If you’re thinking of buying the new Peugeot 308, don’t. Not yet, anyway.
The company released UK specs and prices for its latest hatchback yesterday, and for a potential C segment customer, they catalogue an attractive prospect. In entry-level Access trim, with the 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol engine, the car starts at £14,495; that’s cheaper than a starter Volkswagen Golf or Seat Leon, and very close indeed to where the Kia Cee’d and Hyundai i30 begin.
Ford will sell you a Ford Focus cheaper, but only in the kind of poverty spec that would make a Greek car hire firm blanch. The 308 comes with air-con, cruise control, Bluetooth and a DAB tuner - pretty much the first four things that should be at the top of anyone’s kit wish list. Chuck another £2k at the problem and you can have the 1.6-litre HDI, which at 95g/km CO2, will be tax free to boot.
So why wait? Well, for a start, you can’t really have the Access trim. Yes, it sounds good, but it doesn’t come with alloy wheels or rear parking sensors or Peugeot’s new 9.7-inch touchscreen, so at resale time it’s going to be about as attractive as a used Network Rail toilet. Realistically, you need the Active level above it, which gets it all plus an electric handbrake, dual-zone chiller, auto headlights and wipers, and, enticingly, sat-nav.
You could have all that right now of course. Except you definitely shouldn’t. Because you’ve upgraded to the Active trim, a whole new range of engines are now available; including the turbocharged version of the aforementioned three-pot, which instead of cranking out a measly (and insufficient) 82bhp, develops 130bhp while also gently lowering CO2 emissions.
Peugeot’s Benjamin Hindsley, an Englishman tasked with overseeing the 308’s overall attributes, reckons the motor is more than a match for Ford’s award-winning 1.0-litre Ecoboost: an engine which, for now, it will outperform - 172lb ft of torque nixes 125lb ft - and significantly undercut the Ford, since it retails at £17,945 compared to the similarly specced £19,795 Titanium Focus.
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There's light at the end of the tunnel for PSA it seems. Citroen's DS range is healthy, the Cactus concept has been well received and now Peugeot look to have produced a competitive and (shock) desirable family hatch.
So why couldn't they combine the introduction of these high-tech EU6 flash motors with the launch of the new model?? These will undoubtedly be the ones to go for so the early cars with the carry-over engines will be worth peanuts and could harm the newer cars in time.
With the resources of a successful brand the new engines and new model would have synchronised but let's hope PSA can continue the momentum and good will the 308 seems to have generated long enough to see in the new motors.
@jonfortwo Peugeot have
@jonfortwo
Peugeot have always had rather dubious gearboxes! Great diesel engines over the years but always niggly annoying gearboxes.
Infernal cupholders!
It would be great if journalists did not keep cranking on about cupholders. They encourage people to drive with one hand on the wheel whilst drinking from a cup held in the other which is driving without due care and attention. If you need a drink stop!
What a pity the laudable efforts by the French police (and, so it seems, the manufacturers) to discourage this practice are being frustrated by the chuckle headed British.
Quite right!
Coffee in France is drunk in cafés and bars and virtually always as a single shot. Starbucks caters for the tourists who insist on their flavoured milk.
Which is why Peugeot don't see cup holders as important - it just isn't in the culture and long may it continue. Anyway, they are too busy phoning and texting in cars here to drink...
308 very nice in the metal btw, saw one about a month back. Nothing specacular but quietly understated.