The fashionable segment of coupe crossovers is gradually full of more and more new models. We have a rich Chinese car on the test, made on the Swedish aggregate base, and known in China under the name FY11.
Dealers now have the nerve to rewrite the price tags right in front of your eyes in the showrooms, so it becomes an extremely tedious task to choose a car. It is easier to entrust this business to the professionals, who work with closed databases of automobiles.
The Geely Tugella is based on the Swedish-Chinese CMA platform, which we have already met in the Volvo XC40. It is designed for compact cars, but in the case of the Tugella we are talking about dimensions almost comparable to the Volvo XC60.
But we couldn’t jump over the top: the wheelbase is 2 mm shorter than in XC40. The trunk, of course, is also smaller – 446 liters. So it is a universal platform, which has its limits and has a big beautiful body.
A long hood gives a massive silhouette. The grille of Geely has a secret: behind it there are louvers, which open if the engine needs to cool down. And this is clearly a European technology, which we have previously seen on the BMW models. By the way, the way to open the hood is from Bavarian brand – you should pull the lever in legs twice, and then the hood just rises on gas pads.
By the way, let’s look into the engine compartment: there is a variant of the Volvo engine, but with an index peculiar to Geely – JLH-4G20TDB. It is two-liter gasoline engine with 238 horsepower and torque of 350 Nm. It is paired with an eight-speed “automatic” Aisin, which is also used by the Swedish brand on many models.
A drive of the crossover is exclusively full and, certainly, it is also “Swedish”. Fifth generation Haldex electrohydraulics is applied here – the same as at Volvo. Clearance of “Tugella” is 204 mm, which is very decent. The four-wheel drive system allows you to fool around a little on a dirt road with the lack of grip – ESC does not meet and does not interfere with your drive. But on asphalt be kind to keep your hands, electronics reluctantly releases the car.
The fuel consumption of Geely Tugella is not the smallest, but in Volvo cars with similar motors T5 it is approximately the same – 10,5 l/100 km. For a two-liter unit of such power is very decent, especially since it clearly feels the difference between the three standard driving modes: sporty, comfortable and economical.
It often happens that even in spite of the strong exterior design, Chinese cars limp in the interiors, which seem to have been designed by neural networks. It seems that Geely has certified designers of interiors, because as in case with Coolray, the interior in our Tugella is made perfectly.
Yes, it looks a little bit dull in completely black execution, but the selection of materials and their quality dilutes this feigned severity. The design successfully combines eco leather, alcantara, brushed aluminum and even glossy plastic. But let’s speak about disadvantages.
Non-fixable gearbox lever has not obvious mechanics of control, because it is necessary to press the button to change gear – everything is clear here – but this button is not intuitively located. One wants to press the park button with the thumb and, certainly, the car will not go anywhere. The necessary button is hidden in the other side of the lever.
The cup holder block has its own chip – heating and cooling. Next to them is a button that lights either blue on cooling or orange on heating. True, this only works with the “rear” cup holder, not the one with the button next to it.
Noise isolation Geely Tugella is much better than in Coolray – how else could it be, it is after all the flagship of the brand.
The digital dashboard here is large and bright, but the onboard menu is controlled with difficulties – you need to switch to a special mode from the steering wheel. There are no problems with design, if not to count two ugly blue and red modes on economy and sports modes – their design, to put it mildly, is disputable.
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Separated they live in Bookmarksgrove right at the coast of the Semantics, a large language ocean. A small river named Duden flows by their place and supplies it with the necessary regelialia. It is a paradisematic country, in which roasted parts of sentences fly into your mouth. Even the all-powerful Pointing has no control about the blind texts it is an almost unorthographic life One day however a small line of blind.
