00:00This has got to be one of the most anticipated cars of the past years, the new Dacia Bigster,
00:07a C-segment SUV that aims to make mobility in that segment more affordable.
00:14What do you get for your money? We'll find out right now. Welcome to REF.
00:17As of now, the Bigster is available with three different engines. All of these are hybrid ones,
00:33two multi-hybrid versions with 130 or 140 horsepower, and the full hybrid version is the
00:40one we're testing right now, 155 horsepower, a 1.4 kilowatt hour battery that should enable,
00:46and that's what Dacia claims, the car to drive up to 80% purely electric in the city.
00:58It is, however, clear it cannot compete with a plug-in hybrid that has maybe 60, 70 or 100
01:07kilometers of electric range, but it still manages to keep the consumption low.
01:16The official number is four and a half liters per 100 kilometers. I could not achieve that. However,
01:27we were driving country roads quite frequently. That means around 90, 100 kilometers an hour,
01:34and I had an average consumption of 4.9 liters, which is very good for a car in the C-sev segment.
01:41And there are more engines in the works. During the next month, Dacia will add another engine to the
01:52lineup, which is one that is also quite important for the brand, and that will be an autogas version,
01:59so LPG. And it has a combined range of more than 1,300 kilometers. So it has an LPG tank and a regular fuel tank,
02:11and with those together, you can make that long-distance trip.
02:15However, Dacia already said that most of their customers that use LPG models from the brand,
02:29because there are others, tend to only drive with LPG since it's way cheaper than regular fuel.
02:37By the way, Dacia expects around one-third of Bigster customers to go for that LPG version,
02:49because the numbers are similar with other LPG cars in the brand.
02:55While the Bigster might not look as nice as the Duster, it's no eyesore and boasts decent performance too.
03:01The interior of the Bigster, as you would expect in a car that has such a small entry-level price,
03:12features a lot of plastic. But that is by no means a bad thing. I mean, look at this.
03:20It looks really good. This is plastic. This is plastic. This is plastic. And all of the rest is
03:28as well. But that doesn't make it look bad.
03:37I'm really trying to find something to complain about in the interior, but I can't. I mean,
03:43look at this. You even have physical buttons for climate control, which is very nice.
03:47And down here, you have the U-Clip system, where you can add all sorts of different helpers. For example,
03:55this holder for a handbag or something.
04:03As you would expect from a C-segment SUV, the space in the back is ample. I have been sitting
04:09in the front. There is still a lot of leg room, a lot of head room, despite the fact that our test
04:15car has a panoramic glass roof. Before building the Bigster,
04:26went out and asked potential C-segment SUV customers what they wanted from a car like this.
04:34And then they decided to add some of these features to the new Bigster. For example,
04:39an electric trunk opening and also an electrically adjustable driver's seat.
04:45Of course, all of these things are not standard for the entry-level version.
04:50The Bigster's trunk can swallow between 1851 and 1937 liters, depending on the variant.
04:58The general driving impression in the new Bigster is pretty good. You can
05:03tell the difference, for example, from the Duster. It is more silent than its smaller brother. However,
05:12it is clear a car that starts at under 24,000 euros, you won't find high-class silent interior.
05:20You can definitely hear the road and you can also hear the wind, which is made worse by the fact that
05:32today we have quite strong winds in France, around 90 to 110 kilometers an hour.
05:43The suspension is exactly what you would expect from a C-segment SUV.
05:48Quite soft, but not too soft.
05:52The steering is also SUV-typical, absolutely okay. It has enough feedback from the road without being too direct.
06:06Just as basically any other car nowadays, of course, due to EU regulations, you have a lot of driver
06:13assistance systems in the Bigster, which will often remind you if you're driving too fast,
06:18and that's quite annoying, and it's always the same with any other car I've driven.
06:28But just as other manufacturers, Dacia has a clever solution to that,
06:33and that is a button right next to the steering wheel. If you press it twice,
06:40it will activate a mode that is called My Safety Perso, so personal,
06:46and that will then have the warning sounds disabled with all the systems still working.
06:51Since we're driving the hybrid version, the Bigster also has a B-Drive mode that will have
07:02recuperation, so that way, if you lift your foot off the gas pedal, the car will decelerate
07:09quite a bit to charge the small battery. I like to use that mode whenever I have it in a car,
07:20because it keeps you from using the brakes quite often if you drive accordingly,
07:26and that way, you have a very relaxed driving experience.
07:30Right next to the steering wheel you will find other buttons, and one of these
07:40is labeled with e-save, and if you activate that, the car will stop using energy from the battery
07:47and instead charge it so it is full or nearly full once you get into a city where you would
07:53want to drive purely electric. The Bigster is also available with all-wheel drive,
07:58and the ground clearance of around 22 centimeters makes it very suitable for light and medium off-road use.
08:14Summing up my Bigster experience, I have to say I enjoyed driving the car,
08:18and an entry-level price of under 24 000 euros is simply unbeatable to other manufacturers. You get
08:25a lot of car, a big car, for that money. It simply cannot be matched by any other manufacturer. Of
08:31course, it also has some flaws. It's clear, if you want to sell a car at that price, you have to make
08:37compromises. The noisy interior and a lot of plastic are some of these downsides of the car,
08:43but considering the price, you can easily live with that.
08:47All in all, the Dacia Bigster sets a new standard in terms of value for money. It's an affordable,
08:54spacious C-segment SUV with good standard equipment and decent ride comfort. The minor downsides are the
09:02sometimes noisy interior and the widespread use of plastic on the inside.
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