PEUGEOT 406 1999 test drive - 2004 sedan

French lessons

I always treated France and everything French with prejudice. And there were grounds for that. Firstly: the school was French, and by the tenth grade I had to know more about Lenin in Paris than about Pushkin in St. Petersburg, and more about the resistance movement than about the car. It got it. Secondly: sometimes they sent real French women to school as part of a cultural exchange for teaching the language of real French. When looking at them, the confidence that all French is the same charming and elegant whether it be the supersonic line Concord or the Citroen car. Well, thirdly. About ten years ago, or even more, they found Cape with a friend an abandoned body from Citroen and decided to see how a foreign country was arranged.


They removed the door, dismantled the lock and did not believe the eyes of nine details of the castle five were plastic.


Then they checked the castle at the school GAZ-52 turned out to be all-metal and we decided that everything French was not for us. To top it off to the listed, in the army, the political officer Comrade Rybalkin added that their tanks are not at all tanks, but matchboxes.


Over time, my knowledge of the Paris commune began to give in to the knowledge of the car. But prejudice to the French cars remained. Even the numerous victories of the Renault F1 engines and the all-wheel drive monsters of Peugeot and Citroen in rally-raids could not rehabilitate them in my eyes. For the time being.


The time came as unexpectedly as winter comes in Moscow. Peugeot invited the next modifications of the 406th model and the Partner van at Test-Drive. Desperate guys, I thought, believe that the entire skepticism will disappear in a couple of days.


The day before the departure on the lips, the song of Vysotsky Moscow-Odessa was spinning: but I need to where they don’t accept for three days, and therefore they put off the flight ... And indeed, Paris did not accept. The ground -based airport services were howled. I had to fly to where they take it. He flew to Brussels, from there 4 hours by bus to the Champs Elysees. Night Paris is lively, friendly and safe. From the hotel a stone's throw to the Eiffel Tower. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be as all -metal as a school truck, and therefore, measured part of the skepticism to everything French.


The next morning it was necessary to take a tour to the city of a tour. This is 300 km from the hotel. On the outskirts of the local airfield (the fourth airport in two days), journalists were expected by a whole deck of the new PEUGEOT of 1997 of the model year 406 with the V6 engine and universals 406 Break. My colleague and I chose a map with keys from a 6-cylinder machine, reasonably deciding that all the sweetest should be eaten at once, and the diesel station wagon should be left for dessert. The Test-Drive scheme on the first day was a simple 150 km along the autobahns, the streets of towns and villages and the serpentines connecting them. Then the change of horses, or rather, Lviv, and another 120 km on a diesel engine with a full range of roads of different categories. The map of France, the detailed legend of the route, accompanying papers and complete autonomy. For everything about everything was allotted for three and a half hours, which spurred to go quickly, not to turn around and not be distracted by trifles.


We start the motor. Before this, you need to dial the code on the instrument panel of the hinged remote control. All journalistic cars were encoded in the same way 1997 This is a model year. The motor immediately gave out a powerful bass sound. We looked at each other and realized that the walk for appetite is canceled and the car is not comic to work seriously. Acceleration from the place makes you strongly get behind the wheel and very quickly sort out the lever of the box. The first and second gears are so short that the motor instantly rests against the speed limit, and in order not to lose the dynamics, it is better not to put it on with switching. This is the only way to achieve sprint acceleration by a passport of 8.2 s to 100 km/h. Having scattered at our pleasure, we went calmly, without twisted.


The accelerated dynamics on the 3rd, 4th, and even the 5th programs were on top. If you want to overtake, don't want to overtake. The fifth allows you to drag yourself in the right row and slowly (40 kilometers per hour), and sharply shoot without lowering the gear. The machine is obedient to the steering wheel and has a good reaction to pressing the gas pedal.


A three-liter 24-valve engine created by Peugeot and Citroen (as part of PSA) in cooperation with Renault. A similar engine is already installed on Renault Laguna (motor 3).


Peugeot experts pay tribute to the merits of a competing company and not without pride declare that formula technologies and know-how of Renault Sport motor builders were used in the work on the V6. Considering that in a year, Renault will leave Formula-1, the cooperation of French companies will bring much benefit to the stables using Peugeot V10 engines. For the 1997 season, this is Jordan. In the future, the national tandem Ligier-Peugeot is not excluded. Wait and see.


We fly along the autobahn. Speed \u200b\u200blimit 130 km/h. On the speedometer almost a hundred more. Only a power supply in the motor and no external stimuli is felt. The Porsche 928 is shown ahead. The driver, before that, is confident that he was traveling on the king of the auto track, saw only bright lights of the car that caught up in the mirror, turned on the turn signal and supplied to the right. Peugeot swept past him. Peugeot (!) Overtook (!) Porsche (!).


Where is it visible? After a few seconds, his supercar caught up with us. The piston studied our outwardly ordinary machine until he noticed the V6 shiddik on the front wing. On this he calmed down, showed his thumb and retreated.


From the autobahn, they turned onto the road of local significance with cascades of turns. This is where the real test began.


As you know, the 406th has a unique elastokinematic rear suspension, which provides the stabbing of the rear wheels depending on the corner of the body roll in the bend. In high -speed modes, this significantly improves the controllability of the car and its active safety. The speed at which the rear axle is skidded on the Peugeot 406 is much higher than that of other cars of this class. And it is unlikely that the average driver is capable of (primarily morally) to turn into a turn at a speed that clearly exceeds the safety threshold. Therefore, the 406th, in the case of a mentally healthy driver, almost excludes the loss of grip of wheels with the road.


I pay tribute to the perseverance of my partner in the test. For some reason, he certainly wanted to tear the car from the trajectory at all costs, at least one of the axes. At first it looked like a sport very vividly and spectacular. He sharply turns it in no one breaks down. The wheels seemed to be glued. Then it began to resemble a mockery of a passenger who hung on belts and hangs from side to side. And if a random fellow traveler was sitting in my place, he would have given him ... in a good Russian. And so I had to silently wait for the driver to finish the experiment. During this occupation, we were found by the Belarusian crew at a diesel universal, which closed the Pelets stretched for tens of kilometers. Going on such a car in the tail for a diesel engine is not worthless and we switched to a straightforward movement and added gas. A pity, what a skid could turn out! The behavior of elastokinematic suspension in an extreme case is more difficult to predict than ordinary. The taming of Peugeot 406 is not an easy task: another unknown elastokinematics of the suspension are added. But again, you need to very, very hard to get into such a situation.


One of the turns we slipped and wound the extra 3 km, which we then had to be subtracted from the actual mileage so as not to miss once again. However, we soon noticed that the difference in the readings of the electronic odometer on the Peugeot and the numbers according to legend is constantly decreasing, that is, we do not understand what, but we play (!) The paper card is the distance that weaned between three houses in some village. There are many theories about the holes in space, but not one of them explained to us on the day where the mistake is in legend or in the odometer. Everything turned out to be much easier and more banal in a typical Russian habit of passing left turns along the shortest path, that is, straight along the oncoming lane, each time we reduced the path by 10, and in some places and all 20 meters. A dozen turns and play a hundred or two meters. Some sections of the route consisted only of turns.


Naturally, people who made up the legend could not take this into account, because they laid the route taking into account only their strip. And we were mistaken with a turn, already having a decent savings on the odometer. Therefore, electronics have nothing to do with it. To the assembly point in the town of La Roche Possay entered zero to zero with a legend.


Now it was necessary to transfer to the diesel Peugeot 406 Break and go to it to the Fontevraud Abbey, which in the vicinity of Saumur south of Normandy. The first La Roche Possay, who entered the Central Square, immediately attracted attention. Even the most avid players in Buli (national game, about it a little later) found a couple of minutes to consider the cars closer.


There was something to see. Outwardly, the station wagon does not give the impression of a purely car-passenger car, as was the case with Peugeot 405 Break. On the contrary, the new station wagon is not inferior in civilian to the sedan. A very proportional and tightly knocked car. We got a green Break, almost British Racing Green.


The first comparison related to mind concerned the aristocratic Aston Martin with the Shooting Brake body - it looks so powerful and expensive. The rear overhang compared to the base model is increased by 170 mm. This allows you to place an additional series of seats directed against the move over the rear axle.


You will get a 7-seater car. The basic is a 5-seater option. The spacious and light interior is not inferior to modifications V6 leather, inserts under the tree on the instrument panel. It is equally convenient to go to the theater on such a machine (there will be no complexes for the appearance), and to the household (the luggage compartment volume from 526 to 1741 liters), not to mention distant wanderings. So the name universal justifies itself. The universal showed himself 2.1 l diesel. We have no doubt that he is burdened. But the fact that diesel Peugeot can accelerate to hundreds in 12.6 seconds became a revelation. The machine is dynamic and speedy.


So, the game in the Buli. No matter how much he was trying to delve into her essence nothing came of. I only know that on weekends a good half of the French picks up steel balls and scatters them along gravel paths. Something between golf, towns and billiards. During the game, you can discuss all the news, including the novelties from Peugeot. And in sports stores it is easier to find a set of heavy steel balls than packaging tennis balls.


If the sedan could attract the attention of others, then only with a widen v6. For the year 406th, the model has already managed to become silent on the roads. But 406 Break was perceived differently. It will appear on sale only next year. The provincials, who ignored the Parisian car dealership, saw him only in magazines and on television. Therefore, behind a living station wagon on the road, a line was constantly lined up. They caught up with us, looked closely at the back (the car did not change in front), tried to overtake (did not work), unfolded and then drove about their business.


But here is the finish board of the test drive on the first day of the gate of the abbey Royale de Fontevraud. Residents of the district call this area south of the north, implying the neighborhood with Normandy. The monastery appeared here at the beginning of the 13th century. In the XVIVIVXVIII centuries, he was rebuilt three times and completed until he turned into one of the largest in the old world. In 1804, Napoleon decided to use the high walls of the monastery differently - Fontevraud became a prison, also one of the largest in Europe. The last prisoner came out of here only in 1963.


Since 1975, the abbey has been a national cultural reserve.


We had dinner in the monastic refectory. A small post -Soviet space formed at the round table.


How Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian are sitting in a joke ... A couple of Frenchmen joined us. He is in the past Press Attash Peugeot, she is just his wife. Both are retired. The company at its own expense arranged a weekend in abbey. Moreover, people of their generations have something to talk about with journalists, and not only about Peugeot cars. The former press attache told in sufficient detail about local wines, about all kinds of cheese varieties, about how, working in Peugeot, he shook around the entire perimeter of the borders of the USSR. But to visit the country did not happen.


What he regrets and wants to go at least to St. Petersburg. Naturally, it is not indifferent to cars and can talk for hours about the machines of his youth. The most mystical French car is considered by Citroen Traction Avant a universal police and smugglers. With the word Citroen, his wife revived and put forward the counter -ds ds and only DS! 40 years ago it was a dream of any Frenchwoman. As for cars with a lion, they have always been considered primarily family machines for wealthy people. In general, no mysticism. It should be noted that under the flag of Peugeot it was possible to loudly extol Citroen without hesitation for the third ten years, the French, speaking Citroen, imply Peugeot and vice versa.


These firms merged into the company PSA.


They brought wine from local cellars. Wonderful white wine, famous for the whole of France. Called Coteaux du Layon. Our interlocutor advised to call in the morning to the winemaker himself, whose shop is located near the abbey. I recommend. FF25.80 for 3/4 liters, but only in Somyur.


In the morning, several orange juice boxes brought breakfast to the former convent on the diesel Peugeot Boxer. Going into the courtyard, I found that the partner had a trace. He took a glass of juice and keys to the last 406 BVA remaining in the yard, scored code 1997, went. This morning, the machine was in handy. This time the route ran along the picturesque suburbs of Saurus. The absence of a navigator in the car did not worry. The map showed that the route was looped and you need to try very hard to get lost - the main thing is to go from the farm to the farm.


Sometimes it seemed that the car had a clear excess of comfort. Leather, air conditioning and all bells and gatiles. I wanted to turn off everything and open the windows so that the salon was blown with fresh air, the ended aroma of wormwood, the tart smell of vineyards and flood meadows. The end of October, and the golden autumn is just beginning.


Having had breakfast only a glass of juice, I drove 51 km largely thanks to the machine gun. By the way, in the Peugeot 406 BVA, the box has an electronic control system that adapts the transmission to the driver style. So I recommend it.


After a real breakfast, an acquaintance with the next novelty of Peugeot Partner took place. A utilitarian thing.


Partner is already produced at the PSA plant in Spain in parallel with Citroen Berlingo. The bicobobrum body has two modifications of Break (5-seater station wagon) and COMBI (van). The latter was provided for the test. The carrying capacity of the van is 475 (with a 1.1 l engine) or 800 kg (with a 1.9 l diesel). In any case, 3 cubic meters of useful volume are at your service. Typically, wagons are designed from sedans or station wagons and, as a rule, lastly so cheaper. But such vans are not entirely practical in operation. It turns out that they simply put on a superstructure on a passenger car. Partner and Berlingo, on the contrary, should be considered as independent structures, although all the mechanics are taken from the models of Peugeot 306, 106 and Citroen ZX. The body layout is designed specifically for utilitarian purposes, and not borrowed with alterations of cars. As a result, the machine has a whole and finished image. The high, almost vertical landing of the driver and passenger allows you to release additional space in the cargo compartment.


This does not mean at all that the comfort in Peugeot Partner was sacrificed. A high ceiling, excellent visibility, anatomical seats, a steering column adjustable in height and air conditioning allow the driver to feel like in a solid passenger car, even if 800 kg of cargo behind him. Partner is equipped with two airbags, adjustable belt mounts and a protection system for a lateral blow. The passenger chair can be folded by releasing a place for a long (2.1 m) cargo. Behind the back of the left chair, a Swedish wall is installed that protects the driver from the movements of the cargo. However, this is just in case, the load of almost any configuration can be fixed with special belts.


A van with a diesel engine 1.9 liters (71 l.) Is equipped with a 5-speed manual. In general, the car is like a car. A soft suspension, a painful diesel, along with a successful selection of gear rates of the box, do not disappoint the driver who even crossed from the super -compass Peugeot 406 BVA. About the gear lever from time to time, you can forget. The elastic motor, without straining on the coolest climbs and in narrow turns of the town, pulled an empty van on the third.


Having left for the Loire River embankment, I decided to check the car for the dynamics. Naturally, this is not a V6, and if you end up at least one Porsche, for some time you could sit on his back bumper, but nothing more. As they say, van van. Partner easily dealt with small efforts, pre -scaring them with rumble of a diesel engine at high speeds. It was as pleasant to drive them as solid machines. Very informative pedals, effective brakes. The steering wheel is relatively sharp, requiring mean movements.


I already know the one who is the first to buy Peugeot Partner in Somure. This is an ice cream, whom my partner and I furnished on the embankment. At the first traffic light, he drove up and stood nearby. After a minute acquaintance, he finally became convinced that his de Shvo was outdated over the past 20 years.


On the return road from the abbey to the tour was allocated an hour and a half. At the same time, the right to choose the most liked modification of Peugeot 406 was granted. I preferred V6. He stomped on the gases and rushed to the destination.


That, in fact, is all.
 
Ivan V. Paderin
 

Source: Motor magazine [No. 12/96]

Video test drives Peugeot 406 1999 - 2004

PEUGEOT 406 1999 test drives - 2004

PEUGEOT 406 1999 - 2004 Krash Test

Krassh Test: Detailed Information
18%
Driver and passengers
14%
Pedestrians
406 1999 - 2004
Engine
Transmission
Control system and suspension
Brake system
Air heating and air conditioning
Launch and charging system
Electric components and so on
Corrosion body stability