Your questions answered: Is the new Ford Ranger really worth it?

It’s back to basics this week, with one reader tossing up between the nation’s two top-selling vehicles – the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux.

Another wants to know which new cars have in-built capability to warn of speed and red light camera locations.

Plus, we’ve got readers wanting to stand out and have some fun on the roads – one with a Tesla Cybertruck, the other using a lot more fuel in a Chevrolet Corvette.

And we touch on vehicle aerodynamics and cheap hatchbacks.

All of which reinforces the breadth of tech, design and engineering in the automotive world.

Question:

Answer: Don’t resist, just go with the flow… The new Ford Ranger is a decent step up and is certainly a more convincing ute than the HiLux. Better tech, better drivetrains, better comfort and better driving manners. About the only area it doesn’t beat the HiLux on is long-term reliability, something we still need to assess.

You’ll also be a couple of years early for the all-new HiLux, which will be offered with electrification. So, yes, switch from the T brand to the Blue Oval. You won’t be disappointed.

Question: I’m looking for my first car and was more than happy to get a cheap hatchback. But I can’t find anything!! Everything seems to be bigger and more expensive than what I was expecting. Will there be more coming? – Grace W

Answer: Cheap hatchbacks have mostly disappeared as car-makers have added more safety gear and stepped them upmarket. The MG3 is missing safety gear, which leaves the Kia Picanto or Rio as the picks at the budget end of the market.

Check out carsales’ Best First Car 2022 mega-test, which covered a range of light and small hatches priced below $30,000, and saw the Mazda3 come up trumps.

Otherwise consider second-hand. The Mazda2 and Mazda3 are both reliable picks, or you could go for a Hyundai i30 – recently named carsales’ Best Used Small Car for 2023.

Question:

Answer: The latest Chevrolet Corvette certainly looks the business, making it something of a supercar bargain, on paper at least. But there’s something of a Corvette drought because General Motors can’t keep up with its popularity.

If it’s any consolation, we get the same treatment here at carsales. Very few of us have experienced the C8, although senior journalist Bruce Newton scored a first local drive last year.

Will it change? We can’t see a whole lot happening in the next couple of years, unless some of those with orders decide to cancel.

You could look at the second-hand supercar market, maybe a Porsche 911? Or you could go electric and consider the Porsche Taycan or Audi e-tron GT.

Question: Is the Tesla Cybertruck ever going to happen? It seems we’ve been hearing lots about it but there hasn’t been a whole lot of action. I’m not entirely sold in the look of it but I love the idea of an electric ute. – Javier P

Answer: There certainly has been a lot more chat than action with the Tesla Cybertruck, much of it related to the crazy wedge-like design. Tesla put a bit more meat on the bone at its recent investor day, although there are still more questions than answers.

The company says the ute will go into production in Texas late this year and that it will be the first Tesla to use a 48-volt electrical system for vehicle ancillaries.

The big question is whether it will come to Australia.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has previously said it would not be designed to meet European regulations (which align closely with Australian Design Rules) but that there may be a smaller ute somewhere in Tesla’s future.

But the close-to-production Cybertrucks shown recently were also slightly smaller than the original concept, raising the question of whether this is the smaller one.

As we said, more questions than answers…

Question: We recently bought a Mazda CX-9 and are loving the car. But it’s using more fuel than we expected. Is there something wrong? How can we get it using closer to what was written in the brochure? – Jenny C

Answer: Claimed average combined fuel use for the Mazda CX-9 all-wheel drive – which uses a 2.5-litre four-cylinder turbo-petrol engine – is 8.4 litres per 100km, but you’ll have to work hard to get close to that. That’s because those fuel figures are derived in a laboratory to a government test that isn’t representative of real-world driving for most people.

That’s especially true if most of your driving is around town, where you’re using the brakes more (and putting heat, or energy, into the braking system) and accelerating regularly from a standstill.

The ‘urban’ fuel figure for the CX-9 is 11.0L/100km and we’d reckon that is closer to most people’s average usage, although even then you can go higher.

Either way, we usually recommend adding 20-40 per cent to the ‘combined’ average fuel use figure (the one printed on the sticker on the windscreen of a new car) to get something more realistic.

Question: I have a few cars of different makes. Love the GPS of my two Mazdas, CX-8 and CX-30. Both have warning for speed and red light cameras. I have not encountered GPS of other car-makers that do that. Do you know which GPS from the different manufacturers has this feature? – Howard L

Answer: Plenty of cars will give you warnings about upcoming speed and red light cameras as well as school zones and other things to be aware of. Some are subtle and handy in their warnings, others can be annoying in their intensity.

Hyundai, Kia, Toyota, Lexus, Peugeot and Citroen are some of the cars that allow these features.

Don’t forget the third-party apps, too. Waze will not only alert you about the fixed speed cameras but also where mobile patrols are; the data comes from other motorists driving by.

Question: Our kids are now old enough to enjoy the outdoors so we’re thinking of taking off around the country for a few months before they start school. We’ve never done a trip like that and don’t know what to look for in a car. Help! – Ryan R

Answer: There’s a big difference between the soft-roader SUVs that dominate Australian roads and four-wheel drives designed to go off-road. It’s the latter you want, especially if you’re planning on heading beyond the bitumen.

Look for a dual-range four-wheel drive system, which is a good indicator the car is designed to tackle the rough stuff. Also look for at least one locking differential (some have three).

Your shortlist could include the new Ford Everest, Toyota Prado, Isuzu MU-X and Land Rover Defender as a start. Any dual-cab 4x4 ute will also handle the worst Australia can throw at it.

Consider some extras, too. We’d be starting with all-terrain tyres that are typically hardier than the road-focused rubber on most 4WDs.

Question: I look at the proliferation of boxy SUVs and wonder whether we’re heading backwards on aerodynamics. They seem far bigger and more upright than the sedans and coupes we used to drive a lot more of. So, are SUVs a backwards step on aerodynamic efficiency? – Huang T

Answer: Vehicle aerodynamics is a complex subject. There are two things that determine how much drag a car will produce, which directly influences how hard the engine/motors have to work to shift air out of the way.

The first is the frontal area, or size of the car. The second is the drag coefficient, or how slippery it is through the air.

Designers are clever at making often bulging shapes work well through the air; clever ducts and smoothed surfaces – especially under the car – can make a big difference. Smaller air intakes on EVs (which don’t need as much cooling) makes them better again.

Conversely, some sleek cars – including supercars – can be relatively poor from a drag perspective because they have enormous air intakes and wings for downforce.

So, yes, there are lots more SUVs, but some are quite efficient from an aerodynamics perspective.

Got a question but don’t know where to find the information you need? Email us at editor@carsales.com.au

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