The most arousing fresh cars due in 2017
On the 2nd weekend of two thousand seventeen we examine the most titillating cars due to debut over the next fifty weeks.
With one hundred fifty eight cars set to be exposed before 2018, there’s no shortage of multitude. We pick out some of the most interesting in the list below.
Visit our page for a total run down of all the fresh cars due in 2017.
SUVs may be the largest thing on the road at the moment (in both senses), but the BMW five Series sells in such numbers that it remains BMW’s most profitable model.
We’ve already driven the fresh one and what a lovely thing it is, improved in every area from before. Munich’s main concentrate has been on equipping the five Series with the latest technology, both inwards and out. It has also adopted the firm’s modular CLAR platform, introduced very first on the seven Series, which is stronger and lighter than before, to the benefit of treating and fuel economy.
Inwards, the five Series’ slight growth means better rear room, helped by a reshaped rear bench with a decently defined central seat.
One of the strongest non-mechanical suits of BMWs in latest years has been the iDrive infotainment system. The latest version in the five Series is superior to that of the seven Series. It gets a voice control system that recognises natural speech rather than specific directive words, and the on-screen menus are now customisable.
Electronic driver aids include semiautonomous features. The optional £2250 Driving Assistant Plus lets you take your palms off the steering wheel for up to thirty seconds at a time (keep your eyes on the road, however, please), with the car braking and steering accordingly to keep you in lane and a safe distance from other cars.
A Touring model will come in August, earlier than previous estate variants have followed the saloon, as will an allnew M5 at the end of the year, a car you can read about overleaf. But for now, it’s the saloon we concentrate on. Here’s Greg Kable’s verdict from his latest drive, which should whet your appetite ahead of its UK launch. He liked it a lot.
“The crowning achievement for BMW has been to broaden the capability of the five Series to a point where is it now every bit as capable, if not more so, than the talented Mercedes-Benz E-Class. The five Series has taken a big step forward.”
The puny five-door SUV-coupé is a radical styling departure for BMW and will look almost unchanged from this concept. It’s based on the same front-wheel drive underpinnings as the more conventional X1. It will go on sale in two thousand eighteen (along with an i8 Roadster), but we’ll see it very first in 2017.
The fresh X3 SUV is set to get an evolutionary look, growing in size to become almost as big as a firstgeneration X5. It will be powered by updated four-cylinder and all-new six-cylinder petrol and diesel units. The more spacious interior gets a thicker infotainment screen with the latest version of iDrive.
The top dog of BMW’s range gets a twinturbocharged 6.6-litre V12 engine with 592bhp and 590lb ft, mated to a rear-biased xDrive all-wheel drive system. A 0-62mph time of Trio.9sec is promised, along with a 155mph top speed. It’s an M7 in all but name.
Mild styling and kit switches but no power or dynamic revisions. The real headlines are saved for the swifter, more focused CS model joining the M4 range.
The Panamera range will get another six models as production is ramped up following the fresh car’s introduction late last year. Included is a pair of entrylevel models: the rear-wheel-drive Panamera (£66,386) and four-wheeldrive Panamera four (£69,412). They are joined by a quartet of long-wheelbase four-wheel-drive models: four Executive (£76,034), four E-Hybrid Executive (£84,838), 4S Executive (£98,672) and Turbo Executive (£122,480).
The very first batch of Panameras are reaching the UK now, with the Turbo the highlight. It’s plusher inwards but has the same grip and rhythm that made the original model so excellent to drive. It’s phenomenally quick and generates levels of lateral acceleration seemingly unlikely for such a large car.
At last — after fourteen years of the old model — there’s a fresh Continental GT, a model that shares its MSB underpinnings with the Panamera. Bentley’s core model was revolutionary when it was launched, but it has fallen behind these days. Expect a racier fresh look with better proportions yet still the timeless appeal that the original Conti GT exudes.
Powertrains will include the all-new 600bhp W12 that’s making its debut in the Bentayga and an updated Four.0-litre petrol V8. There will also be a petrol V6 plug-in hybrid, which will use the set-up that develops 410bhp in today’s Porsche Cayenne plug-in hybrid. Bentley is unlikely to suggest a diesel V8 option in the Continental. The treating of all models should be improved by the significant weight reductions planned.
MERCEDES-AMG GT R COUPÉ JULY
AMG may just be the world’s most successful enthusiast sports car brand right now. Once known as a slightly esoteric tuning company, AMG has benefited from a sustained period of investment by its possessor, Mercedes-Benz, to the point where it’s likely to have shoved through 80,000 sales in 2016. It’s hard to find any other spectacle brand with this volume of sales — Porsche excepted — now spread across forty eight models, with more to come.
There is no surer sign of confidence trickling out of AMG than the announcement of a headline-grabbing hypercar, due in 2018, with the unique proposition of a 1000bhp road-legal hybrid powertrain said to be lifted straight out of the Formula one car.
Today, AMG’s success is built on two piles: the spectacle versions of mainstream Mercedes cars, and the GT supercar, the 450bhp-plus twoseater priced from £95k and aimed at high-end Porsche nine hundred eleven models.
The GT range will expand in 2017, with a fresh GT Roadster and a sexier GT C model (C for ‘clearly visible genes’, evidently) being launched to top the Roadster range and sit above the GT S coupé. A GT C coupé is also tipped to show up before two thousand seventeen is out.
The range will be crowned as a entire with the launch of the GT R coupé. The 577bhp, more focused model is billed as a road-going version of Mercedes’ Nürburgring 24-hour race-winning GT3.
Taking a leaf out of Porsche’s ‘how to’ book on launching numerous nine hundred eleven variants, the GT range is now bewilderingly sophisticated, with at least four different engine outputs from the Four.0-litre twin-turbo V8, two bodystyles and two different rear axle configurations: standard and broad track.
AMG is coy about sales and production of the GT, but numbers from industry analyst JATO suggest the GT is doing very well but has a long way to go to match the 911.
In Europe, the GT sold one thousand nine hundred fourteen units in the very first half of two thousand sixteen — a 12% increase — and it remains ahead of the SL (1343 units), Bentley Continental (1144), BMW i8 (1105) and Audi R8 (1054). But the nine hundred eleven stands head and shoulders above the field, with 11,701 European sales in the same period.
Overall, Porsche is in a class of its own, with a unique range of own-badge products — which AMG has yet to match — and sales in six-figure numbers. But if the GT can begin to close the gap and AMG gets even more ambitious, who knows what the future might hold for Aufrecht Melcher Grossaspach?
Mercedes claims its fresh pick-up, the fresh X-Class, is more than a reskinned Nissan Navara and Renault Alaskan, both of which it will be built alongside. Mercedes commercial vehicle boss Volker Mornhinweg said the rigid was aiming for “crisp handling” and “a lot of work” had gone into refinement.
Minor tweaks for the GLA will bring it in line with the A-Class. Expect more power for the AMG-badged GLA45, with a boost to around 376bhp.
The fattest switches in this facelift will take place inwards, with lashings of fresh technology added along with a broader, frameless dual-screen set-up.
MERCEDES-BENZ E-CLASS ALL TERRAIN JULY CABRIOLET SEPTEMBER COUPE APRIL
The E-Class range is set to build up three fresh additions in 2017. The Coupé has the greatest significance, bringing with it a more conservative design treatment. The Cabriolet will be spun off that model, and the All Terrain is effectively a version of the E-Class Estate with a rugged Audi Allroad-style treatment.
Mercedes will turn the GLC into a super-SUV by providing it the twinturbocharged Four.0-litre V8 engine from the C63 saloon. It will have more than 500bhp.
Chiron’s quadturbo W16 engine produces 185bhp per litre. With 8.0 litres in total, the final figure stands at 1479bhp. That’s 492bhp more than the Veyron. It has 1179lb ft in total, to give 591lb ft per tonne. That dwarfs even the Ferrari four hundred eighty eight GTB, with a ‘measly’ 211lb ft per tonne from its twin-turbo Three.9-litre V8.
Despite its 1995kg weight, the Chiron can cover 0-62mph in under Two.5sec, surge past 124mph four seconds later and hit 186mph in under 13.6sec.
The Chiron has a top speed of 261mph, which is 7mph quicker than the Veyron’s terminal velocity and 11mph quicker than the take-off speed of Concorde.
The average Chiron possessor also has sixty four other cars, three helicopters, three jets and a yacht. They will drive their Chiron an average of one thousand five hundred fifty miles a year.
Each gram of rubber in the Chiron’s tyres can withstand a centrifugal force of 3800g, which is more than the rubber on a Formula one car can manage.
It can drink 7.Four single-shot glasses of petrol a 2nd, just hammering the consumption rate of an 18-year-old in Magaluf. Plane out, it can empty its 100-litre tank in 9min.
Kia will look to come in the spectacle big league this year with the launch of its very first sports saloon. The rigid has been hard at work at the Nürburgring, developing it under the leadership of ex-BMW M boss Albert Biermann ahead of its launch at next week’s Detroit motor demonstrate.
The four-door sports saloon’s design takes inspiration from the striking GT concept of 2011. It’s likely to use a 315bhp turbocharged four-cylinder engine to drive the rear wheels. There’ll also be a diesel version for Europe — most likely with the 197bhp Two.2-litre engine from the Sorento.
It’s a weird one, the Civic. It has a cool cult following among youths in America but has only ever been seen as a quirky choice in Blighty. Either way, this fresh one hasn’t switched too much. It’s slightly thicker and more conservative inwards, but its essence remains. It just should be more competitive in the market.
The petrol engines are two downsized turbocharged VTEC units: 1.0 and 1.Five litres with 127bhp to 180bhp. The 118bhp 1.6 i-DTEC diesel is carried over from the old model.
The 1.Five petrol engine offers significantly better spectacle and driveability than the current, normally aspirated lumps, and there’s refinement and roundedness to the dynamic character that should suit the car’s existing customer base nicely. Unluckily, it’s no sportier than before, even in Sport trim. Still, even however it isn’t agile, it steers with well-judged rhythm and weight and corners precisely.
Alfa Romeo has a complicated relationship with those who love the brand and want to see it prosper. For decades, we’ve observed this excellent, historic company fight to get its footing, coming perilously close to falling vapid on its face at times as it has created often pretty cars that have otherwise lacked the character promised by the Alfa badge.
This time, however, prosperity might just be around the corner, thanks to a fresh SUV called the Stelvio. It’s the 2nd new-generation Alfa after the Giulia saloon (deliveries of which have eventually now commenced) and the one with the greatest sales and profit potential.
The Stelvio, if it’s a success, is the precursor to a potential nine-car onslaught over the next five years that will include a BMW five Series rival, a fresh sports car and a flagship large SUV based on the Maserati Levante. Put simply, if the Stelvio works, it can permit Alfa to make the kinds of cars we love guilt-free and with the company in the black.
It will be launched in hot Quadrifoglio form, with a Ferrari-derived allaluminium Two.9-litre V6 producing 503bhp and mated to an eight-speed automatic gearbox and a rear-biased four-wheel drive system with torque vectoring. Lower powered two-wheeldrive Stelvios are likely to feature a 207bhp diesel engine.
Alfa is promising driver-focused dynamics with excellent treating, telling the Stelvio has been “uniquely engineered to challenge two-door cars on the track without compromising the SUV side of its character”. The base model will cost from about £40,000 and the Quadrifoglio £65,000.
‘Made in China’ is a phrase you seem to see written on most goods nowadays, but the faraway People’s Republic has yet to conquer one of the most visible markets of all: the European car market.
Geely, holder of Volvo, is looking to switch that with a fresh brand, Lynk&Co, the one being the very first mainstream Chinese car to go on sale in Europe. It will be launched in China in 2017, with European sales following in 2018.
This one is claimed to be the most ‘connected’ car yet, being continuously connected to the internet, and owners will be able to control, monitor and lease their cars with their smartphones.
Based on the soon-to-be-launched Volvo XC40, the one will have a range of engines from Volvo’s family of Two.0-litre fours and 1.5-litre triples, with a plug-in hybrid due shortly after launch.
Lynk&Co’s head honchos want to “revolutionise and simplify” car buying and the one will not have traditional trim levels. Instead, it will have fixed-price equipment collections that “draw inspiration from contemporary style and technology sectors”.
It will also be the very first mass-market to car to be open API (application programming interface), essentially permitting outside software developers to “enrich the automotive experience” of the one with ideas of their own.
Like many of us this month, the Peugeot three thousand eight has hit the gym. The popular people-carrier has been transformed into an SUV, but does the driving practice live up to its elegant looks? It sure does. The 1.6 turbo petrol model has a sleek engine that pleasurably complements its stable treating, well-controlled bod and soft, largely comfy rail. Its luxurious, modern interior is even more extraordinaire. Material quality is hugely improved, as is the infotainment system, and an excellent 12.3in digital instrument display is standard. All the seats are comfy and there’s slew of room.
The original Discovery, which is twenty eight years old, has long been at the heart of the Land Rover brand, providing ordinary car buyers a (relatively) affordable car that could be a rough but convenient, family-oriented off-roader.
Now in its fifth generation, this fresh model gets an altogether less rugged appearance as part of a shove upmarket, with a design that’s arguably no longer as distinctive as it once was. Looks aren’t everything, tho’, and Land Rover promises that the Discovery will be no less capable on rock-strewn paths than its predecessor, and our latest early drive of a prototype in Scotland confirmed that.
Despite being thicker inwards and out, it’s swifter, lighter and more efficient than its predecessor. A bonded aluminium monocoque substitutes the mighty old ladder chassis and permits the Discovery to be up to 480kg lighter than the fourth-generation car.
The weight loss has permitted Land Rover to fit a fresh twin-turbo fourcylinder diesel engine to the car for the very first time, alongside V6 petrol and diesel models. Four-wheel drive and an automatic transmission are standard.
The seven-seat cabin is this fresh Discovery’s strongest suit and it’s where the bulk of the development has focused. There is genuinely room for seven adults and each person will be able to keep their backside warm with a heated seat, charge their phone, find a space for their water bottle, keys, wallet and other oddments, and connect to the car’s wi-fi hotspot.
The big gap inbetween the Range Rover Evoque and Range Rover Sport will be plugged with a fresh model that we’re likely see at the Geneva motor demonstrate in March for the very first time. It is set to be sportier and more road-biased than other Range Rover offerings. Another Land Rover hit in the waiting?
This well-built but unspectacular SUV is Audi’s best-selling car, to such a degree that Audi has built an entire factory in Mexico just to manufacture the fresh model coming this year. Engines include a Two.0-litre diesel with 187bhp and a Two.0-litre petrol unit with 249bhp, plus a range-topping 282bhp Trio.0-litre V6 diesel due soon after launch.
The fresh Q5 has so much going for it: it’s quiet, comfy, lovely to sit in and unlikely to cost you too much to run, thanks to competitive fuel economy and emissions and probable strong residual values. Anyone who buys one will do so for one or all of those reasons and not be disappointed with what is a very impressively engineered car.
But it’s not much joy to drive, which is a fatter shame in the Q5’s case, because you can tell that it has a mighty fine chassis just waiting to be tuned in a more involving way.
We’ve been waiting for the resurgence of the Alpine brand for a long time now. Renault, its possessor, has done little with it since 1995, despite coming close to reviving it in two thousand eight before the credit crunch hit and killed off that idea.
T here have been a few concepts since — the Mégane-racer-based Alpine A110-50 and the Alpine Celebration at Le Guy’s — but, realistically, all of Alpine’s heritage dates from before 1995. That history includes sales of more than 30,000 road cars and more than one hundred race cars produced.
So, ultimately, the time is here for a decent revival. This fresh model, powerfully based on the Alpine Vision concept exposed early last year, is a unspoiled sports car inspired by previous gems such as the A110 and A160.
Rumoured to be called the A120, it will be a lightweight, mid-engined, two-seat machine. It is expected to be powered by a 1.8-litre petrol engine derived from the turbocharged 1.6-litre motor used in the Renault Clio RS, producing around 250bhp and good for a 0-62mph time of Four.5sec. A 300bhp variant is also on the cards, as is a convertible. The A120 will send drive to its rear wheels through a dual-clutch automatic gearbox with steering wheel-mounted shift paddles.
Leaked pics and test cars have exposed that the production car, a £50,000 Porsche Cayman rival, has no rear wing but smoother lines and a rear diffuser with a centrally mounted harass. In addition, A110-inspired foglights have been kept.
This is the 2nd model in Aston’s ‘second century’ plan after the acclaimed DB11. The all-new sports car will be the replacement for today’s Vantage and it will feature a design strongly inspired by the DB10 created for the James Bond film Spectre. It should be much sportier in nature than its predecessor, too. Aston boss Andy Palmer has described it as “Aston’s race car, the weekend warrior, a track car — much edgier”.
Stiffer, better, swifter, stronger. Aston’s range-topping GT gets more power, sportier suspension and some fresh trims in one last round of switches before a two thousand eighteen replacement. Its reworked Five.9-litre V12 gets 595bhp, 27bhp more than the outgoing car. Torque remains at 465lb ft. Available in coupé and convertible Volante bodystyles, it looks much the same as before but with fresh carbonfibre aerodynamic features such as a revised front splitter and rear diffuser.
Can Vauxhall tempt people out of their BMW three Series and Mercedes-Benz C-Classes? Don’t scoff. All three fresh Insignias — the Grand Sport large hatch, the Sports Tourer estate and the Country Tourer soft-roader — are claimed to be much improved inwards and out. The interior is far plusher, with more modern tech, and the engines should be more frugal, both for fuel and tax.
The Ford Fiesta supermini is the car that just won’t go away, topping UK sales charts for what seems like a billion years. (In reality, it’s eight.) And this fresh model not only promises more of the same, but it also introduces the Fiesta Active, a crossover-style trim level, and a luxury Vignale spec, both tapping into growing parts of the car market.
You’d be forgiven for noticing little difference inbetween the previous generation and this fresh one, with Ford executives choosing to play it safe — and you can understand why.
But the interior has been overhauled, the rail and treating are claimed to be even better than now and there’s a more efficient version of Ford’s popular 1.0-litre Ecoboost engine.
Still, the early signs suggest that it will be pricey compared with some rivals, beginning at around £15,000. There are two key reasons for this: one, low-spec Fiestas don’t sell well, and two, Ford doesn’t want to cannibalise sales of its fresh, cheaper Ka+ supermini, introduced last year.
The real test will come when we drive the Fiesta — and know the pricing — but it’s hard to believe that Ford will have messed up such a winning formula.
Having established its models as being among the most competitive mainstream offerings in Europe, Hyundai is now moving on to another popular trend: spectacle versions of its models. Rivals such as Toyota’s fresh Gazoo arm aren’t far behind.
Very first to launch will be the i30N, based on the all-new i30 hatchback also due this year and using a Two.0-litre turbocharged engine with more than 260bhp. It has been developed at Hyundai’s centre at the Nürburgring and there are high hopes for the hot hatch, which will top the range of the third-generation i30.
Meantime, the Hyundai reckons the more sedate, standard i30 is “accessible, appealing in design and superb to drive”. On looks at least, the i30 may not be cutting edge, but Hyundai’s cars just keep on improving, aesthetically and otherwise, so we’d be astonished if the i30 wasn’t keenly priced, well specified and pretty decent to drive when it goes on sale in March.
Who doesn’t love a Golf? And Volkswagen knows it. Despite all the VW drama of late, it has had very little influence on the popularity of its ubiquitous hatchback. So VW has taken the evolutionary route with the design of the facelifted version, on sale this spring.
The eighth-generation Golf will arrive in 2019, with VW boss Herbert Diess recently describing it to Autocar as “very innovative, a major milestone and with more traditional drivetrains” (as opposed to its planned line-up of electrical vehicles).
In the meantime, this update will tide customers over, with an upgraded interior and a fresh 1.5-litre turbocharged petrol engine. There’s also a concentrate on technology and connectivity, with gesture control, an updated app system to integrate Apple CarPlay and more, and safety systems such as Traffic Jam Assist.
So how does VW see the Golf fitting alongside its ID electrical hatchback in the future? Diess insists they will run in parallel, noting that EVs will be irrelevant in some regions for at least a decade. Witness this space.
How quickly things progress. This time last year we demonstrated you the F-Pace — Jaguar’s very first SUV. Now the I-Pace has come to the fore and looks set to jolt Jaguar’s electrified revolution into life when it is exposed in production form late this year.
When the concept version of Jaguar’s very first EV was launched at the SUV-heavy Los Angeles motor display in November, it was a showstealer from the moment the covers came off. We expect the I-Pace to go on sale in 2018, and if the reaction to the F-Pace is anything to go by, it’ll be a hit.
The I-Pace will be a direct rival to the Tesla Model X, with a 90kWh battery pack providing the necessary punch. Sure, it’s a concept for now, but Jaguar’s intentions are clear, and the I-Pace puts into practice the EV packaging advantages that Jaguar chief designer Ian Callum forecast.
The LA motor showcase provided an accurate picture of where the car industry is going, however, with almost as many EVs as there were SUVs. The I-Pace will cover the EV base for Jaguar and is expected to be priced at around £60,000. Meantime, the raft of manufacturers with SUVs, electrical cars or both on the way proceeds to grow.
NextEV’s Nio NP9 all-electric hypercar has 1360bhp, Chinese backing, a 0-62mph time of Two.7sec, a 194mph top speed and a production run of just six.
Only in two thousand seventeen could a hypercar be out-accelerated by a sports saloon — the Two.4sec-to-60mph Tesla Model S P100D — but NextEV will soon have that base covered, too, with a fleet of mainstream EVs from 2017.
NextEV says the Nio NP9 has lapped the Nürburgring in 7min Five.12sec, just 8.0sec slower than the Porsche nine hundred eighteen Spyder, which holds the EV lap record.
Words by Kris Culmer, Jimi Beckwith, Rachel Burgess, Sam Sheehan and Mark Tisshaw