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| Road Test Citroen C5 2.7 HDi V6 Exclusive Tourer |
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Smooth And Spacious
A very practical one, too, certainly in comparison with the "normal" C5. That car's load-carrying ability is far from being the best in its class, but the Tourer is a different matter entirely. Its boot holds 533 litres with the rear seats up (already 94 more than the saloon) and when you fold those seats the capacity increases to 1490 litres, which isn't bad at all. Better still, the tailgate opening is wide, and the sill over which you have to carry luggage is at pretty much the same height as the boot floor. Loading is hardly going to be a problem. In other respects the car tested here is very similar to the Exclusive saloon we drove a while ago. The main difference is that that car had a 2.2-litre four-cylinder turbo diesel engine and a manual gearbox, while this one has a 2.7-litre V6 which is available only with automatic transmission. I like the V6, but the briefest glance at the specifications of the two units makes it clear that it would be a daft choice.
For a start, it raises the price by no less than £3000. That would be okay if there were compensations, but I don't think there are. The V6 is quiet, but so is the 2.2 (a lack of decibels being one of the C5's most remarkable features). The V6 is more powerful, with a 35bhp advantage over the 2.2, but it's not much quicker (4mph flat out, half a second from rest to 60mph). And the V6 is a hell of a lot thirstier (9.3mpg behind the 2.2 on the combined economy cycle) and much more expensive to tax thanks to the correspondingly higher CO2 emissions. You would really have to like automatics to be prepared to suffer all this. These grumbles aside, though, I found this particular Tourer to be a splendid machine. One of its duties during my time with it was to transport two of us from one side of the country to the other on a Friday and then back again on the Saturday. There was no rush, so I didn't need a sports car; what I needed was something that would waft along for several hours without causing any strain or upset, and that's exactly what the C5 did.
This was partly because of the seats, which are unique to the Exclusive trim level (the only one available with the V6 engine) and are quite brilliant, as long as you take the trouble to adjust them exactly to suit you. If you don't, aches and pains will ensue. The ride quality also contributed. The C5 is definitely built for comfort rather than speed, and its suspension is very soft, though also very well controlled. The saloon, however, is better in this respect than the Tourer, no doubt for the usual reason that estate cars have to be set up on the assumption that they may have to carry heavy loads. There's another, rather unusual result of this compromise: I found with the saloon that it was vital to press the Sport button on the centre console to achieve the best balance between ride and handling. In the Tourer, the same action simply makes the ride too jiggly, and in this case I'd stick with the standard setting every time.
My passenger on the long trip was baffled by the C5's complete lack of cupholders, which does seem very strange. And there are other ergonomic oddities - the hazard warning light button is an arm's reach away from the driver on the wrong side of the dashboard, there's a lack of rear seat room which is astonishing considering the overall size of the car, and though you may think I've gone soft I was still surprised that a car like this has no reversing camera, which would be a useful addition since rear visibility isn't great. So there are things to complain about, but for all that I greatly enjoyed my time with the Tourer, and it was with a heavy heart that I gave the keys back to the delivery driver after the week in which it became part of my life. Price: £25,495
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