Chery Tiggo 9 PHEV: Value shmalue

What is it?

Let’s get something straight.

Wheels magazine (is it still a magazine) may have recognised the Chery Tiggo 9 as Australia’s best value large SUV.

But they’re talking about the top of the range Ultimate model, not the entry Elite which is the one most punters will end up buying at this end of the market.

And the Elite is a quite different beast, front-wheel drive, with a smaller battery, less powerful drivetrain, less electric only range and of course less equipment.

But it costs less and it still seats seven.

What’s it cost?

There’s two grades, Elite FWD (our test vehicle) priced from $52,990 and Ultimate AWD priced from $59,990.

Although both are described as “super hybrids” with the same 1.5-litre turbocharged petrol engine, Track has two electric motors, while the Ultimate adds a third motor and larger battery.

This means more power and greater range.

Standard kit for Elite includes synthetic leather trim and two-zone climate air with rear outlets, heated power-adjust front seats, acoustic glass for windscreen and front doors, colour selectable ambient interior lighting, cooled console box, power tailgate and a tilt-slide panoramic sunroof with powered sunshade.

There’s also 19-inch alloys, puddle lights, pop-out door handles, walk-away locking, LED head, tail and daytime running lights, auto high beam, auto lights and wipers, and front and rear parking sensors.

Ultimate adds 20-inch wheels, real leather, auto dimming mirror, a heated steering wheel, heated and cooling for both the front and rear seats, massage for the front seats, head-up display, automatic parking assist, additional side parking sensors, and a 14 speaker Sony system.

Infotainment consists of a 15.6-inch touchscreen and 10.25-inch instrument display, with Bluetooth, intelligent voice control, built-in navigation, AM/FM and DAB+ digital radio, wired and wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

Audio is provided by an eight-speaker Sony sound system.

There’s also 50W wireless phone charging, USB-A and -C ports front and back, 12 volt outlet front.

Tiggo 9 has not been rated for safety yet but features an array of active and passive safety features.

There are 10 airbags that includes front, front side and centre, rear side, driver knee and side curtain airbags.

The advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) incorporate the likes of Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB), Emergency Lane Keeping (ELK), Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) and Forward Collision Warning (FCW) — just to mention a few.

Tiggo 9 is covered by a 7-year unlimited kilometre warranty, plus an 8-year battery warranty, with capped price servicing and roadside assistance for 7 years.

Service is due every 12 months or 15,000km, with servicing capped at a total of $3174 for the first seven years.

What’s it go like?

You’re buying this car primarily for the seven seats, right? So let’s have a look at the seats first.

The key figures are the length and wheelbase which dictate how much room it has inside.

The Tiggo 9 is 4.8m long with a 2750mm wheelbase.

To give this some perspective, Toyota’s soft road Kluger is 166mm longer with a 100mm longer wheelbase, which means more room for longer legs.

There’s a smaller Tiggo 8 that seats seven too, but at 4724mm/2694mm it has even less legroom  — it is however $10K cheaper.

Other alternatives include the Jaecoo J8 or fancier Omoda 9 (also produced by Chery).

But back to the Tiggo 9 . . .

Getting in and out of the third row presents some challenges.

First, to raise the two third row seats with the straps provided, you need to slide the second row forward to provide clearance for the headrests.

Second, the single,  second row, tilt and slide seat that provides access is located on the driver’s side of the vehicle, not ideal in our neck of the woods where it exposes those getting in and out to the risk of passing traffic.

By rights it should have been switched to the other side as most manufacturers normally do.

Third, returning the access seat to its original position proved problematic, requiring the driver’s seat to be moved all the way forward before it too could be moved all the way forward.

This unlocks the seat and allows it to be returned to its original position. Talk about a major pain in the butt.

Once ensconced, there’s just enough room for smaller children and even then some negotiation may be required with those in the second row. Adults can forget it.

The seat adjustment, by the way, is located on the door, like a Mercedes.

With the seats in use there’s little room leftover for luggage, as is the norm for most seven-seats SUVs, but at least the third row packs flat when not required.

Cargo capacity is limited to 143 litres, with 819 litres when the second row is folded, or 2021 litres with both rows folded.

There’s no spare under the rear floor either, just a tyre repair kit.

Powering the Tiggo 9 Elite is a 1.5-litre turbocharged four cylinder petrol engine, which produces maximum 105kW of power and 215Nm of torque, together with two electric motors, both of which are located at the front —  delivering 75/170Nm and 90kW/220Nm apiece.

Combined output is 225kW of power and 315Nm of torque.

With three electric motors, Ultimate, in comparison, delivers 315kW and 580Nm.

Torque is the more significant figure because it’s the stuff that gets you moving quickly and makes short work of hills when the car is fully loaded.

In the Elite driving force is sent to the front wheels via a three-speed dedicated hybrid transmission.

Four driving modes are available, accessed by a large circular control knob in the centre console: pure electric, series, parallel, and energy recovery.

Despite the fact it plays second fiddle to the Ultimate in terms of power, the front-drive Elite with its single electric motor is by no means a slouch.

Chery doesn’t provide acceleration figures, but it feels around the 8.0 or 9.0 second mark from 0-100km/h.

Of course, you need some charge to receive assistance from the battery.

With a 70-litre fuel tank the Tiggo takes premium 95 unleaded and has claimed fuel consumption of 1.5L/100km, but that depends on keeping the battery topped up — otherwise it reverts to normal hybrid operation.

Power consumption is 15.6 kWh/100km.

You can expect to get about 77km (WLTP) driving on electric power alone (1250km combined).

Driving mainly in normal HEV or hybrid-electric mode, we clocked up just under 400km at a rate of 6.0L/100km.

In our defence, sometimes it is not convenient to charge the battery, but it’s great to have the option.

AC charging is limited to 6.6kW, but with a fast DC charger it can be charged at a rate of up to 41kW.

Access to the car is via walk-up/walk-away locking, with pop-out door handles and a drivetrain that powers up automatically in readiness for departure.

There’s no start/stop button. However, before the transmission will engage, you must have your seatbelt fastened.

It sounds like a great idea, but in practice it wears thin fairly quickly.

Surprisingly at this price point the steering wheel is power-adjust, but disappointingly offers very little range of adjustment.

You can also choose between Comfort and Sport settings in the system that alters the amount of steering effort required.

Of note, sometimes the transmission wouldn’t go into gear and at other times it jumped out. This happened on more than one occasion.

Once up and running however the Tiggo is an easy, inoffensive car to drive and that is a compliment.

It accelerates briskly and even handles pretty well as we discovered, pushing hard through a few corners.

Ride and handling is a pleasing balance of comfort and control and it doesn’t porpoise the way some SUVs do on undulating roads.

The Tiggo just feels a little disconnected, but that won’t be a problem for the majority of drivers.

Three-level regenerative braking is offered, but there doesn’t seem to be a way to adjust it that we could find.

On a downhill run you can actually see the battery level begin to rise.

Thankfully, most of the driver assistance stuff isn’t too intrusive. The Chinese seem to be getting better at this stuff.

A complete lack of physical controls however became annoying after a while.

Want to change the temperature. See the touchscreen. Turn the radio down. Touchscreen. Anything else. Touchscreen.

Not only is it annoying, it is also difficult once you’re on the move.

Limited control is accessible via the steering wheel buttons, but these can be difficult to see in strong sunlight.

Alternatively, there’s always voice control, but after a minute trying — like us —  you’ll probably give up, swearing.

We’ve been doing this job for a long time.

Once upon a time glitches in test vehicles were rare.

These days they have become commonplace, and point to a lack of research and development.

What we like?

• Easy to drive
• Inoffensive styling
• Doesn’t use much fuel

What we don’t like?

• Cramped third row
• Limited steering wheel adjustment
• Volume dial absent
• Touchscreen not intuitive
• Almost everything controlled through touchscreen
• Can’t see buttons on wheel in bright sunlight

The bottom line?

Is the Tiggo 9 value for money? Sure.

Is it cheap? Not really, not when you consider that it costs almost $60K to put on the road.

When we wonder did this become the price point for a family wagon. 

The quality of Chinese vehicles may have come on in leaps and bounds, but so too has the price. What next?

 

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