2012 Subaru Impreza
Has Subaru gone normal?
In
past years, we’ve paid scant attention to the Whole Foods parking-lot
version of the Subaru Impreza, concentrating more on its rowdier twin,
the rally-bred WRX. But for 2012, Subaru has made the basic Impreza more compelling, thanks to a thorough makeover. A Subaru spokesman confided that the two biggest knocks on the old Impreza were its sad styling and lousy fuel economy. So, Subaru addressed the former with a new wrapper (for both four-door-sedan and five-door-hatch versions) and the latter with a new, significantly more efficient driveline.
The restyle has turned the Impreza sedan, like our test car, into a miniaturized version of the Legacy. And, like so many contemporary family sedans, the Impreza’s silhouette is roundy, almost fastbackish, with a short nose and a sharply raked windshield. Its otherwise smooth surfaces are crimped here and there with modeling around the wheel arches, defining lines along the hood, a simple hexagon of a grille, and a squared-off deck. The front corners are defined by wide squinty headlights and the rear by big, chrome-trimmed taillights. The Impreza’s look doesn’t pop, but it’s not unattractive.
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Despite the redesign, this Impreza casts the same shadow as the last one. It does, however, have an inch-longer wheelbase, which adds a few more cubic inches of space to an interior that’s bright, airy, and sufficiently roomy for four adults. The driver’s seat is anatomically contoured to comfortably fit all but the morbidly obese, and the command and control stuff is where it should be. The dash is simple, almost austere, with easy-to-read, white-faced gauges; a logically laid-out center stack; and lots of nooks, crannies, and cup holders for iPods, Big Gulp cups, and the remains of a Big Mac.
And, though the new version is no smaller, Subaru says it is as much as 165 pounds lighter than the old car. Our scales say that this well-equipped sedan, at 3014 pounds, is 36 pounds lighter than the more modestly equipped sedan we tested in 2007.
A brand-new version of Subaru’s traditional flat-four engine provides power. Though it’s nearly the same-size package as the prior boxer motor, Subaru claims a 28-percent reduction in friction, thanks to lighter pistons and connecting rods and other detail refinements. At 2.0 liters and 148 horsepower, the new engine is smaller in displacement and less powerful than the 170-hp 2.5-liter it replaces, but Subaru says the car’s reduced mass negates any performance penalty. Our numbers disagree: The new flat-four propelled our manual-transmission Impreza to 60 mph in 8.6 seconds, accompanied by Subaru’s distinct exhaust trill. That’s a full second off the last Impreza sedan we tested. Even considering the 22-hp/36-pound loss versus the old car, that’s not great. More worrying, the new motor’s lack of low- and midrange power, compared with that of the old car, is revealed by our 30-to-50 and 50-to-70-mph top-gear tests, in which this Impreza is two-plus seconds slower.
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The new engine, when coupled to an equally new CVT, earns EPA ratings of 27 mpg city and 36 highway, the highest fuel economy of any all-wheel-drive car in America, Subaru boasts. That’s a fairly shocking, 38-percent improvement in highway mileage over the old four-speed auto. When equipped with a five-speed manual, as was our test car, the Impreza returns a slightly less impressive 25 mpg city and 34 highway, according to the EPA. We saw only 24 mpg.
The Impreza’s electrically assisted steering is calibrated to give the driver a good sense of the road with a reasonable off-center effort buildup. The steering is precise during cornering and requires only a light finger on the wheel to keep it firmly centered between expressway lane markers. This is not to say that this is an exhilarating car to drive, but it’s certainly not exasperating.
Though the Impreza doesn’t stand out in any particular way as far as the various criteria of the small family-sedan class go, it does separate itself from the pack by virtue of its forget-the-weather, four-wheel-drive system. Some things don’t change. View Photo Gallery
Source: http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2012-subaru-impreza-sedan-road-test-review
