The story compares four sporty coupes: Acura RSX, Chevy Cobalt SS, Mitsubishi Eclipse and Scion tC.

On page 60, the magazine says the tC has the group's "most comfortable ride." And, unlike the others, the tC's rear seat "can accommodate adults."

Anyway, interesting writeup.



Paul

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Here's the December 2005 road test of the tC, in case nobody has posted it yet...

The tC Line
Body style Coupe
Drive wheels Front
Trim lines —
Engines & transmissions
2.4-liter 4 (160 hp), 2.4-liter 4 supercharged (200 hp); 5-speed manual, 4-speed automatic
Base price range
$16,200
HIGHS | Ride, quietness, rear seat, hatchback versatility, turning circle, value.
LOWS | No rear wiper, lacks a sporty flair.

While not exciting, the Scion tC is a well-rounded, competitively priced coupe with a lot of standard equipment. It’s one of the few coupes with a usable back seat. Its ride is relatively comfortable and quiet. Handling is sound but not really sporty. Acceleration, shift quality, and fuel economy are commendable. First year reliability has been average.


THE DRIVING EXPERIENCE

The tC has the group’s most comfortable ride, with good isolation from bumps and ruts. The ride is controlled and steady, but fairly stiff for rear passengers. On the highway, the ride is smooth and relatively quiet. The engine hum is mostly civilized.

The tC was agile, with limited body lean and precise, responsive steering. The driving experience, however, is more like that of a small sedan than a sports coupe. At our track, the tC is mostly predictable with understeer that changes to a bit of oversteer after lifting off the throttle. It posted a good speed in our avoidance maneuver. The 37-foot turning circle is tight.

The 160-hp, 2.4-liter four-cylinder provides adequate performance and returned a very good 26 mpg overall. The five-speed transmission is easy to drive smoothly and the clutch is easy to modulate.

Braking was very good, with short, straight stops. Headlight performance was also good.


INSIDE THE CABIN

The interior is put together well and the seat fabric is pleasant, but some surfaces are hard. The headliner is thin and the dual sunroof covers are flimsy.

Most drivers found a comfortable seating position, although tall drivers found it tight. The tilt-only steering wheel marred the driving position for some. Forward visibility is good, but the rear view is compromised. The lack of a rear wiper is a nuisance in inclement weather.

The driver’s seat is firm with good support, but lacks enough thigh support for tall drivers. There’s a variety of seat adjustments, but none for lumbar. Rear-seat room is relatively good, but there’s limited head room. The cushion provides good thigh support and leg room is very good. Front access is good, but the roofline is low. Rear access is OK.

The controls are simple and well-designed. Minor gripes include the long reach to the mirror controls. The radio controls are confusing on our 2005 tC, but the 2006 version has a radio that’s much easier to use.

Cabin storage is modest. The 60/40-split rear seats fold to increase cargo capacity, and the rear hatch opens easily. A small spare tire sits below the cargo floor.

SAFETY NOTES

The driver’s seat has a side knee air bag. A driver’s-seat position sensor influences air-bag deployment. To protect from whiplash, outboard rear head restraints must be raised. The rear-center restraint does not provide whiplash protection, even when raised.

Driving with kids. The large hump in the center of the rear seat makes it hard to secure child seats. Some rear-facing infant bases might be difficult to secure using the safety belts. The LATCH anchors are awkward to access.

 

 

Long reach to the mirror controls? Its closer then the radio!

 

That has to be the most bland review I've ever read. They should have just said: "The Scion tC: mostly harmless."

 

quietness?? aparently that didnt get one with the gremlin bang pots and pans in the hatch hahaha...i love my tC

 

Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't that same magazine post performance as 8.8 to 60 and the quarter in 16.7 for a 5 sp. car? Seems off. It is great they recommended it but I agree with the above posts that the write up was pretty lame.

 

Yeah i noticed that. ALL the 0-60 times are totally incorrect in that article. Or Consumer Reports test drivers really suck.

 

quietness?? aparently that didnt get one with the gremlin bang pots and pans in the hatch hahaha...i love my tC


I love that movie!!! Mabye the reviewer should of went for the snickers under the seat!!! HA HA HA *evil*

 

Give the reviews on the other cars here. POST em.......don't be biased! I want to here the other reviews........post a link or something

 

The tC came in third behind the Cobalt SS and RSX base.

The review is purposefully bland. Consumer Report isn't a car site but a non-profit organization that reviews consumer products (usually around 200-300 products per monthly magazine.) So it really only has what is really relevant.

The review is pretty good and characterizes the tC pretty well. It's no track monster but it's pretty quick. That's the one thing the review didn't seem to mention.. although the only "fast" car in that review set is the Cobalt SS which is NOT reccomended despite coming in first place. The SS scored the best for handling and acceleration but is 24k dollars tested. It was more than the as-tested price of the next priciest car which came in second, the RSX base coming in at 20k. The tC came in third and the Eclipse GS brought up the rear. The tC costs the least of all of these cars and came in after much pricier cars so it can be inferred that, although not the sportiest of the bunch, the tC is the best sporty value. But we already knew that didn't we!

Obviously the supercharged car comes in first place in the "sporty" coupe comparison test. And obviously the vastly bloated Eclipse GS came in last place (3100 lbs for a 2.4 litre engine?) I felt a more proper comparison would have been the 2.4 litre SS (non-supercharged) in this group or the Eclipse GT. So I feel that rightfully the tC should have taken last place among sporty coupes - it's just that at 25k~ the Eclipse GT is in the next class of sports car so it couldn't have been included (which is fine.. it's just that the SS is still out of place.)

So I think the only coupe rightfully placed here are the tC and RSX. The tC comes in after the RSX because the tC is a bit of a boar (more muscular than a pig but still not quite nimble) in handling. The tC out accelerated the RSX though by a good margin but speed isn't necessarily sport (or else we'd all be packing V6 Camrys, eh? jk)



About the acceleration numbers..

The reviewers for consumer report drove the car as a consumer would. Other car magazines would try to get the best possible numbers. Those numbers above are obtained by accelerating to redline from idle with minimal wheel spin.. almost as if you were at a redlight and just drove off BUT NOT LAUNCHING OFF. That distinction should be made - these 0-60 and 1/4 mile numbers are vastly slower than what you'd get on a track and Consumer Report is a poor indicator of track and strip performance. It IS a good show, however, for real world driving on a daily basis.

 

Here are some numbers from that article.

1. Chevy Cobalt SS
2. Acura RSX
3. Scion tC
4. Mitsu Eclipse

0-60

1. 7.3
2. 9.1
3. 8.8
4. 9.3

45-60

1. 3.8
2. 5.7
3. 4.9
4. 5.4

1/4 Mile

1. 15.7
2. 17.0
3. 16.7
4. 17.0

Transmission

1. Good
2. Excellent
3. Good
4. Average

Routine Handling

1. Good
2. Good
3. Good
4. Good

Emergency Handling

1. Good
2. Good
3. Average
4. Average

Avoidance Maneuver, Max Spd MPH

1. 54.0
2. 52.5
3. 51.0
4. 50.5

Braking Feel/ft 60-0

1. Excellent / 132
2. Good / 143
3. Good / 136
4. Good / 139

Wheelbase in.

1. 103
2. 101
3. 106
4. 101

Overall MPG

1. 23
2. 28
3. 26
4. 23

Curb weight

1. 2,990 60/40
2. 2,745 61/39
3. 2,890 60/40
4. 3,345 59/41

Max load lbs.

1. 890
2. 700
3. 865
4. 660

Turning circle ft.

1. 42
2. 40
3. 37
4. 42

Suitcases + duffels

1. 3+2
2. 2+2
3. 2+1
4. 1+1


These are values drawn.. I felt they had some relevance..

 

WTH is up with those 0-60 numbers????????

 

The reason the Cobalt SS was not "Recommended" was because they have no reliability data from their reader survey.

The reason the tC was "Recommended" is because it has an "average" reliability score for the first year (in their survey), it exhibited no "unacceptable" behavior, and it scored well overall.

Consumer Reports labels as "Recommended" *all* tested cars that meet their criteria (which includes at least "average" reliability in their survey). The reliability requirement is the reason all-new cars less than a year old are rarely "Recommended."

There's also an even higher category of recommendation that's given to cars that meet the criteria AND do well in crash tests. None of the cars on the list below have that lecel of recommendation, probably because they haven't been given all the qualifying tests (frontal-offset and side-crash tests conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety).

The current issue tested four sporty cars, but their ratings are then added to those of other such cars that were already tested. Here's the entire list, in order of overall score (*-Recommended):

"Sporty Cars"

Audi S4 $50,870
*BMW M3 $56,495
*Subaru Impreza WRX STi $32,870
*Mazda RX-8 $31,305
*Cadillac CTS-V $52,685
Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution $29,094
* Subaru Impreza WRX $25,470
Chevrolet Cobalt SS $24,135
*Ford Mustang GT Premium [V8] $29,020
*Mini Cooper Base $18,295
*Acura RSX Base $20,940
*Scion tC $17,115
Pontiac GTO $34,295 NA
*Chrysler Crossfire $29,920 NA
*Hyundai Tiburon GT (V6) $21,389 NA
Mitsubishi Eclipse GS (4-cyl.) $21,764 New New NA

RichC

 

Like I said, it's the fastest a person would go if not racing.

 

link?

 

No link. It's a paid subscription site, or a paper magazine.

RichC

 

Seems to me that the tC came in second in just about every catagory. Why then does it end up in third place. Just because its boring according to one man's subjective opinion? When I look at a colbolt or a baseline RSX, I yawn at their exterior looks, and the interiors are even worse. Styling wise the only car that can hang is the eclipse. In the performance tests the tC came in second repeatedly to a $24,000 supercharged monster that should not have been in the competition anyway being $7,000 more than the tC. (why not stick a SRT4 in there or a WRX) This is not the first review that has the stats in favor of the tC yet gives it an overall bad grade. Is it that boring? Maybe they made it a bit more low budget luxury sedanish, and not rough bumpy sports carish enough. You may suspect that I have a completely biased point of view, but it if you assign a numerical value from 1 being the worse and 4 being the best for all the tests, the cobolt has a score of 50, the RSX has a score of 37 and the tC has a score of 41. As expected the supercharged cobolt is no where in the league of these other cars taking first place in 60% of the tests. But if you look at the remaining three the tC has the best performance ratings. So why is it that they say it was outperformed by the RSX?

The Maybach and the corvette Z06 have nearly identical drag/slolum/braking #s. In fact the Maybach is a bit quicker. (if you don't beleive me go to howstuffworks.com and read their article on the Maybach, too lazy to find the link again) No one would ever deny that the corvette is sporty, yet those words would never be used to describe the Maybach. So what makes a sports car sporty? Is it performance or is it a stiff clutch and rough suspension? The perfomance #s are in print for this test and IMHO #s never lie. You do the math.

 

It didn't come in third. It came in 12th, out of 16. But it's the least expensive car on the list.

Styling is not a factor in CU's ratings. When they say it's "not exciting," they're talking about their judgements that "Handling is sound but not really sporty;" and "The driving experience, however, is more like that of a small sedan than a sports coupe," and things like that.

I'm not saying they're right -- I've never driven a tC -- but that's how CU rates cars.

In addition to performance factors, they also include things like seat comfort, driving position, ergonomics, fit/finish, safety, build quality, etc.

If they were to compare the tC to a different groups of cars (all cars under $18k, for example) obviously the ranking (but not the raw scores) would be different.

RichC

 

It's Consumer Freakin' Reports, what do you expect?

 

That's Consumer Reports for you. That said they are the best place for car reviews and an indispensable source of information when buy a new car (or anything else for that matter). Their reliability data is second to none.

I have a feeling that a big part of the "average" first year reliability is all the rattles, squeaks and pops from the interior. Even still, it's just about the only Toyota (I think the Avalon, another first year model, with tons of electronic crap is the only other one) NOT rated excellent.

I look at it this way - it was a review of sporty, fun to drive cars. The WRX, the EVO, and the RSX are all faster and handle better than the tC. I know it's subjective, but if your main goal is a "sporty" car than these cars hit the target more than the tC. But take in to account price, ride rear seat, reliability etc and the tC more than holds it's own.