Grandland X Hybrid is good, but not great

The last few years have been tough ones for a company that was once a market leader across Europe and was also an industrial behemoth providing tens of thousands of jobs in many countries.

However, as the unwanted child of an American automotive colossus, Opel/Vauxhall became a shambling wreck, making poor cars and even worse corporate decisions about future investment and strategic planning.

In the end, General Motors was only too willing to sell off what had once been a money-making machine like few others in the car-making game. 

It looked like GM’s former European arm could vanish without a trace, but then the company’s luck started to turn and, thanks to the intervention of a somewhat unlikely French suitor, the future of these once great brands went from a spark to a flame.

Now, while the PSA Group – which controls Peugeot, Citroen and DS – did not provide any guarantees when they purchased the Opel/Vauxhall brands, neither did they invest considerable sums of money to allow those marques wither on the vine.

It may be that certain of the Opel/Vauxhall production plants will be closed or revamped in the not-so-distant future because of production synergies or Brexit (the giant Ellesmere Port plant near Chester and the home of over 1,000 jobs is under severe question merely because of its’ location), but the brands themselves have been saved.

Of course, the waters became all that bit more muddy recently when the PSA Group merged with Fiat Chrysler (FCA) to form new company Stellantis which will now control the manufacturing, marketing and sales of a whole heap of brands from Alfa Romeo to Peugeot, to Fiat, to Jeep, to Citroen, to Opel and beyond. The future still seems brighter for all those marques.

Thanks to the initial defibrillator provided by Peugeot, the heart of Opel is now beating again and the evidence we have seen thus far of the co-operative ventures between the two parties is becoming very fruitful; something we have commented upon in these columns in recent times. The broader merger of Opel’s new owners with FCA will further expand the multiple applications of platforms, drivetrains and so forth.

For Opel right now, the Corsa-e – which is heavily based on Peugeot’s e-208 – was the first sign of life and this week’s tester, the Opel Grandland X Hybrid 4, is another, although it must be said, not quite as convincing a case as its’ junior sibling.

That said, it is not often something cobbled together very quickly with an array of elements that previously had been unavailable to the poor souls left drilling the coalface of a near abandoned mine, turns into anything worthwhile. But this car, while not being anything like a finished article, comes close.

Previously the Grandland X was a largely unwanted and unappealing thing which buyers largely avoided. Bulky, poor to drive and generally unloved, it was not a big success. But, funny enough, this car had Peugeot heritage even before the French bought Opel out.

Under a pre-purchase agreement with GM, the PSA Group sold them the platform and the mechanical package which belonged to the 3008 and the Citroen C5 Aircross, excellent machines both, allowing Opel to create a mid-range SUV to compete with the two aforementioned, as well as the Ford Kuga, the Nissan Qashqai, the VW Tiguan and all the rest.

But despite being based on two good cars, Opel managed to make a third which was nowhere as good. The sales figures confirmed as much.

The new car – our tester – aims to sprinkle a bit of magic dust on something previously lacking anything of that nature. Dynamically they may have managed to achieve their aims, but if all the attention was focused on making the car an interesting drive, much was overlooked in other quarters.

The Grandland X Hybrid 4 (a very clunky title even for a PHEV, I think) actually has three motive forces, one petrol and two electric.

The petrol is a 1.6 turbocharged unit which makes 197 bhp and it is allied to a front electric motor which adds 108 bhp and a rear one which contributes a further 111 bhp. Power is fed to the road through an excellent eight-speed auto ‘box.

Now I know that mathematicians among you will tally all that oomph to 416 bhp, but the system’s maximum output is just under 300 bhp (which is impressive enough in itself) and that is because all three power sources do not necessarily work in tandem. At full power, all three will be working, but at differing revs.

Without boring you all too much, the three hundred horses on offer are more than enough to keep anyone occupied, if that’s what they’re after. But, for those with a yearning for green motoring, the car has the potential to return 1.4 l/100 km (204 mpg) if you pull the various strings together correctly.

Opel claims a range of 56 km of all-electric motoring, but the reality I found was that if you got 35 km you were doing well. Sure you can do zero-emission around town if you work it right, but if you slip it into anything other than the default ‘hybrid’ setting – the 4WD and Sport settings are the options – your economy slips sharply.

Even, so – and despite a 0-100 kph time of just under seven seconds and a top speed of 235 kph, which is GTI territory after all – you should be able to eke out a return of 5.1 k/100km (54.9 mpg) over a range of driving. That’s close to diesel territory and not bad at all.

Get heavy with the loud pedal, though, and those figures will evaporate quickly, even if you are enjoying the hell out of yourself in a car that as a sort of faux sportster is less of a family car and more of a thrash-it-and-smile device.

But, that’s all very well until you find the performance on offer is not really matched by the handling that’s delivered. It is relatively easy to find the limit of the grip parameters, which is not something you really want to explore in a car this size, because when it does let go, it’s not pretty.

That said, it handles well generally and especially so in 4WD mode, but – really – this thing is so quick it can sucker you into believing it’s better than it is. Caution is advised.

While the outside is stylish and nicely set-off by the 19” alloys and its beautiful blue coat, the inside is a different matter. All the tech is there and very easily utilised at that, but – dear, oh dear – the décor is drab, grey, scratchy and awful. Lean too heavily on the door handles and the panels creak and groan. Not good.

Something of a curiosity then, the PHEV Grandland X Hybrid 4. And not cheap with it. Peugeot may have saved Opel’s bacon and its future under the Stellantis banner might even cure the same bacon.

But it is early days yet and while we’ve had had one benchmark model from the alliance already, two might have been too tall an order in such a short timescale.

It will get better.