NEW Kia Tasman review (inc. off-road, underbody hoist & 0-100): Is this the new class leader?

CarExpert

There’s a new dual-can pickup on the block. It’s Kia’s first crack at a dual-cab Ute, but has it delivered the goods? Paul Maric reviews the 2026 Kia Tasman X-Pro to see if it can topple segment leaders in the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux.  Hardness tester, noise and lane keeping results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/121Auf6HGvaBqRToYcuAz94alin7Sw55SpOPECBDlnKE  Read the full review: https://www.carexpert.com.au/car-reviews/2025-kia-tasman-review  Skip Ahead: Intro: 00:00 Exterior: 01:11 Interior: 06:00 Infotainment: 07:37 Practicality: 10:42 Underbody: 14:08 On-road: 18:10 Semi-auto tech: 25:23 Accel. & braking: 26:30 Off-road: 29:50 Verdict: 36:02  We review every new car on the market, bust car myths, cover the latest car tech and answer your burning questions.  Whether you need new car advice, purchase validation or simply love learning more about new cars and technology, we are your car experts.  Subscribe to Car Expert: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7DvMhvy3H7ntEgn9n3xQcQ?sub_confirmation=1  You'll find us dropping new video content three times a week. If you'd like to ask a question about one of our videos, simply leave us a comment. If you'd like to give us any feedback on our content, feel free to email us, or alternatively, hit us up on social media.  Finally, we want this channel to grow with your support and feedback. If there's anything you don't like or would like to see us change, we'd love to hear from you!  Follow us on social media to see what we're up to and to ask any questions!  CarExpert: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarExpertAus Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/CarExpertAus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carexpert.com.au  Paul Maric: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulMaric Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/PaulMaric Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaulMaric  #kia #tasman #review

Transcript

00:00Well, this is genuinely, genuinely impressive. I wasn't expecting this. Going out on a limb here

00:07to say this is probably one of the best cars we've tested off-road here. It is just very

00:10straightforward and easy. Fuel tank over here, it has protection, but it's plastic. Plastic is

00:17an interesting choice. G'day, I'm Paul. This is the new Kia Tasman. Before I get started though,

00:22tell me what you reckon about the design in the comments section below. Do you love it? Do you

00:26hate it? What do you think they could have done better? I'm going to run through design stuff in

00:29just a second. The entire range kicks off at around $43,000 for the dual cab pickup and it caps

00:36out here at this top spec called the X-Pro at just under $75,000 before on-road cost. Put that into

00:45context, that is around the same price as a V6 Ford Ranger Wildtrak. This is a four-cylinder. So yeah,

00:52pricing strategy is very interesting. They have already announced driveway pricing, which tells

00:57me that people perhaps haven't rushed into dealerships to sign up for this. They often wait

01:01for driveway pricing, but anyway, we'll see how it goes. Now, if you do want to skip ahead to other

01:06parts of this detailed review, you can use the time codes that are on the screen, or if you're on

01:10YouTube, you can scroll down and use the chapters below. Now, design, it is entirely subjective. So

01:15whether I like or don't like the design is kind of irrelevant. You're the one buying it and the design,

01:21whether you like it or not, is entirely up to you. So I'm going to run you through

01:24the design highlights. So full LED headlights with an LED daytime running light, and that's a vertical

01:30stack over here. LED fog lights as well. And then you've got these sort of piano black bits tacked on

01:36here and on this lower section as well. Camera integrated down here as well for the 360 camera.

01:43And then all of this stuff down here is plastic with the Kia logo there. Now, I did mention as well,

01:49when we first looked at this car in Tassie, that this is just a poor design from a functionality

01:55point of view, because if you are doing a lot of off-road driving or any off-road driving, you'll

01:59actually notice down the sides of this car, there are scrape marks from the launch event, and that's

02:04obviously from bushes and other stuff that you encounter on off-road trails. If you're encountering

02:10bushes and stuff, you're likely to encounter sort of errant branches, and they are just going to smash

02:16right through that. And if you lose your headlights while you're off-road, you're going to be in a

02:20spot of bother if you need to drive at night. So I think that is a poor design, and that is something

02:24that they need to address, because that is way too wide of the body there for that location, for

02:30that headlight. Around the side here, you've got all-terrain tyres for the X-Pro. So it's a pretty

02:36chunky set of all-terrain, so I'll be curious to see how this goes up against our sound meter and whether

02:41it has a lot of noise that comes into the cabin. But yeah, it's a set of 17s piano black finish on

02:47the wheel there. Now, the wheel arches front and rear have black cladding on them. You can actually

02:52get this in a body-coloured style, depending on which variant you go for. I don't know, I just think

02:58from side on that the black just doesn't work well with some colours. It's just, it's a strange

03:03looking setup, but with body-coloured panels, it actually looks significantly better. But anyway,

03:09that is my opinion. Piano black on the wing mirrors there, with camera built into there,

03:14and then an indicator built into there as well. Got roof rails here, a sunroof as well. You've

03:19got privacy glass. Then you've got this section that kicks up to the side, which is a bit of an

03:24interesting setup. One thing I did find when I was trying to get my daughter into the car,

03:28there's no sidesteps. He can get sidesteps, but I don't know, just how high the ute is, and

03:33bucky, whatever you want to call it, pickup truck, it is tricky to get in and out if you do have

03:37kids. So I would get sidesteps if you are planning on moving kids around. Even as an adult, it can be

03:43a little bit tricky to manoeuvre in and out when it is this high. This bit's pretty cool. So you've

03:47got storage off to the side. It's a bit like a RAM box that you're going to find in a RAM 1500,

03:51quite like the sort of versatility of it. And it will tell you as well, if you have driven off with

03:57this open, even if it's slightly ajar, it will tell you, it'll beep and bong at you and tell you

04:02that it is open. You need to get out and fix it. Disc brakes on the rear. You've got leaf springs

04:07there. I'm going to run you through the whole underbody as a portion of this video. You can

04:11skip ahead to that now. You can just wait for it, but it'll be just before we go for a drive. I'm

04:14going to run through the entire underbody and just show you some of the interesting things that I've

04:18found under there. Similar to Ranger, they've got bits that pop out here for canopies and whatever

04:22other accessories you want to add to the vehicle. Come right to the back with me. Around the back,

04:27you've got full LED taillights. You've got a sidestep there to retrieve things from the tray.

04:33You've got the X-Pro badging down here. Tasman in individual lettering and then Kia embossed onto

04:38there. You've got a camera built into here. Brake light built into this section as well. And then a

04:44three and a half tonne braked towing capacity is available. The other interesting thing too,

04:49basically all the variants have over a tonne of payload, but if you are doing a Novator at least,

04:54you can't have over a tonne of payload. So you can, as a no cost option, get this reduced to just

05:00under a tonne. So that sorts that problem out as well. In here, you've got a button to release the

05:05tray. And then the tray is spring loaded as well. So within here, you've actually got springs that make

05:09it easier to drop down. It sort of doesn't just slam down with these cables to hold it in place.

05:15You've got a plastic bed liner in there with lights off to the side. And then over here,

05:20what have we got? Is that a power outlet? 240 volt, 400 watt power outlet in the tray there,

05:25which is, which is pretty cool. Now, in terms of dimensions, the tub is 1512 millimeters long,

05:301572 millimeters wide with just under 1190 between the wheel arches and then a depth of around 500

05:39mils. So pretty reasonable specs there. You've also got this tie down system on the side that slides

05:44backwards and forwards and allows you to sort of tie down objects that are in your tray. So let me

05:50know what you reckon about all of that for Kia Tasman. Do you love the look of it? Hate the look

05:55of it? What do you think of the pricing? Do you think it is too expensive? I'm keen for your thoughts

05:59in the comment section below. So we're inside the Tasman. I will show you what the Kia looks like.

06:04So you've got the Kia logo there. And then when you push a button, it lights up. Kia logo on the back

06:09there as well. Then you've got lock, unlock, a button there to drop the tailgate, remote start,

06:14and then also a feature to get you out of tight parking spaces, which is handy, I guess.

06:20So it's a proximity sensing key. You can leave that in your pocket. The push button start is here on

06:24the gear stick. And the gear stick is this big knobby thing. You operate it like you do in an

06:27IONIQ 5. And then the push button start is integrated into there as well. So I said this at the launch.

06:32I think this interior feels super high quality and just top notch. And you would expect it to be

06:38high quality and top notch for $75,000. But if you compare it to like a Ford Ranger, for example,

06:44it does feel more premium. It feels like they've gone to a lot more effort to make this more car-like

06:49as opposed to dual cab-like. Even stuff like these materials here, you can see they've got sort of

06:54flex of material in there. It just looks, I don't know, even this, like you've got measurements of

06:59the car. Just funny little bits and pieces just to make it feel a bit nicer. In terms of touch points

07:05though, centre armrest, pretty firm to the touch. Soft on the door though. How soft is it all?

07:10We've got our durometer. We've tested the main surfaces in this cabin. If you do want to see

07:14how this car compares to others that we've tested before, there is a link in the description below.

07:18Builds quality. Let's see what it feels like. That all feels pretty solid. Nice. We'll see what

07:24this is like in a few years' time. They're using like an unknown engine and a dual cab ute application.

07:30It's their first time doing something like this. So we'll see what it's like in the longer term.

07:33This is what your door slam sounds like.

07:38Now let's talk about infotainment. You've got two 12.3-inch displays, a smaller 5-inch display

07:44in the centre there. Then you've also got some buttons down here as well to operate air conditioning

07:49and then shortcuts for the infotainment system. This is the latest version of Kia's infotainment

07:54system. So it's connected to the internet. It means you can remotely communicate with the car.

07:58And in addition to what you'd find in a typical like Kia SUV, you've actually got a few extra

08:03bits and pieces here. You've got an off-road menu that I'll show you once we go off-road,

08:07but really cool animation there once you sort of boot that up. And then if you jump over here,

08:11you've got a trailer menu as well. This particular car has a brake controller fitted to it, but no

08:15tow bar. But you can see here stuff like checklists. So if you are heading away, you can triple check

08:20that everything is all set up the way that it needs to be. Active weather, voice memo, and other sort

08:25of bits and pieces. In terms of smartphone connectivity, you've got Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

08:31It's wireless on both fronts. Nice and fast and snappy, which is good. And then you can use these

08:37shortcut buttons to take you back to the home menu if you need it. And this is what Android Auto looks

08:41like. So wireless as well, full screen, nice and snappy. Same thing with every new Kia I've driven

08:51with this setup, but I can't see that climate control screen because the steering wheel's in the

08:55way. I just can't understand why you would put that there. Very odd placement. Thankfully, you don't

08:59really need to interact with it much because you can just use your temperature controls here, fan

09:03speed. But yeah, just a bit of a weird one. One thing I did notice, and normally I talk about this

09:08when we do our reach test, but they missed a great opportunity here to have a lip down the bottom that

09:14I can rest fingers on. Because what happens is if you've got Waze or something running and you need

09:18to enter an address or do something, you'd normally just put your fingers here and then you're able to

09:23click on buttons and stuff. But you don't actually have anything to hold onto. So you kind of have to

09:27grab the top of the screen. You've got to lean in for it. It's a bit of a clumsy arrangement. So I

09:32think that definitely could be better. On the audio front, you have AM, FM and DAB radio through a 12

09:38speaker Harman Kardon branded sound system. Good sound system. Not quite as good as the JBL sound

09:43system in the Hilux, but still pretty reasonable for a car like this. You have sounds of nature as well

09:49if you do want to stay in a nice serene environment. Screen ahead of the driver. Again, different from other

09:55Kia SUV products. You've got a whole bunch of off-road displays that you can flick through.

10:00So there's actually quite a bit of useful information there along with that trailer

10:02display as well. So they've done a good job with that integration and it's quite impressive how it

10:06all sort of comes up there. Let's talk about parking. Front rear parking sensors, 360 degree camera. I'll

10:12show you what that looks like. So quality, that's pretty good. That's our broken registration plate.

10:17That was my fault. And then top-down view over here. And then what you can do is select

10:22other views as well. So you can do front, wide angle front. Look, camera quality at the back is

10:29actually not too bad there, but some of those angles are not amazing. Like that one's a little

10:34bit blurry there, but no, it's actually, it's fine. It does the job. And there's your 360 as well.

10:40What else have we got here? That's it. And then this is what the horn sounds like.

10:44Now let's talk about practicality and we'll start off with your connectivity options. So

10:49down here, you've got two USB-C outlets. You can actually actively switch between data and

10:55charging. So you can run your smartphone mirroring on data if you want. Two wireless phone chargers.

11:00You've also got a 12 volt outlet here in the center console. On the storage front, plenty of storage.

11:05So down there, a couple of cup holders, this little slot here, reasonably sized center console.

11:10There is this glove box down here, which is, what's that? That's a little glass breaker. Very cool.

11:16So you've got this up here, which is another kind of redundant little slot for stuff. You might be

11:22wondering, where is your sunglasses holder? Well, I'm sort of looking high and low. And then I found

11:26this. I reckon you could fit some sunnies in there. It would just be very hard to get to while you're

11:31driving. You'd have to kind of reach back, flick it up and faff around with that a little bit. It'd just

11:36be easier if they were up there. But anyway, beggars can't be choosers. But on the upside, even if you

11:42can't get your sunnies, you can have a table to do your invoices and stuff like that on, where you're

11:48probably going to charge us an extra 30 or 40% or even just not turn up to a job. No, I'm sure the

11:54car expert tradies are good people. On the comfort front, dual zone automatic climate control. Here on

12:00the door, you've got heated and cooled seats. You've got heated steering wheel. Passenger has heated and

12:04cooled seats. Both driver and front passenger seats are electrically adjustable, so you can go forwards

12:08and backwards. Backrest can go forwards and backwards. You can lift the front of the seat,

12:13the back of the seat, and then you have lumbar adjustment as well with memory for the driver.

12:18And then you also have tilt and reach adjustable steering. And as I mentioned before on the reach

12:24test, stuff on that side is a little bit harder to reach and it's just missing that little lip there

12:29to lean on. Now, before we jump in, you can see they've actually thought about this. You know,

12:35if you're designing a ute from the ground up, you kind of have a bit of flexibility in terms of how

12:39it all works out. So behind here, you've got two top tether points, one on each side. There isn't

12:44really any storage behind here and that appears to be the subwoofer for the sound system. But beneath

12:50the two sets of seats that you've got actually have under seat storage. This is the brake controller,

12:58but you've got space in here to put little odds and ends. So that all sort of works out nicely.

13:03Grab handle once you want to hop inside. In terms of space, this is actually pretty reasonable. So

13:10knee room isn't too bad. Tow room, a little bit compromised, but not the end of the world. I've

13:14got my seat sitting quite far down. Grab handle up the top there. You've got heated seats for your

13:21rear seats. There's sort of wetsuit material for storage of items in there, plus a little phone

13:27holder in there, two USB-C outlets here. You've got a 240 volt outlet with 400 watts down there,

13:33air vents. So all sort of really decent there. Then there is a little wrap handle here,

13:38which reclines the seats as well. So obviously not much use if you're an adult, because you're

13:42going to be wedged into there. But if you don't want to kick back and relax a bit, you don't have

13:45a really tall driver. You can probably sort of sit back and enjoy yourself. And then center armrest

13:50there with a couple of cup holders and a device holder. So this is an excellent place back here.

13:55They've kind of ticked every single box in terms of the things that you need. It doesn't feel

13:59cheap back here. It sort of just does everything. So all right, does the window go all the way down?

14:05So it's manual up and down. Oh, look at that. Fantastic. Now, before we go for a drive, I want

14:10to just show you under the Care Tasman so you can get a better idea of what it looks like and just

14:14some of the interesting stuff that we've found as we're poking around here. So up the front here,

14:19you have tie downs. These are not rated recovery points, but you can get rated recovery points as an

14:24accessory. And I have a rating of, I think, 8,000 kilos. You can see here as well, this car was used

14:28for the launch. So it's got a little bit of scratching on this plastic section. Underbody

14:33protection. It's still up the front here for this section and this section here under the engine.

14:39You've got an anti-roll bar there as well. And then we'll duck in under here to have a bit of a closer

14:44look. Now, this part is interesting. You've got a driveline that runs from the engine down to here.

14:50And before I run you through the transfer case, have a look at this bracing here. This is

14:54interesting to me because it looks like it was maybe an afterthought. It doesn't sort of feel

15:00like it was meant to be there. And perhaps they found when they were loading this up that they

15:04needed a bit more structural integrity here. And maybe that's why they added it in. I don't know

15:09for certain, but yeah, it just seems like a bit of an odd thing to throw in there. You can see the

15:15diesel particulate filter is located up the top there. So it's tucked right up there next to the

15:20engine instead of being down here, which is where you're going to find it in some of the other

15:24vehicles. It is possible that they've left a lot of space here. And you'll see as we get closer to

15:29the back for hybridization of sorts and future proofing this. And that's maybe why they've tucked

15:35all of that stuff under the top there. So transfer case up the top here. This has the ability to switch

15:42between two-wheel drive high range, four-wheel drive auto for on-road driving, and then also

15:46a four-wheel drive high range and low range mode. So up here is interesting. There is an all-wheel

15:52drive ECU module, and this is what gives the Tasman the ability to drive as a four-wheel drive on

15:58sealed surfaces. And you can't do that in some dual cab utes. And we actually shot a video explaining

16:03why. You can click up there to watch that. I don't know where that's from, but it has both a

16:07Hyundai and a Kia brand on it. And it appears to be from like a passenger vehicle. So I don't know

16:13how they've integrated an all-wheel drive system within this transfer case. It could just be like

16:17an on-off style system. I don't know if there's any degrees of slippage, but yeah, just something

16:22interesting to see there. And if we jump through to the back here, we've got fuel tank over here.

16:28It has protection, but it's plastic, nothing too special there. And it's tucked up fairly high. So

16:34it's not like you're going to bash that too much. You're going to hit the diff before you hit that

16:38fuel tank. But yeah, plastic is an interesting choice. This is another part that I find interesting.

16:44So you've got the diff here. Off to the side of the diff, you've got the dampers. And the dampers sit

16:48inboard of the chassis rails. We saw with the next generation Ranger and also the updates they did to

16:53Hilux Rogue and GR Sport. When they widened the track, they actually moved those dampers to the outside

16:59of the chassis rails to give them better stability when cornering. So it'll be interesting to see

17:04what this feels like when the speed picks up and also on some of the corrugations that we have

17:08to see whether that affects the handling performance. You'll notice as well, these bump

17:13stops have contacted the chassis rails up here and over here as well. So I don't know what they were

17:20doing at the launch, whether the cars were fully loaded and hitting sine waves, but you can see

17:24there, there has been contact with the chassis. You can also see here that the lower load spring sort of

17:29sits inverted so that you're going to hit a point when this is under load, that you get that

17:34compression. And this is basically where it stops. It won't really compress beyond that. So you've

17:39got a bump stop up the top there and this lower load spring that's going to stop movement. So I do

17:43suspect that when you are on the sine waves and it is bouncing, when you do hit that lower part of

17:48that compression, it is going to feel quite abrupt. And then finally, around the back here,

17:53we've got the spare tyre and then also all of your safety equipment. So they've got all the radar

17:58sensors there for your rear cross traffic alert. And then this car obviously doesn't have a tow bar

18:02fitted, but when it is fitted, it sits along here and hangs out the back there. So that is a quick

18:08look under the Kia Tasman. Let's go for a spin. Okie dokie, we've just hit the road in the Kia Tasman.

18:16I'm going to run you through all the stuff in a sec, but let me just talk about the beeps and the

18:20bongs to start with, all the safety stuff that's now mandatory for these guys to get a five-star

18:24safety rating. Stuff like speed sign recognition doesn't work well at all. It keeps reading the

18:30wrong speeds and then it just constantly beeps at you every single time you're over the speed it

18:34thinks it is or when it enters a new speed zone. So to turn that off, you have to sort of have the

18:40car on, push and hold the OK button, go through menus and faff around. It does have a driver attention

18:46monitor, which I've actually found to be not that bad. I've spent quite a few days now in this

18:50and that hasn't gone off anywhere near as much as I thought it would. So that's been

18:54tuned pretty well and I've switched off the lane departure warning just for our drive here

18:57on the ride and handling tracks. I'll be sort of in and out of the lanes. Now, off to the

19:02important stuff. Let's talk about the drive trains. So Kia Tasman uses what I thought was

19:08going to be fairly disappointing and at the launch when they announced that this was getting

19:12a 2.2 litre diesel and no V6 or no other engine option for the Australian market, I thought

19:17that's a bit grim. So this uses a 2.2 litre diesel out of the Sorento, turbocharged four

19:24cylinder. It does produce 154 kilowatts of power, which is fairly healthy, but unfortunately only

19:29440 newton metres of torque. So it's quite a low torque figure compared to a lot of the

19:34other dual cabs in this segment. Stuff like Ranger and standard Hilux variants, they're sitting

19:40at 500 newton metres and it goes up to 550 newton metres when you get to that top spec Hilux.

19:45So not great from that point of view. It is all mated to an eight speed auto and if you

19:51give it a punch, it's not that bad. Like it's not amazing, but it's also not anywhere near

19:59as sluggish as I thought it was going to be at 440. So it's okay from that point of view.

20:03What they've done just to be a little bit creative and to make this feel perkier than it is, they've

20:09given the transmission a very aggressive shift pattern. So what you'll notice is you just breathe

20:15on the throttle and it will start diving back through the gears. So what you find is it is

20:19constantly hunting. It's constantly going up and down through gears and it becomes very tiring,

20:25especially if you're on like a road where it's got quite a decent incline. If you get stuck behind a

20:31bit of traffic, it'll start diving back through gears and yeah, it just gets pretty tiresome. So

20:36you find that it's always sitting around that 2000 RPM mark and then you breathe on the throttle

20:40and it's back through the gears. So that is unfortunately a side effect of having such a

20:45small engine. So not the end of the world, but just something to take note of. One of the good

20:49things is you can drive this in two wheel drive high range on sealed surfaces, but they also have

20:54a four wheel drive automatic mode. So that four wheel drive auto mode allows you to drive it on

20:58sealed surfaces like this without causing any issues. Interestingly, it sets itself back to 4A

21:05automatically every single time you start the car. So even if you do switch it back to 2H,

21:10it will be back in 4A when you start the vehicle again. So again, not the end of the world, but just

21:15something worth taking note of. Now in terms of fuel economy, Kia claims a combined average of a little

21:20over eight litres per 100 Ks. We're sitting on nine at the moment, so near enough and pretty reasonable

21:28for a four cylinder dual cab U. Now let's attack our sine waves. So I mentioned before when we were

21:34looking underneath the vehicle that it did look like it had hit its bump stops a couple of times

21:39there. So see what it's like now when we dial up 130 Ks here for our sine waves. Actually, there is

21:46a fair bit of body roll. Alrighty, here we go. So there's 130. See what the body control's like.

21:54Yeah, that is a bit all over the place. I don't know. It feels okay, but once it gets a bounce on,

22:04it really just feels a bit uneasy. And I did actually sort of feel a bit of sort of scuttle

22:10shake through the body when you hit bumps as you're sort of approaching corners and stuff. So

22:15yeah, it's not amazing, but it is, you know, dual cab U on leaf springs. There's not really a great deal

22:21they can do with it. I'd be curious to see what it's like without these all terrains. I haven't

22:25driven just a standard one, so we'll have a crack in one of those shortly. Okay, see what it's like

22:30on our bouncy road. So this is a terrible quality road. Do this at 90 Ks an hour. The ride just in

22:37general, I don't know, feels a bit busy to me. I noticed sort of on the highway and even on this

22:43sort of stuff here, you can hear it in my voice that there's just a fair bit going on beneath the

22:48skin there. Here's our condensed sine wave. Yeah, the ride is just, it's on the firmer side. And as

22:56a result of that, it just feels busy over just minor imperfections on the road. It's not that bad.

23:02You kind of get used to it, but I think it's probably something they need to have a look at.

23:06And perhaps it is just limited to this model here with the all terrains. We'll see once we get our

23:10hands on one of the more standard cars. I would have thought with big all terrains like the ones

23:15fitted to this, it would be quite noisy on course chip roads, but it is fairly quiet when you're on

23:20the highway. It's not really that bad. We did put it up against our calibrated sound meter and this

23:25is how it went. If you want to see how this car compares to others in this segment, there is a

23:29link in the description below. Let's chat visibility. So I can see clearly down the front and it's

23:35interesting, those black little mascara bits or whatever they are on the front of the bonnet there,

23:41they actually stick up a little bit. So it gives you a really good indication of where the front edge of the

23:44car is. Nice and decent sized wing mirrors there as well and good visibility out the back too. So

23:49from that point of view, it's pretty decent. Just on towing, do you guys want us to get the car back

23:55to do a towing test? This car doesn't have a tow bar on it, but if you're keen on that, we'll find

23:59one with a tow bar and see what it's like when there's a bit of load attached to the back of it.

24:04Now I'm going to pop this into sport mode. We test all cars back to back in the same way.

24:09I want to see what it's like around the ride and handling track. It just gives us a good idea of what

24:12vehicles are like when limit handling and how it compares to some of the competitors. Brake pedal

24:18feels good. Yeah, fair bit of body roll there. I'll tell you what, it's pretty predictable. These

24:29all terrains don't have a huge amount of traction, but pretty predictable in terms of how it feels.

24:36And yeah, once the speed picks up, it doesn't feel

24:39all that fast.

24:44But look, it is holding, holding its own. Yeah. I'd be really curious to see what this is like

24:49without all terrains because it's actually doing a reasonable job here. Yeah. You can see they've

24:54actually put a bit of effort into, yeah, there's that scuttle shake. The back just feels a little

24:59bit disconnected from the front. But yeah, aside from that, it's actually sort of motoring along

25:06pretty nicely. And that 4A mode is doing a great job of giving us all the traction that we need.

25:12Steering feel is excellent despite the size of the vehicle. All right. There's the back straight,

25:17sort of just moving along. Okay. Yeah. So there you go. Not the punchiest thing in the world,

25:21but actually holds its own through a couple of corners. Okay. Time to test the semi-autonomous

25:26systems. Do this at 70 Ks an hour. We'll see what it's like. Okay. There's 70. The steering wheel

25:33is up the top there. That's gone green. We're going to test the three outer lanes to see how

25:38well it holds its own. So our first lane here, it's doing a good job. Jump over to the next lane.

25:47All right. Steering wheel has gone green and it is drifting out of the lane there. Try that one more

25:55time. Yeah. There we go. That is better. Kind of weird that it just went out of the lane

26:03there. That was odd. All right. We'll try the outermost lane.

26:12String wheel is green. No. Yeah. That's not very good. I think that system definitely needs

26:18some calibration. Like first lane was fine, which is easy, but second lane, it was drifting. And then

26:23that outermost lane, it just kind of ignored the line and just left. So yeah, a little bit

26:29disappointed there with that setup. Okay. Time to do a little bit of performance testing. I want to

26:35see how quick this is because that's my primary concern with this engine, just how fast it'll

26:41actually accelerate. And once we get to the end, I'll actually get the guys to overlay some of its

26:46competitors as well. So you can see where it sits. Turn traction control off. I'll leave it in 4A

26:51and I might do a run in 2H as well, just to see if it's any better. We'll go all the way through to

26:56120. So here we go. It's funny. It actually feels nice and strong off the line there. So let's see what

27:09happens. There's 80, 100, and 120. All righty. Let's see how that went. We are on the access road,

27:24so it did take a little while to get there. Okay. So 0 to 100. Jeez, that's not bad. 9.37 seconds.

27:33That is quicker than a 2.0-litre Ranger. Wild track. Wow. That's impressive. 80 to 120. 7.52 seconds. So

27:41those figures are pretty impressive. I wasn't expecting that. This has 60 Nm less torque

27:47than a Ranger. That is impressive. We'll go have one more crack just in two-wheel drive.

27:57So you're getting slightly less power loss.

28:03without having to engage the front axle. We didn't have any wheel slips. So all right,

28:08there's 120. All righty. So that was 0 to 100. 9.56. So slightly slower. 80 to 120. 7.48,

28:18which is slightly quicker. So yeah, pretty impressed with those numbers. I wasn't expecting that.

28:25I did notice there when I had a look at our previous numbers on the Ranger, it was in the wet,

28:29and I can't remember in that video whether it affected traction off the line or not.

28:33But yeah, pretty impressed there with the Tasman for acceleration.

28:38All right. Let's do a stop from 100. See what the brake and tyre package is like.

28:47All right. We are on ATs here. So I'm going to caveat that. All right. So 100 to 0.

28:54what? 2.76 seconds, 38.17 metres. Oh my God. That is ridiculous. This is stopping like only a couple

29:09of metres longer than a Sorento. That is unbelievably good in terms of stopping distance. And it absolutely

29:15murders a Ranger. I think a Ranger is typically like over 40 metres. That is unreal. And that is

29:22on all terrains. I'll be keen to test this out just on standard tyres to see how that goes. But

29:26very impressive. All right. How quick does it go in reverse? Let's find out. Here we go.

29:32All right. There it is. 71, 72, 72 kilometres an hour.

29:52Okay. Time to do a little bit of light off-roading here on our light off-road course. I'll run you

29:57through the specs that we're working with. The X-Pro actually has a pretty reasonable ground

30:02clearance coming in at just over 250 mil. In terms of the approach angle, which is the angle of the

30:07face you can approach before you hit the front of the car, that's 32.2 degrees, which is also a

30:11reasonable number. Departure angle of 26.2 degrees, which is the same, but in reverse. And then you have

30:17a weighting depth of 800 mil. In terms of the actual equipment you have in here, you've got a four-wheel

30:22drive low range, four-wheel drive high range, which will apportion 50% of torque to the front and the

30:27rear. And then four-wheel drive low range, which is a torque multiplier. You've also got a rear diff

30:33lock that works in two-wheel drive and also all of the four-wheel drive modes. So pretty comprehensive

30:37system. Some drive modes here for off-road driving. You've got an off-road screen in the centre,

30:42which I'm going to flick on. Really cool design. And this is probably the coolest off-road screen I've

30:47seen on any car before. It gives you a whole bunch of information. And then the off-road display ahead of

30:52the driver. So let's give it a crack. We're going to start off with our two-wheel drive test first.

30:57So with our two-wheel drive test, what we're going to do, I want to see what the traction control

31:01systems are like. And we have our offset mogul set up here with concrete blocks. We're going to kick up

31:07the driver's side rear wheel, and we'll see how well the traction control system works in two-wheel

31:13drive high range. So we've basically fully unloaded the front and rear wheel. I'm going to roll onto the

31:19throttle and see what happens. I've just left it in the normal mode, just to see how well it copes

31:23with this situation first. So rolling onto more and more throttle. Wow. That is impressive. It

31:30basically just crawled out of that with no issues at all. So that is two-wheel drive high range, no rear

31:34diff lock, just traction control doing all of the work. So very impressive. You can see they've put a

31:40fair bit of effort into off-road controls there. You get some brands that'll just spin up and won't go

31:46anywhere. Whereas that is, that is actually pretty impressive. Okay. So now we're going to do this

31:51one. We attack normally in four-wheel drive high range, but what I'll do, I'll just leave this in

31:56four-wheel drive auto so we can see how that fares. And then if it doesn't have any luck, I'll try to put

32:01it in four-wheel drive high range. All right. So we'll just get it rested onto that bit there and roll

32:07onto the throttle. Again, I've just left traction control running. Wow. That is, that is impressive.

32:17Yeah, that is really impressive. All right. Let's head over to our hill. I think this is where things

32:21are going to get a little bit more challenging. Okay. Now our hill has been compacted a little bit,

32:26but it's still sort of gnarly enough, a couple of dugout sections. So we'll see how it goes. I'm going to put

32:30this into low range. So into neutral, drop it down into low range. That will engage the transfer case.

32:39There we go. Pop that into drive. So terrain mode, I'll stick it in mud, I guess. It's sort of the

32:45closest to what this is. So we'll see what happens. So first up, I'll try going out without the rear

32:50diff lock with a constant throttle to begin with. And then if it doesn't have, if it does work,

32:56I'll come back and do a stop and then a go just to see if it has a hill hold. So just constant throttle

33:03there. Nice. Nice. That is genuinely impressive. That is genuinely impressive. It was able to walk

33:16up there without any dramas at all. And that is without the rear diff lock. So I'm feeling pretty

33:23good about how this performs off-road. All right. I'm going to drop it through our little mud hole

33:27here. Whoops. I don't know what that was. That was my walkie talkie and a horn honk. All right. So

33:38with this off-road screen, if you flick it across, it actually gives you that front on view. I'm going

33:42to put the hill descent control on. So X-Trek is the variable speed stuff. We'll actually test that on

33:49our hill in just a second. It says, please release brake pedal. Oh, there we go. Cool.

33:55And then we can, oh, nice. Increase the speed of that as we go too.

34:00This is, this is seriously cool. Very nice. All right. Let's go back to the hill. I just want to

34:05try X-Trek one more time on the hill just to see how well that works. Okay. So with this X-Trek stuff,

34:11we've actually tested, where's the Land Cruiser or the LX here with this hill ascent stuff and

34:18actually worked pretty well. So it manages all the traction control stuff for you. So I'm going to

34:22flick that on by pushing it down. It's preparing. Please release brake pedal. Set it up to speed two.

34:29Turn the parking sensor off. We'll see how well it copes with these holes in the, in the ground here.

34:41I'm laughing because it is managing all of this on its own. Wow.

34:51Look, this is genuinely, genuinely impressive. I wasn't expecting this. We had the LDV Teron here

34:59the other day that has a similar system to this and it kind of didn't work because what it would do is

35:03it would get to that first rut and then it would just flare up and it would just keep spinning. It

35:07wouldn't actually control itself. This actually climbed that without any dramas at all. I know

35:12that the hill's been compacted a little bit there, but going out on a limb here to say it's probably

35:16one of the best cars we've tested off-road here. It is just very straightforward and easy. So

35:20yeah, very impressed so far. Now last up, we've got rocks. So I'm going to pop this into

35:26rock mode. So that has dulled the throttle. I've left it in low range. We'll just see what

35:32comfort is like across the rocks here. All right. Let's ride the brake with the throttle.

35:40Sorry, Sean. He's getting drenched. It's just started raining.

35:46Yeah, this is, this feels really nice. That's weird. On the road, it's sort of a little firm

35:51and busy, but here on the rocks, those all-terrains really soak up a lot of the bumps there.

35:55It's just crawling over those really nicely. Yeah, right. All right. There you go. Okay. So Kia

36:02Tasman, what do we reckon? You know, it's, it's, it's strange because on paper, this doesn't seem

36:09very good. You've got an underpowered engine, you know, big price design, which a lot of people

36:15aren't really loving. But when you drive it from in here, it's actually pretty good. The interior is

36:20nice. The engine's actually not that bad and it's fantastic off-road. So I don't know, to me,

36:26really the only sticking points are the price and the design. And if you can get past those,

36:32you know, it is actually a decent vehicle. So one of the things we need to do, we need to do some

36:36towing because I need to see how that engine works with towing. The gearbox hunting stuff is really

36:40frustrating. And I think if I owned this, that would really annoy me just it constantly just hunting

36:45for gears. So I want to see what it's like with the trailer. We're going to try and book one of

36:48these with a tow bar on it so that we can actually test that out. And, and then I guess that will

36:53sort of give us a better indication of how it is. But let me know your thoughts in the comment

36:57section below. Would you still just buy a Hilux or a Ranger? Or are you actually going to have a

37:01look at one of these? Because if you put the styling to one side, it is actually a pretty compelling

37:06package, albeit an expensive one. So yeah, let me know your thoughts in the comment section below.

37:11If you did enjoy this video, please make sure you like it and share it with your mates. And if you

37:14haven't done so already, subscribe to the channel and press the bell icon. But until next time,

37:17take it easy.

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