DODGE CALIBER 2.0 SXT
IMPRESSIONS
If you want to stand out from the crowd and also own a practical and value for money car you will not have to look much further than the Dodge Caliber.
The Caliber is a medium sized car, it is called the C segment, around the size of a Mondeo but slightly smaller, but we hasten to add much more distinctive, “our” car was a very attractive shade of red called “Inferno Red” we had a number of compliments during our time with the Dodge regarding the colour.
As we said the Caliber stands out from the crowd and gives its owner an entry level model that has the flexibility to do more in terms of seating friends and storing gear than most.
The manufacturers say that this car is targeted at the 35 year old male. We liked it although we are a little older than the target age.
The Dodge seems to have been brought out at the right time as more and more vehicle buyers are switching to smaller cars that have the interior space, functionality, and flexibility of sport-utility vehicles, and what’s more important , at a value for money price.
Caliber offers all of these things plus its distinctive styling.
This range is built in America, and we all know that cars that originate from over “there” usually have all the bells and whistles that you could ever need, the Caliber is no exception to this.
The entry level “S” has just about all you will want including air conditioning on the diesel model, fabric covered seats are standard on the “S” and “SX” leather features on the “SXT” and on the top of the pile “SXT” Sport the seats go back to fabric seats but colour coded, these we felt looked rather nice.
The Caliber range has both petrol and diesel engine options, the petrol comes in 1.8 and 2.0 litre versions and the diesel is a 2.0 litre version. We only tried the diesel version but judging by the petrol engine’s pedigree it should certainly be a cracker.
The diesel is a state of the art, direct injection turbo diesel with high pressure fuel injection, dual balance shafts, and a variable geometry turbocharger plus four valves per cylinder. The injectors are electronically controlled, thus leading to high power and torque together with fuel efficiency. Max power is 138bhp at 4000rpm and torque is 229ft lbs at 1750rpm.
Mated to this engine is a six speed manual gearbox which appears to work well and pretty smoothly, as the car had only covered 3500 miles we put a slight stiffness down to its newness.
To make sure that in the event of an accident the occupants are protected as much as possible the Caliber has more than 20 advanced safety technologies which include side curtain air bags, standard driver and passenger air bags, an Electronic Stability Programme and a tyre pressure monitoring system.
The ESP system includes traction control and brake assist.
We were able to drive both the “SXT” and the “SXT” Sport models for about 500 miles between them and had no aches or pains in either.
All switches fall fairly readily to hand, the radio is very good, at least to our ears, and the air conditioning kept the windows mist free. The engine although not the quietest unit in the market place produces plenty of power, we would say that the acceleration feels quite potent.
The finish seemed good and the whole represented good value for money.
Techy Bit
Model: Dodge Caliber 2.0 SXT Sport
Price: £15,430 (starts at £11,495)
Fuel consumption: around 40mpg
Acceleration: 0-62 in 9.3secs
Kerbweight: 1560kg
Max noseweight: 80kg
Max trailer weight: (unbraked) 450kg
Max trailer weight: (braked) 1120kg
Adrain French
Print
Don't forget to mention that you found this information through the World of Motorhomes Website.