Subaru Outback test drive 2006 - 2009 station wagon
Reaper and Shvets
Any attempts to combine the unconnected are usually doomed to failure. Well, for example, can you imagine a car that is simultaneously a freight universal, a limousine, and an all -wheel drive alternate, and even a sports car? But the automakers with fantasy are all right, and sometimes they manage to combine contradictions even very well. One such reaper, Shvets, and on the dud, the player is probably known to you - Subaru Outback. The second - do not believe - one of the new options in the Volkswagen Passat family. The opposition engine used on Outback 3.0R is characterized by balance, compactness and low weight. But perhaps the main feature is the Subaru Intelligent Drive system. According to her command, the motor will work in the mode that the driver will consider the most suitable. Intelligent (defined by default) will provide smooth traction characteristics and decrease in fuel consumption, Sport and Sport Sharp - respectively, faster or very sharp response of the engine to press the accelerator. In fact, Si-Drive controls not only the engine, but also the algorithm for the automatic transmission of Sportshift E-5at.
Family clearance. No car will say more about its owner than outback. People buy such a car in a strictly defined everyday phase - during the family clearance period. The owner of Outback is no longer a young man, but still energetic. Behind the first crises of marital life. Children are attached to good schools and prestigious universities. The height set continues along the career ladder. And even if a loan for a new apartment with underground parking is not yet repaid, but there are already plans to open your own business or desire to build (buy - this is too trivial) a cottage in the place that you can be proud of. The owner of Outback literally burst out ideas for the future, like Outback himself bursts from the possibilities embedded in it. This is the case when a person and a car find each other. 
The image of the owner Volkswagen Passat is more blurry. It may turn out to be both a person who is time to stick a second photo into a passport and a man who has recently become a grandfather (according to family status, and not according to a charged pension). In any case, the station wagon based on Passat is exemplaryly sharpened for all generations of users: it looks representative, rolls comfortable, very roomy. Despite utilitarianism, it is a little more than just a family car. Especially Variant with a 250-horsepower engine and all-wheel drive 4Motion. Only those who are also in the phase of the family clearance will wish to overpay 10-15 thousand for such an apparatus. Those who are not enough for another practical car. Dream Saray. Enough indicative facts - cost and equipment. Our couple here finds a striking resemblance. Both cars in price came close to the psychological barrier of $ 50,000. And there and there the salon - leather, box - machine gun, engines - 245 and 250 forces. And also, if you use the terminology of private ads from hand to hand, full of an electric package. The difference is plus or minus some kind of badges. What one car has in the basic configuration, but the second does not have, can be ordered. However, even with surcharges, price parity will remain.
It is much more interesting to look for differences. Outback combines the functions of a comfortable member, a very capacious universal truck and all-terrain vehicles with a constant all-wheel drive. The clearance of twenty centimeters is serious. The German rival is also an all -wheel drive car. However, due to some nuances of the 4Motion system (torque, on the rear wheels, it falls through the viscous factory only when the front slipping), as well as due to a passenger road clearance of 16 centimeters, it is impossible to call Variant 3.2 an all-terrain vehicle. His trump card is the dynamics of acceleration. The engine with a solid torque and the DSG box with a low gear shift time endow the barn with such speed qualities that not every sports car has.
The brakes of the German car are endowed with the function of automatic drying of the brake discs (after the wipers are turned on, the system works with a frequency of 5 minutes), and the electromechanical steering amplifier is characterized by a progressive characteristic (the force increases with speed growth) and auto -detachment to compensate for the irregularities of the road profile. All Passat Variant, including Trendline equipment, are equipped with LED side and rear turns indicators, as well as repeators in external mirrors. Cars supplied to Russia are equipped with heating windshields, washing nozzles and, of course, heated seats.
Tougher-soft. The Japanese station wagon will seem slow and imposing until you pay attention to a round puck in the central tunnel with Sport and Sport Sharp signatures. You transfer the selector to the first position - the car becomes the way that it should be when there are 245 forces under the hood. Acceleration is effective, the automatic is crossing the transmission with predictable delay. But from switching to the second Outback mode, literally beasts. The reaction of the motor to the adding of gas should be immediately, the box switches exclusively in the high -speed range - where the Subaru opposite has maximum thrust and power. Indeed, in the person of Outback you get three cars in one, as they say in an advertising booklet. The dynamics of Passat Variant 3.2 is straightforward. This car is always ready for hard Sput - only drowning gas to the floor. DSG switches quickly, with light jerks, but the main thing is not hesitating with the transition to the transmission below. Let the acceleration rate at the option is not such as to cause a crunch of cervical vertebrae, but we have no competitors (Audi products from the list of rivals) among the station wagons.
I liked how the suspension works in Outback. It has a long stroke, works rather softly and elastic. Despite the fact that the body of this station wagon is significantly higher over the road than other cars, Outback in steep turns is practically not fired. The secret of high stability and good controllability is apparently explained by a low center of gravity. The massive power elements of the Outback body go down, and the engine, thanks to the opposition structure, barely rises above the wheel axes. It is a pity that Outback has a steering wheel from one extreme position to another more than three turns. A sharper steering wheel suggests itself into a car with such pure controllability.
The suspension in Passat Variant works harder and does not allow the slightest buildup. The car is more acute, although the reactions are slightly lubricated - the rather large weight of the station wagon (200 kg is heavier than the Japanese) affects. However, the level of comfort in the German car is lower. The rest is equal. There is no color in the interior of the Japanese machine. He deliberately sustained in monochrome tones, but it does not look gray and not poor. A qualitatively colored silver central console makes contrast. The black skin of the seats has a smooth dense surface. The Outback salon is very spacious in length, but it is slightly constrained (for its class car) in width and height. There is a huge hatch above your head, but still does not leave the feeling that the roof is ready to lie on the crown. However, there is nothing to worry about very high to drivers of very high stature: the range of adjustment of the seat down and back is such that it will not seem enough. The ergonomics of the driver’s place will appeal to those who are accustomed to proper landing. If you are used to sitting reclining, the river adjustments may seem insufficient. The steering wheel itself at first seems excessively large and sophisticated, since in addition to the buttons of the audio control buttons, the gearboxes are also carried out on it, but the steering wheel is good enough in section and texture. There are also small flaws in the dashboard. At dusk, two -color illumination of the shooter and scales looks spectacular and modern, but in the afternoon, if the backlight is not turned off, the devices of the devices are not read too well.
Specialists who developed the interior for Passat Variant seem to have completely forgotten (or they were ordered to forget) that they make a salon for a practical station wagon. What they did is not ashamed to repeat in some luxurious limousine. Soft plastic black and light panels that simulate the skin on seats, decorative lacquered wood inserts, a classic combination of instruments with chrome cantiks - all this is guaranteed to exceeds the expectations of the buyer Passat. If you did not like any of the eight options for interior decoration, then you just outgrew Passat. In the cabin, only insignificant flaws can be found. For example, small buttons on the dashboard are not perfectly fitted, and some parts are made of oak plastic. But five points for the chairs! They are spacious, comfortable, tailored made of soft leather and have inserts with perforation. The seats adjustments are quite large. With the setting of the steering column, there should also be no problems. If you look after a car with a convenient interior for long -distance travel, then Passat Variant will not leave indifferent. 
Subaru Outback 3.0r Gasoline engine, 6 opposition
Working volume (cubic cub) 3000
Power (L. S. at about/min) 245 at 6600
Moment (nm at rpm) 297 at 4200
The drive is complete
Gearbox 5-speed, automatic
Length/width/height (mm) 4730/1770/1545
Equipped mass (kg) 1575
Maximum speed (km/h) 224
Acceleration to 100 km/h (c) 8.5
Fuel consumption (city/highway, l/100 km) 13.8/7.4
Price in Moscow (price of the tested car) from $ 43,790 ($ 54,000)
Volkswagen Passat Variant V6 4 Motion Gasoline engine, v6
Working volume (cubic cub) 3168
Power (L. S. at about/min) 250 at 6250
Moment (Nm at rpm) 330 at 2750-3750
The drive is complete
Gearbox 6-speed, automatic
Length/width/height (mm) 4774/1820/1517
Mass weight (kg) 1715
Maximum speed (km/h) 243
Acceleration to 100 km/h (c) 7.2
Fuel consumption (city/highway, l/100 km) 14.1/7.7
Price in Moscow (price of the tested car) from $ 50,454 ($ 56 800)
We thank the Subaru representative office in Russia and LLC Volkswagen Group Rus, www.volkswagen.ru.
Text Ruslan Tarasov
Photo Andrey Danilov
A source: "Autopilot"
