Dacia Jogger

Why are people obsessed with lips at the bottom of a car boot? Do you pack your shopping with a fork lift truck?

It’s brilliant being able to slide my bike in, wheels on, from the smooth lip along totally flat floor in current car. It’s a small thing, but a properly thought out boot and seat folding flat is the business.

Went to look at one today…

Bit disappointing really, big big car outside but not as massive inside. Very undulating boot floor.
Load length 150cm with rear pair removed and middle row folded forward. 185 if you took middle row out. Was hoping for 2m.

Definitely won’t work for my bike/surfwagon so a van it is.

Rory Reid has done a review of it on Autotrader…

Although not a great amount of detail on the boot space.
Not that I am considering one, but most concerning thing he said is that he’s managed 21mpg in it!! Now I’m sure he’s not been treating it gently, but 21mpg from a 1 litre 3-cylinder turbo. Yikes.

EDIT – Now that’s clever! The roof rails can be rotated and used as roof bars! So the middle portion between the anchor points at either end basically comes out & can be used as the roof bar. That is a good idea!

@mikertroid what van will you get?

I think 21mpg says more about the journo’s driving ability than the cars economy. For the 1.2l 115bhp 4 cylinder Lodgy TCE I used 5.8l/100 for the first couple of years when I kept a check. That’s 48 mpg.

For the 1.2l 115bhp 4 cylinder Lodgy TCEdifferent engine in a different car

I would also much prefer a van but I’m not willing to pay current prices. A 10 year old Vivaro with 130k on the clock is not worth 10 grand and a newish Transit or VW is certainly not worth 3 or 4 times that.

I think the official figures are a better guide to fuel consuption than what one probably biased journalist says. I find they’re they’re very close for the type of driving I do in pretty much any car. However, if I were being a dick (on a closed road obviouly) I’m sure I could get 21 mpg.

Edit: my T2 camper, a notrious gas guzzler, did better than that. What was he doing? Starting and leaving it running to warm while having breakfast or left foot braking?

That JC journalist found spurious pretences for dissing perfectly good cars when his prejudices do dictated.

Why does the road need to be closed? You can get really bad mpg in lots of very legal ways. I’m sure the size doesn’t help either.

Or he could be doing the speed limit consistently on a motorway with no acceleration or speed adjustment at all.

My experiance with small 3 cylinder engines is they promise massive mpg and when you are on the motorway they offer about half – 1/3rd the headline figures.

Even going from 70-60 in a small 3cyl can double your mpg – especially one as aerodynamically challenged as the dacia

Checking official figures, about 50mpg and some real world figures from various French magazines the worst I can find is 8.1l/ 100km for autoroute use (bearing in mind the limit here is 130kmh), that’s 35 mpg.

I’m well aware of your dislike of small petrol engines which you’ve voiced on many threads, Trailrat. A 50% increase in consumption on motorways is realistic, doubling is not. that journo has mananaged to use two and a half times mote fuel than the official figues and double what French journos achieved overall. I smell a rat.

Yet here I am owning a small modern petrol engine

First tank of fuel at 70mph on my dual carriageway commute 300 miles to a tank

Second tank still going strong after 400 with 90 range still showing doing only 60mph on the exact same route

Edukator

I think the official figures are a better guide to fuel consuption than what one probably biased journalist says

Did you watch the video? He liked the car and also liked the engine.
The fuel economy was one of the few things he didn’t like and even then he did say that most people would do better than that in real world driving, or words to that effect.

🙄

First tank of fuel at 70mph on my dual carriageway commute 300 miles to a tank

Second tank still going strong after 400 with 90 range still showing doing only 60mph on the exact same route

Headwind/tailwind makes a massive difference to MPG in motorway driving

Perhaps if it was a brand new car, the engine hadn’t been run in yet, not helping economy.

That said, VW acknowledged that there is a minimum emgine size before things get inefficient again; perhaps they’ve reached it here. It is a BIG car. On the outside at least.

I’m almost certain to order a van in next couple of days, which will keep me going until such time Hydrogen is a reality.

@thebunk

99% certain I’ll order a Toyota Proace Medium 2.0d. I can get a decent discount, which starts to make sense when you look at what dross you get second hand.
Order time will be huge, but that’s not a problem as it secures the wagon and takes the pressure off as I’ve time to save a few pennies.

A quick glance had me seeing Dacia Dogger as the thread title!

The amount of internal friction required to double fuel consumption at motorway speeds would do lasting damage to the the engine even if it didn’t seize, quite apart from making it difficult to reach the speed limit.

Besides, the tolerances and finishes on modern engine parts are so good the running in effect is tiny.

I’ve driven several brand new cars and all went fine straight out of the box, I’d put the power an consumption improvement after 10000km as negligible, similar to the difference between Summer and Winter tyres.

That 21mpg figure from that review is a slight concern, but I just assumed he had achieved that with an afternoon of ‘spirited’ driving on A/B roads and a bit of urban stop/start surely? How much Motorway cruising do we really believe Car Reviewers do?

I suppose it’s basically the Bogo Renault/Dacia 1L/3cyl – Turbo petrol unit now, intended primarily for smaller cars (the Jogger is really just a stretched Sandero at the end of the day innit), We’re probably not going to see the big boys developing many more engines of this sort now are we?
The future for small (European) urban cars will increasingly be leccy surely(?).

I’m probably prime target market for a Jogger I have four women/girls between 10 and 76 to transport (so being able to put one in the boot might help), plus various bits of luggage and of course my bike(s), I’m also a tight bastard and would happily trade off performance and comfort for a smaller engine and less overall cost. personally I’d like a smaller leccy car really for ~80% of our actual use, but that can come later*.

I’ve spotted one through the window of the local Renault showroom, I don’t know if I want to take the boss to look round one or not, her poker face is terrible, she’s utterly clueless about cars and is more interested in booking holidays right now.
We’ll either walk out having accidentally financed the top spec model on terrible terms, or she’ll have somehow mortally insulted the sales-person, there is no middle ground.

(*If the Spring makes it to the UK we might end up with two Dacias.
Next door have Porsches and Mercs on the drive, I’m really looking forwards to dragging down the neighbourhood further 😉 )

Test drove one today. For reference it was the billy big bollocks Extreme SE version. Test drive route was 9 miles on fastish roads with roundabouts. This is only about the driving not all the other crap i.e. boot openings and lips.

Drives as per a normal car, you can tell there’s more of it back there but it’s not obvious. Seating position is good, decent amount of adjustment on the seat and the wheel. Gearchange is good, not notchy, not vague, somewhere in between. Radio/Nav system seemed alright for the built in stuff but I guess most people would use Android Auto/iCarPlaything.

Bad bits – as Rory says up there on his video it’s a bit noisy. Engine makes a bit of a racket under acceleration but once cruising it’s okay. Some wind noise at 70mph but not deafening.
Fuel consumption, while not as bad as the second worst Top Gear presenter ever makes out, isn’t as good as claimed. All I can assume is that he’d spent his day booting it from one stop light to another. I did have a moment of ‘making progress’ but other than that cruised along and it sat at 38mpg after the 9 miles. This is a bit crap.

In all its a decent car but I’m put off by the fuel economy. I’m in two minds whether to give it a swerve entirely and get something else, or to sit it out and wait for the hybrid next year.

Thanks for that review, Matt. 👍

@northernmatt, thanks for that. This might be a silly question but if you’re not bothered by the practical stuff aren’t you better off going for a second hand S-Max or even a 2 series Gran Tourer? Surely both would be much nicer to drive (and just much nicer)?

38mpg?

Jesus, my mobile skip does that and I got it for free. Definitely not the direction I’m looking at heading.

t. This might be a silly question but if you’re not bothered by the practical stuff aren’t you better off going for a second hand S-Max or even a 2 series Gran Tourer? Surely both would be much nicer to drive (and just much nicer)?

Have you seen the inflated prices for used cars currently? Thanks to WBAC and chip shortages People want stupid money for a ~62 plate S-Max, a decade old car that’s probably on the verge of a DPF or Gearbox failure? If the difference is (for arguments sake) ‘Only’ an extra £2-3k and you get a Warranty I’d rather opt for a Jogger, there’s not much new available from other manufacturers that really compares, it’s a sort of unique car at present.

But yeah 38mpg for mixed Town/A road driving doesn’t sound awesome, my current 14 year old diesel shit box is comfortably managing ~43ish (according to it’s own estimates)

In all its a decent car but I’m put off by the fuel economy. I’m in two minds whether to give it a swerve entirely and get something else, or to sit it out and wait for the hybrid next year.

Does He actually mean a “Hybrid” as in PHEV or dual fuel as in Petrol/LPG which they already offer on the Duster (IIRC) I’m sure I heard they’d be offering the Petrol/LPG option later, don’t remember hearing about a Hybrid before.

But yeah 38mpg for mixed Town/A road driving doesn’t sound awesome, my current 14 year old diesel shit box is comfortably managing ~43ish

To be fair, for a car of that size with a tiny turbo-charged engine dragging it around that doesn’t sound too bad, does it?
We used to have a Shitroen C3 Picasso (it really was an unreliable turd of a car). That had a 1.6 petrol & we’d struggle to get over 38mpg out of it. Even on long trips at steady speeds on the motorway, we never got it to 40mpg. I think the large upright front end of these kinds of cars don’t lend themselves to great efficiency.
I’d have thought this Jogger thing would be better with the Renault diesel engine stuffed in it – is it a 1.5 litre dci? Although no idea if that is possible with tax/emissions stuff – perhaps the small petrol makes better sense from that point of view.

Have you seen the inflated prices for used cars currently?

@cookeaa tell me about it! Am just about to drive around Bristol trying out a load of terrible £7k cars. But if you’re willing to spend £15-17k on a Jogger, and you’re looking for a decent car rather than a van disguised as a car, you can get 3ish year old BMW 2 Series petrol cars for that, with reasonably low mileage and service history. If the Jogger was a bit more practical it would be competing with uninspiring 2nd hand Berlingos and Zafiras but given the boot and seat config I think it’s a harder sell against nicer 2nd hand Fords and Beemers.

Of course, for people that have to buy new, and need 7 seats, it’s in a class of its own and will own that market.

+1 on 38mpg seeming very reasonable for a big petrol-powered car.

I stand corrected, a quick googling yielded this:

The hybrid, due in 2023, combines a 1.6-litre petrol engine, two electric motors (one an e-motor and the other a beefed-up alternator) and a multi-mode automatic gearbox, plus a 1.2kWh battery to make electric-only running possible for short distances.

But that drivetrain/motor/alternator/tiny battery setup starts to sound a bit complex perhaps? I sort of see Dacia as more on the “agricultural” end of the scale and with all that stuff sources from renault and crammed under the bonnet I can foresee potential issues (and more up-front cost)

Dunno, my old (admittedly made 20+ odd years ago) Mk4 Golf Estate had a 1.6L engine and would never have have managed 38mpg, current car is an ancient C4 Pic with a 2L Diesel engine averaging ~43mpg day to day and will still do 50 comfortably on a long run, I’m just waiting for a major fault to manifest and justify it’s replacement.

I’ll bet that drivetrain is going to be coming from the current Clio hybrid so it won’t exactly be bleeding edge technology. The Clio lists at just under £24k so I imagine the equivalent Jogger would be around £20k.

Still, this says the Clio doesn’t get anywhere near its claimed mpg so I can’t imagine the Jogger would improve much.

How many cars do get near their claimed mpg in often biased jouralists’ hands?

The lack of objecivity/eulogising/wilful dissing is even mote apparent with EVs. Taking extremes on Youtube on the Zoé a Youtuber got over 400km out of the 320km 40kwh version while another had one on the back of a tow truck in less than half that having gone flat out along the autoroute to a dead charge point an app would have tod him was dead. Two tests, different agendas.

Edit: your 38mpg corresponds to what I’d expect from you description of route and driving style Matt, more useful to people on this thread than anything else postedso far in terms of mpg

Currently have a Logan diesel and getting comfortably over 60mpg, but no diesel option for the Jogger as far as I can see.
Probably be my next car in a five seat hybrid config, hoping it won’t be £20k as it’s a bit beyond budget (or at least what I’d like to pay)

Test drove one of these today. I really wanted to like it and it drove OK, slightly better than expected in fact, but just had too many impracticalities for us to be happy with.

For example, I wouldn’t be able to get my hardtail in the boot without needing to fold the middle 3 seats forward. Eldest wasn’t happy with his seatbelt coming from right at the back of the roof either.

Shame really. Now looking at used petrol estates for similar sort of money.

I’ve ordered one.

Spent days on AutoTrader trying to find something similar to the Berlingo that it’s going to replace (other than a new Berlingo obviously) but the only results were endless Zafiras, C4 Grand Picasso’s, and the odd BMW 218 thing, all with at least 50k miles, all out of warranty.

It’s not going to do a huge amount of miles. I have another plan for my car for work so the slightly lower than expected MPG is a trade-off I’m willing to take. Went for the Extreme SE model because heated seats. Expected 6 month wait but the sales guy did say that could be as short as 3 but won’t know for certain until the build slot is confirmed.

Hmmm 48.5mpg?
There appears to be a discrepancy here doesn’t there?
Car Reviews not quite consistent, Shocka!

At least Ed will like that one.

That one was laughable. A Youtube channel to sell you shit. Most of it is just chat that corresponds to what you see, it’s the comments on what you can’t see that mislead.

1/ Give me a Dacia and I’ll send a photograph of any mpg between 30 and 55 in 10 minutes. Give it to me for two hours and I’ll extend that to between 10 and 90mpg. You don’t get 48.6mpg in the conditions of the test including messing about doing improbable 0-60 times. I can match the official mpg figures (based on brim to brim over a long period) in my own Dacia but that means driving smoothly.

2/ Whilst the front suspension on Dacias is fine the rear suspension on all the LWB Dacias is harsh unless loaded, especially over speed bumps. The damping really isn’t sophisticated, more RST than Fox.

3/ If you are going to make excuses for a lousy safety score then at least try to justify.

I’l be using our Lodgy today for the first time in a couple of months (I charge the battery every three weeks, it’ll start first go), fifteen 314x500x200 19kg bricks to pick up which aren’t even half the allowed payload.

The small petrol engine/MPG argy bargy reminds me of the test Top Gear did years ago.
Clarkson wanted to prove a V8 M3 was more eco than some basic 1l engined hatchback, quite possibly a Dacia, I don’t remember.
The car was thrashed round the test track flat out with the M3 burbling along in pursuit, with a measured amount of fuel.
The giant V8 used less.

Horses for courses, but these tiny petrol engines in large cars are pretty easy to get terrible MPG from.

From my experience with my last couple of new vans, they tend to gain about an extra 3 MPG over the first few thousand miles as the engine wears in.
This is measuring miles per brimmed tank rather than onboard computer.
My new van has just done 35MPG on the first full tank, hoping to see that get closer to 40 over the summer.

, but these tiny petrol engines in large cars are pretty easy to get terrible MPG from.

Equally easy to get excelent mpg. 🙂

My new van has just done 35MPG on the first full tank, hoping to see that get closer to 40 over the summer.

3mpg would be a typical improvement between short journeys with cold starts in the Spring and short journeys with cold starts in Summer.

, but these tiny petrol engines in large cars are pretty easy to get terrible MPG from.

Equally easy to get excelent mpg. 🙂

Agreed!

3mpg would be a typical improvement between short journeys with cold starts in the Spring and short journeys with cold starts in Summer.

Also agreed, but what I’m talking about is measuring brimmed tanks over 500+ miles of similar driving, with one driver, over the long term.
Mostly and B road journeys of 10-60 miles at a time.