Peugeot 508 2015 Review - International

There is one thing the French tend to do really well and that is style. You see it in things like their fashion, architecture and cars. So you have to wonder what on earth Peugeot was thinking when it designed the 508. The 2011 original lacked the design clarity of the current 208 and the about-to-be released 308.

So now Peugeot has given its premium model the 508 a mid-life makeover, with the new car due in Australia by March next year. The actual spec and pricing has not been officially locked-down but a three-tier model line-up and auto-only transmission scenario is likely.

The 508 platform, including steering and suspension, roll on as before but the nose and tail are new (the wagon's rear does not change), while the dashboard includes a seven-inch touch-screen and more refined engines and automatic transmissions.

The front-end Peugeot lion has leaped off the bonnet to the grille, the bonnet sits more horizontal and lighting on top models (the GT and Allure) is LED. The Active spec has LED running lights and fog lights with old-school halogens for main lights.

At the rear, the sedan has lost the chrome strip across the boot lid and ues revised tail-lights with 36 LEDs in three vertical strips. The rear bumper is also new.

The new hardware bumps up overall length 38mm — 16mm at the front for both models and the 22mm at the rear for the sedan only.

Three new engines (1.6-ltre petrol and two 2.0-litre diesels) meet Euro 6 emission requirements, and the Aisin-Warner six-speed automatic has been heavily revised.

The new 1.6-litre THP 165 Stop and Start petrol engine replaces the Euro 5-compliant 1.6 THP 156 and has an intercooled turbocharger (with a twin-scroll turbo), using stochiometric direct-injection (with 200-bar injection pressure) and has continuously variable inlet valve timing.

Power is up 5kW but torque is as before, and CO2 emissions are down from 144 to 135g/km with the six-speed auto we will have exclusively in Australia.

Of the two new Euro 6 diesels — a 2.0-litre BlueHDi 150 110kW six-speed manual and a 2.0-litre BlueHDi 180 132kW (six-speed manual or six-speed auto) — we will most likely to get only the BlueHDi 180 linked to the six-speed auto. The 2.2-litre six-speed automatic is likely to continue in the GT spec.

The BlueHDi 180 is a significant re-work of the existing 2.0-litre HDi, while the 2.2-litre remains a Euro 5 engine.

Peugeot said a key part of the engines' lower fuel and emissions output is the idle-stop system. While this concept is by no means new, Peugeot's doesn't have a disable switch, so if the engine has automatically stopped but you want it running, you have to re-start it yourself.

New safety features on the 508 facelift includes a reversing camera and blind-spot monitoring.

The centre stack has been revised with a new seven-inch screen with shortcuts for navigation, climate-control, audio and telecommunications functions. A new storage cubby sits in the centre console.

The interior refresh works well, with soft-touch upper interior plastics. The seats are comfortable, there's plenty of room and the instruments and dials are easy to find and see (except for the HUD adjustment, hidden in a compartment down near the steering column). The lack of enough storage is the only other complaint inside.

Ride and handling is, as you'd expect, unchanged from the previous 508. This means that you are served up steering that is direct enough but not exactly the sharpest for feel and with a safe push-wide handling bias. Ride was compliant on the generally smooth roads of Mallorca.

The 1.6 turbo petrol performs well and sounds good doing it. It has a slight hesitation off-idle but otherwise slides smoothly into its easily accessed torque curve (torque peaks at 1400rpm) and spins out to 6500rpm smoothly and quickly.

The six-speed auto shifts smoothly but its electronic supervision doesn't take much to be tripped up. Give the car a bootfull and then back off and the transmission holds onto the gear you reached when you had the accelerator planted.

It will eventually cotton-on to the fact you no longer want maximum power and upshift, or you can flick the upshift paddle yourself. Other transmissions do this cog-swapping stuff better.

We didn't have the opportunity to drive the new 2.0 BlueHDi 180, but we did drive 200km on the Mallorcan roads in a 2.0 BlueHDi 150 six-speed manual. This turned out to be a sweet package, with a responsive and smooth engine and slick transmission (although the manual won't be coming to Australia).

The refreshed 508 line-up can't come soon enough for Peugeot, with sales year-to-date down 48.5 per cent. According to VFACTS, sales of just 247 to the end of August this year were down from 480 for the same period last year.

The latest 508 is not going to push the premium Peugeot model to the top of the sales charts, but it gives the model better looks and improved technology. And if the price and spec mix is right, it will be a better mid-size alternative than the current 508.