TMW - We test the latest Mitsubish ASX5 Leather - A car thats better than so called remium cars.

The Mitsubishi ASX is a great car, and is probably the best car in it's range, it is good enough for the family, offers plenty of space and pricing that's now more competitive that ever, so why is not a better seller.

There are a selection of engines of engines available from two 1.6 litres, one petrol and one diesel and the car tested here, the 2.2 litre diesel automatic, the trim levels are a little confusing, with numbers and letters from ASX2-ASX3-ASX4 and ASX5, with pricing that starts at £16k and tips the scales at a whopping £27k, which takes it into more premium priced products.

Even the basic model comes reasonably well equipped, with our car coming with electric front drivers seat, Nav system, Heated seats front AND rear, leather upholstery, Climate and cruise control, and these are just some of the toys, of which i will list later, the exterior of the car has been updated with the new corporate look, and it is a huge leap forward for such a small change.

The car is a proper off road car, none of these "soft roaders", which is another big plus point for the car, you can select two wheel drive if on normal roads, but once you go into the muddy and rough stuff, the press of a button takes in into four wheel drive, the auto box can then be moved into manual mode with flappy paddles, which are available anytime.

The car comes with a rear view camera to aid reversing, the front comes with Emergency Stop Signal System, alerting you to anything too close in front of you, a great help whilst driving, the overall look of the exterior is of a capable and well resolved SUV, one that really should sell better than it does. 

The only downside to the engine is that it was a little course at higher revs and at motorway speeds, but it is more than capable to over take anything at said motorway speed, without any real issue or trouble, it is not as refined as other engines from other brands, but once you have the radio on and your tootling along, you really don't notice the noise - there is very little road noise intrusion either, which considering other cars in this class fail to get a grip of, Mitsubishi has.

 The ride is very good, the car grips to the road and sticks to the corners well, push it however, and it will try and give way, but you get used to what you can and can not get away with, and at that point it becomes a perfect car with near to perfect road manners, it even smooths out the ever increasing pot holes.

The car out performs other cars in the class from the Mokka X and Ateca, with really light steering, the car is the perfect town car, it is very easy to park as well.

The automatic on our car is very smooth and totally un-noticeable when it changes up or down at reasonable speeds, boot it and yes you can feel the change, it is a shame that the gearbox is limited to just 5 a speed, when most other brands are now heading towards 7 or 8 or in the case of Ford, 10 speed auto, but never the less this is acceptable, for this generation at least.

The interior of the car is simple and easy to understand, with a  lot of the functionality on the touchscreen you find everything close to hand and easy to operate, the other button, switchgear and dials that are not on the touchscreen, are all easy to reach and equally easy to operate, the movable arm rest houses a storage bin, and the car has a load of storage dotted all over the interior.

The steering wheel is a decent size, fits nicely in the hand with decent well weighted controls, the wheel has reach and height on all models, once you get your self sorted and comfortable utilising the four way electric seat, steering wheel and mirrors, you find that there is also loads of room for your feet with enough space to place your foot, rear space is also really good, with more than enough room for, even, the larger passenger, however that does impact on the boot space a little, but it still is large enough to take a family week shop, a few large suitcases or similar.

The 60/40 split rear seats at the back give significantly more space, although with the seats up you get over 440 litres of stowage room, and a nice tough is having these seats lay totally flat, which a large number of its competitors are not able to do.

Considering the seats are leather and the suspension is more tuned for a firmer ride, the seats are very comfortable and you fell well cossetted from the first time you get in, once sitting the dash display is simple and easy to understand, possible slightly on the small side, but you don't spend your journey looking at display, 

The dashboard is simple and sensibly arranged, with straightforward rotary controls for the air-conditioning and a high-stacked centre console that’s easy to see and reach. The digital display between the instrument dials is rather small and hard to read, but there’s plenty of foot space around the pedals, while all versions have a steering wheel that adjusts for both reach and height.

All models are fitted with Blue tooth with a USB port for your iPod or phone charger, DAB is then added from ASX3 upwards, you would assume to keep costs under control, they all operate the same Touchscreen, but no, the lower models have a 6" version with a 7 " version from ASX4 upwards, this then adds Sat Nav, i found the sat nav to be a little "slow" with you getting to a junction before the system tells you where you need to go, which on an unknown road can be rather off putting, the system itself is not the best one available, in fact the Outlander PHEV we tested previous was better, and other brands have superior set ups too..

The dash looks the part, but its quality lacks a little, there are some hard scratch plastics, and lots of soft touch plastics with piano black flashes dotted about, the doors have red leather inserts which match the red leather upholstery, which is really striking and looks the part, the amount of glass, either from the Windscreen, doors or full length glass panoramic sunroof shows the interior up very well indeed, and to be honest, this car needs the glass roof to give it a more bright and visual appeal.

Pricing for the ASX is very good too, with the entry model costing :-

• £15,999 Mitsubishi ASX
• £20520 Vauxhall Mokka X
• £18,150  Seat Ateca
• £15,645 Ford Eco sport (terrible car)
• £29,150 Land Rover Discovery Sport
• £15,999 Suzuki SX-4 S-Cross

You should be able to do some good haggling and get a decent discount, especially after last months 20% new car sales decline, fixed price service packages should be available as well, keeping costs under control, however, you will find that the 2.2 litre Auto is a tad thirsty and service schedules are only 9000 miles :-

• Economy - Urban 50.4mpg
• Economy Extra Urban 60.1mpg
• Economy Combined 56.5mpg

Yes, you can buy the basic model for £16k, but we say that you should, if you can, put some extra money towards a model further up the range to get some decent kit and better engines, after all, this will be a purchase you keep for some while, so you might as well have a decent car, with better interiors too boot

The car we have has a number of decent options :-

• Leather Upholstery
• DAB Radio
• Blue tooth
• Satellite Navigation
• Rear View camera
• 18" Alloy Wheels
• Panoramic Glass Roof
• Privacy Glass
• All Round heated seats
• LED daytime running lights
• LED For lights
• Dusk Sensing Headlights
• Keyless start
• Auto Wipers
• Auto lights
• TPMS
• Electric Heated and operating/folding wing mirrors
• Emergency Stop Signal System
• Hill Start assist
• Brake Assist
• Climate Control
• Cruise Control
• Auto Stop & Go
• All round Electric Windows
• 4-Way Electric Drivers Seat

And this is just a small number of the options that are on the ASX5 Leather, once you have driven this car, going down the range is a hardship and something you really do not want to do.

OVERALL.

The ASX5 is a great car, beaten by only a handful of other cars, the model that we had was perfect, had the right amount of kit and options, drove very well, was reasonable quiet, handled very well, and apart from the slow Sat Nav and high fuel consumption you would be hard pressed to pick something over this, the price for the uber top model tops out at £23,489 which is knocking on the door of a Range Rover.

But as of today (going to press) there is a three year 0% APR and a £2,500 deposit allowance (Terms and conditions etc apply) this will make it more tempting, so what is stopping you from buying the ASX, as far as we are concerned, nothing, i would pick this over and above the majority of the competition, so go one, you know you wan to !