PAUGEOT Partner Minivan test drive since 2002 Minivan

See and do not die

During the Paris trip, two cars had to check: Citroen Berlingo and Peugeot Partner. The same, like brothers Klitschko, they differ only in details, in particular motors. Diesel Citro or gasoline pezh? Vitaly or Vladimir?


I go to a sleepy car. I open the door with a somnambulic gesture, throw Cofr back. Tru eyes. I mechanically hold out my hand with the key, conquer, turn on the program, turn signal, start moving. Shaking. This tire protector beats on a paving stones, tens of times a second, shaking the hub, springs, a shock absorber, rack support, a spar, a seat frame and, finally, all my vertebrae. And now, through the remnants of sleep, the brain is visited by a beautiful thought. Now six in the morning. I am going through the deserted Champs Elysees. This is Paris.
 



On the topic
This city gives abundant food for thought and memories. Only on Brighton and in Haifa, probably, more Russians live. Of those abroad, of course. Here on the plane you fly with rich offspring and serious deds, hence with our celebrities and bayers stuffed with boutiques for boutiques. But Paris does not spoil Russian speech. He simply does not notice her. Arabs here are still more. And more than the Arabs are only architectural monuments. After Paris, Barcelona resembles the overgrown Sochi, and gives his beloved Petersburg epigonism. The ensemble of the monuments forms a stable coordinate system, having studied which, on the third day, you go to the city without a map. You are guided by the Eiffel Tower, simultaneously squinting at the skyscrapers of Montparnasas. In other words, there are all conditions for the life of a motorist and just a person: there are no giant traffic jams, although there is only one ring of the district road. Here no one takes the lane released for buses and taxi, although the streets are quite cramped. And finally, here no one wants to have a special clock or a flashing light why be like a car with nips or a fire crew? Freedom of travel, equality, brotherhood.
 



French mechanization
During the Paris trip, two cars had to check: Citroen Berlingo and Peugeot Partner. The same, like brothers Klitschko, they differ only in details, in particular motors. Diesel Citro or gasoline pezh? Vitaly or Vladimir? The two -liter Berlingo Multispace Modutop surprised from the very beginning. He started him in an underground parking, and everything around was stuck. The dynamics and the nature of the hesitation did not allow to doubt the trick of a defective copy. But what, we Russians have never drove on defective machines? I waited a little. The frozen HDI warmed up a little and stopped trembling so much. I mentally promised him a one hundred grams of the best Parisian solarium and left the dungeon. The sky over Berlingo was extremely clear. Before us lay a whole capital.
 



Find out a stranger with the help of a car of a special kind. This is also called work, and in these words there is some truth, along with the study of the confusing scheme of streets and alleys, you have to twist the steering wheel and nimble a poker. Less attention is paid to prohibiting signs than interesting angles, and periodic attempts to uncover their camera usually end with traffic jams for a half -quarter. Since we are abroad, creative itching never interrupts erratic beeps and juicy abuse. Locals see: a person behind creative work and draw the right conclusions. Silent and waiting. The passage is vacant drive by and smiles. Homeland, when will you become like that? As in any European city, it is important to switch to the right program in time. Around less crazy, and no longer need to behave like them, defending your square meters. No one is pestering with unique traffic lights. No one will climb the glass with a dirty waffle towel behind the Eurogroshi. Everything is quiet. No one is late. After ten years of driving in the Union, you feel like in a nationwide shirt. After a couple of days, the crisis of reincarnation usually occurs, the shackles fell, and pulls to shine in the stream, overtake and catch up with, as used to it. Until the reproaching the gaze of some former compatriot will shame. And then everything falls into place. The correct program is turned on.
 
Change of concepts and it is still important not to display with the car. To make it clear to everyone that you are a visitor to the outskirts of Europe, just get a red compartment. In the skin of Berlingo you feel invisible: no one pays attention to you, you are your own among yours. But if in Russia, when words, the heel driver clearly stands before his eyes: the semantic series clearly stands: fruits-vegetables, a bag on the belt, bubbling training and eternal thirst for profit, then in Europe the concepts must be changed.
 

Family, two offspring, a dog or explanations like: Father, you hear, chop, and I take a more suitable occasion to buy a similar car for myself. And if you move away from conventions, it is worth recognizing that this machine has an impressive sum of positive qualities, inaccessible to cars of different classes. Excessive visibility of times, three cubic meters of useful volume two, sliding doors on two sides of three, 5.0 liters of diesel fuel costs outside the city, 7.3 in the city four, tuned for active riding with indestructible torsiones five. The sixth number is a unique French ability to translate the utilitarian into the exceptional. On the high -speed winding road of Berling, any competitor is pulled due to honed manageability. Modification of multi -spokes will win due to the abundance of additional containers in the most original and comfortable places. The Modutop version will amaze the imagination that through transparent compartments in the roof you can see the planes setting for Ruissi. Of course, you can’t compare diesel Berlingo with an airplane in the dynamics of acceleration, and in order to squeeze a decent acceleration from the engine, it has to be actively promoted from a maximum of ninety forces only at 4,000 revolutions. But the machine does not deceive expectations, and the most important aggressive driving style is little reflected in the fuel consumption.
 

And the modern, but not too attractive appearance of the car allows it to fit into the landscape of any area with the same success. I dragged Berlingo on the outskirts and to the center, forced me to pose against the background of skyscrapers of defense and old Saint-Denis stores. He is organic both there and there. The invisibility of the car made it possible to put it in the most forbidden places, organizing the tech and risking fines. I was insolent completely and once, having left to lunch, threw it unlocked under the prohibiting sign. Returning, he saw a police officer nearby. Fortunately, he came to the soul of some Arab. There are still more of them here than Russians.

About DT and AI transplanted from a diesel to gasoline for some time reminds a person in zero-gravity like the effort is the same, but everything turns out twice as easier. And although I savored this thought before sitting in Peugeot Partner, he still deceived me. White scales of devices, a comfortable kolobashka on the backstage, support on seats on a young man, this combination usually makes an unambiguous impression. So I pressed the gas. A brisk partner, although less than 1.6 liters, but for exactly twenty more. Hence the pretense of aggressiveness, because behind the trunk of this vacuum cleaner you already plan your city slalom in a different way. It is symptomatic that it was Pejo who was the first to provoke the rudeness of the French taxi driver and answered her no less sharply. Berlingo, following the biblical tradition, would have substituted a second cheek.


You also plan a budget in another way: almost ten liters of high-octane gasoline per hundred in the city cycle are much more quickly devastated by the owner’s wallet. Without modest frills, the partner is more simple and utilitarian, you begin to notice small advantages in its design, such as fasteners in the luggage compartment, huge mirrors, an internal strap for closing a massive fifth door, and convenient adjustment of the steering column. Otherwise, everything is murderous in the same way. It’s good, convenient, but still boring the production of two cars under different names should have left the French to the Americans whom they do not like so, but the foot crowds of which roam Paris in search of simple entertainment. But the tourist, ostentatious city from the car is seen in a completely different way. You are outside the industry, they don’t make money for you. You have time more and sometimes sit in places available only to the old -timers. It is worth envious only to motorcyclists they have no problem with parking. But Paris in motion is more attractive than static. Just like any beautiful car.
 

After even the days after your airbus runs on a take-off and takes a course to Moscow, it still seems that you remember every Shcherbina on a paving stones, every pigeon darted from under the wheels, every couple in love on these eternal bridges. Because this is Paris. Having visited it for the first time, it is impossible to forget him. But a month passes and the images are erased, only the names remain: Poissi Ruassi, Pont Oil, Sakre-Ker passes for six months and the memory helpfully brings only pictures from the Through the Through the Waterpiece Eiffel, the Louvre Picture, the Gramadin of the Triumphal Arch. You have already forgotten everything. Crap.
 


We thank for help in organizing the test Russian representative offices of Peugeot and Citroen
 

Text: Alexander Yevtokin
Photo: author
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Source: Wheel magazine [No. 81/2004]