 67.7
67.5 4538 55.8
$36,645 $38,520 190.6 76.6 68.9 110.4 65.7
65.7 4613
$35,290 $40,220 199.8 76.2 68.0 113.2 65.1
64.7 4600 56.0
$32,345 $34,433 188.4 75.2 68.1 109.8 64.0
64.2 4401
AS TESTED
41
67.4
MAX
51
$35,545 $41,385 205.0 78.4 69.7 118.9 67.8
% REAR
57
% FRONT
MIDDLE
INTERIOR VOL (cu ft) FRONT
TOWING (lb)
4954 56.5 43.5 5200 2000 22.0
CURB (lb)
REAR TRACK
FRONT TRACK
WHEELBASE
HEIGHT
WIDTH
WEIGHT
FUEL TANK (gal)
CHEVROLET TRAVERSE LT † FORD FLEX SEL † HONDA PILOT EX-L † HYUNDAI VERACRUZ LIMITED MAZDA CX-9 GRAND TOURING TOYOTA HIGHLANDER SPORT †2009 model year.
DIMENSIONS (inches) LENGTH
VEHICLE
PRICE ($) AS TESTED
BEST IN TEST
BASE
*EST
C/D RESULTS
was sparsely outfitted—cloth seats, for instance—but was a whale of a bargain at $33,648. Adding a third row to our car would bump its price to $34,433, which is the number we used in the chart and for scoring purposes. We were disappointed that our six cross overs managed an observed average of only 19 mpg. Sign of the times: On the way north, we observed a man riding a Schwinn. With a bag of golf clubs slung over his shoulder and a full-size Igloo cooler in his left hand, he was a candidate for a closed head injury. “What you got there,” observed associate editor Tony Quiroga, “is a guy with an SUV parked in his garage.”
55.5 44.5 4500 4500 18.6
6
122
NOV 2008
CARANDDRIVER.CO M
