My current ride is an 05 TL.
First of all it's inexcusable for the sales person to be so ignorant about this new vehicle. It's a turn off when the customer knows more about the vehicle than the sales person!
Found the interior trim of the car to be good. I'm not sure what others mean when they say there is too much hard material, as the arm rests are soft and most of the car uses Dylark (soft plastic) on most parts. It's not as nice as my TL, as the TLX interior is fairly anemic with most plastic the same colour. All interior functions were easy to get at and worked as expected. I did not like the lack of a door closing handle, when the door is wide open there is nothing to grab onto in order to close the door? So if your 5'8 and have a sore back you'll need to unbuckle, put a foot outside the car to close the door :( Big oversight IMO and expect to see some kind of change for next year.
The ELS stereo sounded excellent, played my Eagles DTS CD and it sounded great. For some reason it wouldn't play two tracks? Disk is fine and works in the TL and home equipment.
Seats don't seem quite as comfortable as the TL, but in all fairness I have a sore lower back right now and the leather is new, so I'll need my wife to validate as she is super sensitive due to several back issues.
Yup there is glare from the side window that looks like it's from the mirror, but it's actually the window. Same thing as my TL but not as noticeable in the TL as the vent is black and doesn't have chrome colour around it.
Love the vented seats with variable air flow!
Rear leg room appears to be the same as the TL, so I don't think the cabin has been shortened, just the exterior. Rear seats where comfortable and I think any passengers will appreciate the electric heat during the winter :)
Trunk space is smallish as with TL, but being able to fold down the rear seats will help a lot.
All in all the interior is very satisfactory!
On to the drive. Was able to take it ( by myself) on a 60km trip out of town on a road I drive on a regular basis. First thought was, this is a quiet ride. A lot of work has been done to reduce noise level in the cabin. However most our highways are sealed with tar and pea gravel on top. So all the noise came in from the tires, however it is much better than my TL. With this type of road surface it's almost impossible to get rid of road/tire noise. Noise was comparable to the A6 and RLX I drove a couple months back.
The auto cruise control doesn't work as well as the RLX or A6. It had a hard time keeping a constant distance from the car in front of me and was even hitting the brakes at times, had it set to follow max. distance. My thought is that it just needs to be tuned properly. Lane control worked ok, but again our highways aren't perfect so when the side line changed from a solid to a dotted line, the features use becomes questionable. But this was the same for the RL and A6.
Blind spot indicators are nice and unobtrusive, and I like the fact you can control the sound on this option.
Did not notice any acceleration hesitation others have talked about? Driving in Econo mode you can tell the car is managing the throttle. But it didn't seem to affect the cars drivability. When I wanted it to get up and go, it did so without hesitation. I know it took some getting used to throttle by wire in my TL so I wonder if that's what some are experiencing?
Tried the different driving modes and found that Econo or normal was just fine for the most part. Although I did not like the steering feel in Econo mode as it felt a bit sloppy to me, especially when cornering. The steering felt better in sport mode.
The suspension isn't as tight as the TL. The road I drove has a large dip on a curve going up hill and the car didn't handle it well at all going120 km/hr. Felt like i was going to loose control, but it settled down right away( no such issue in the TL). On another such bump on a straightaway the car handled it nicely, better than the TL.
Good all round acceleration but it doesn't feel like it because everything is so quiet. Could have got some hefty speeding tickets after passing people as it didn't feel like I was going that fast, honestly officer :)
All in all a nice ride!
I've been considering a new vehicle that cost $20-30k more but if the AWD model has a little better suspension I think I may just use the extra cash for something else :)
First of all it's inexcusable for the sales person to be so ignorant about this new vehicle. It's a turn off when the customer knows more about the vehicle than the sales person!
Found the interior trim of the car to be good. I'm not sure what others mean when they say there is too much hard material, as the arm rests are soft and most of the car uses Dylark (soft plastic) on most parts. It's not as nice as my TL, as the TLX interior is fairly anemic with most plastic the same colour. All interior functions were easy to get at and worked as expected. I did not like the lack of a door closing handle, when the door is wide open there is nothing to grab onto in order to close the door? So if your 5'8 and have a sore back you'll need to unbuckle, put a foot outside the car to close the door :( Big oversight IMO and expect to see some kind of change for next year.
The ELS stereo sounded excellent, played my Eagles DTS CD and it sounded great. For some reason it wouldn't play two tracks? Disk is fine and works in the TL and home equipment.
Seats don't seem quite as comfortable as the TL, but in all fairness I have a sore lower back right now and the leather is new, so I'll need my wife to validate as she is super sensitive due to several back issues.
Yup there is glare from the side window that looks like it's from the mirror, but it's actually the window. Same thing as my TL but not as noticeable in the TL as the vent is black and doesn't have chrome colour around it.
Love the vented seats with variable air flow!
Rear leg room appears to be the same as the TL, so I don't think the cabin has been shortened, just the exterior. Rear seats where comfortable and I think any passengers will appreciate the electric heat during the winter :)
Trunk space is smallish as with TL, but being able to fold down the rear seats will help a lot.
All in all the interior is very satisfactory!
On to the drive. Was able to take it ( by myself) on a 60km trip out of town on a road I drive on a regular basis. First thought was, this is a quiet ride. A lot of work has been done to reduce noise level in the cabin. However most our highways are sealed with tar and pea gravel on top. So all the noise came in from the tires, however it is much better than my TL. With this type of road surface it's almost impossible to get rid of road/tire noise. Noise was comparable to the A6 and RLX I drove a couple months back.
The auto cruise control doesn't work as well as the RLX or A6. It had a hard time keeping a constant distance from the car in front of me and was even hitting the brakes at times, had it set to follow max. distance. My thought is that it just needs to be tuned properly. Lane control worked ok, but again our highways aren't perfect so when the side line changed from a solid to a dotted line, the features use becomes questionable. But this was the same for the RL and A6.
Blind spot indicators are nice and unobtrusive, and I like the fact you can control the sound on this option.
Did not notice any acceleration hesitation others have talked about? Driving in Econo mode you can tell the car is managing the throttle. But it didn't seem to affect the cars drivability. When I wanted it to get up and go, it did so without hesitation. I know it took some getting used to throttle by wire in my TL so I wonder if that's what some are experiencing?
Tried the different driving modes and found that Econo or normal was just fine for the most part. Although I did not like the steering feel in Econo mode as it felt a bit sloppy to me, especially when cornering. The steering felt better in sport mode.
The suspension isn't as tight as the TL. The road I drove has a large dip on a curve going up hill and the car didn't handle it well at all going120 km/hr. Felt like i was going to loose control, but it settled down right away( no such issue in the TL). On another such bump on a straightaway the car handled it nicely, better than the TL.
Good all round acceleration but it doesn't feel like it because everything is so quiet. Could have got some hefty speeding tickets after passing people as it didn't feel like I was going that fast, honestly officer :)
All in all a nice ride!
I've been considering a new vehicle that cost $20-30k more but if the AWD model has a little better suspension I think I may just use the extra cash for something else :)