A Refreshing Palate Cleanser

With loads of (multi-) million rand machines coming and going over the last few weeks, the Renault Duster has served as a decent palate cleanser between test cars.

While we were busy working on this month’s issue, a few handy machines came and went. The list includes a BMW X4 M40d, BMW X7, Mercedes-AMG G63 and Audi Q8.

These machines have almost nothing in common, other than that we got right back behind the wheel of the Duster almost immediately after interacting with all of them.

Compared to this impressive line-up of vehicles, the Duster is almost depressingly slow. Rather than focusing on the negative, though, we chose to see the positive side of getting back in an affordable SUV.

It fits neatly within the boundaries of what the average South African spends on a new car and it competes in what might just be the hottest segment out there right now.

Over the last few months, we’ve experienced some niggles but the biggest gripe has been the gear ratios and heavy clutch. The clutch doesn’t bother us as much these days, mostly because our left calf muscle has nearly doubled in size. We’re looking forward to an imminent phone call from the Springboks, as we’re now fully qualified to play flyhalf.

The gear ratios remain a source of irritation but we have to take the blame for this one. Any reasonable consumer should know what their car will be doing most of the time and will buy the car that best fits in with that. Our Duster obviously had to be a 4×4, which is available only with a manual gearbox with short ratios. It works a charm when you’re driving in soft sand in Mozambique but it’s less amazing when crawling along at 20km/h on Johannesburg’s Main Road. If you do a lot of city miles, we suggest going the automatic 4×2 route.

The Duster picked up an interesting glitch this month. As mentioned previously, it’s equipped with Apple CarPlay, a source of much joy to us. We never use the standard interface anymore, simply because it’s so much easier and safer to do everything using CarPlay.