FirstDrive:Nissan Tiida
In a recent dash around Dubai,
Paddy Comyngot the chance to try out the 'soon-to
arrive-here', Nissan Tiida
It is pretty easy to see why Dubai is becoming both a popular holiday destination and indeed investment centre for so many Irish. We have so much in common with the place. Firstly, the traffic is terrible.
Even at 8 o'clock at night you can see tailbacks heading out from the main centres to the sprawling outer suburbs. The roads are many and the lanes are multiple, but nobody seems to know where they are going and crashes are all too frequent.
Secondly, they are obsessed with property over there too. In every shopping centre you enter there is someone trying to sell you an apartment of some sort that hasn't been built yet, but will be finished by the time you come back from lunch. Developments here are of a frightening scale and indeed pace.
Oh, and there is rampant consumerism. Just like us Irish who don't really know what to do with ourselves at the weekend anymore, the great and the good of Dubai have another religion to add to the many that congregate in the United Arab Emirates trading centre. Shopping.
For any of us who go and pray at the altars of Woodies, Harvey Norman and Brown Thomas at the weekends, the ultimate Mecca is in Dubai. The Mall of the Emirates is the largest shopping centre outside of North America and its 223,000sq m houses 450 shops, 70 restaurants and a ski slope. You need a map to get around it, as well as comfortable shoes and a generous credit card.
Another thing that we will soon have in common with Dubai will be the Nissan Tiida. The replacement for the bizarrely successful Nissan Almera, a car that outstayed its welcome longer than Rocky, is due to come to Ireland this summer, but it has been the staple diet of this region for well over a year now.
It has already claimed several titles in the region including Best Compact Car, and is a top-seller in its segment. Rent a car in Dubai and you will most likely be given a Tiida. So it seemed rude not to try one out. Just how different this Tiida will be to the one that lands here in Ireland is as yet uncertain. Certainly Nissan Ireland was this week remaining tight-lipped but we can at least make some educated guesses.
The Tiida comes in two guises - a hatchback and a saloon, with the hatchback pictured here the more adventurously styled. The styling is pretty conservative and narrow looking, but there is a reason for this, as the car is built on Renault's small people mover platform and this creates some benefits on the interior.
This is a car that looks more handsome from certain angles than from others. The rear is probably its best visual feature, with more than a hint of Renault Mégane about its derriere. The front is very Nissan, with hints of the Note and Primera. The high side gives the Tiida an MPV look.
Nissan, at the launch of this car in the Middle East, were claiming that it provides 18 per cent more knee room and 7 per cent more interior length than its nearest class competitor. With an enormous 467-litres of boot space, this is certainly generous for the class. A Ford Focus by comparison has 364-litres, and a Volkswagen Golf has 350-litres.
My car was a 1.8-litre four-speed automatic and power was from a four-cylinder 135bhp unit and this was a reasonably urgent unit that was quiet and fuel-efficient too, as it features variable valve timing called Continuous Valve Timing Control (CVTC). This engine is unlikely to have many takers in Ireland, but in a country where you can fill a V8 Range Rover for €35, you can understand why it's the preferred choice in Dubai.
We are more likely to see a 1.6-litre petrol model with 110bhp and 153Nm of torque as seen in the smaller Note, but we are also likely to get the 86bhp 1.5-litre dCi diesel too, and this would suit the car immensely. Our car had a McPherson-type front suspension and basic torsion beam rear suspension, but worked well on a variety of surfaces from very good to very poor. However, it had just two airbags, so we would expect more in the European version, but it did have ABS brakes with Electronic Brake Force Distribution.
At the wheel, visibility is first class thanks to the large glass area, and comfort-wise it was hard to fault the Tiida. Dynamically it wasn't bad either. Dubai drivers have an amazing ability to change lane randomly, and often it can be a Hummer driven by a lady on the phone doing her make-up that is bearing down on you. The Tiida did keep me alive on a couple of occasions thanks to its safe and predictable handling, even if it could do nothing about my inherent ability to get lost.
We would hope to see an improvement in the interior quality as well, of course, in the safety features of the European Tiida, but in Dubai this car starts from just €9,200 so you can't grumble too much. Expect to add €10,000 to the price of the car in Ireland, which we are likely to see this summer.
Factfile
Body styles:Five-door hatchback and four-door saloon
Likely Engines:110bhp 1.6-litre petrol and 86bhp 1.5-litre dCi diesel.
Length: 4,205mm
Width: 1,695mm
Height: 1,540mm
Wheelbase: 2,600mm
Expected starting price: €19,500
Likely launch:summer 2007