In the workshop nearly an hour before the polar fox test drive meeting, I seem to remember only one sentence: we are the new force to build the car 2.0. Lan Tu, a new energy brand owned by Dongfeng, claimed to be a "new force to build cars" in my mind. Then, what are the answers of these new brands, which are mainly traditional OEMs, have top-level resources and are working hard for national ecological construction?
Before we start talking about products, I think it is necessary to introduce this young brand. The words "Blue Valley Magna" can be seen on the tail label of the car, and the "parents" of the polar fox are BAIC Blue Valley and Magna.
Needless to say, with a history of more than 60 years, BAIC is one of the top five automobile groups in China. The name Magna may be familiar to many people. Is a world-famous automobile parts and vehicle manufacturer. Mercedes-Benz G-Class, BMW 5 Series, Jaguar E-Pace and other products are all OEM by Magna.
ARCFOX was founded on 20 16, and just released the Chinese name of polar fox in the second half of this year. It is a very young brand of new energy vehicles. However, with the endorsement of BAIC and Magna, Polar Fox quickly cooperated with international first-line brands such as Huawei, Bosch, SK, Harman and Siemens, and launched the first production car Alfa T in June this year.
The polar fox means the fox in the Arctic. The North Pole symbolizes self-persistence, not afraid of challenges, while the fox takes its wisdom, elegance and sensitivity. The elements of arctic fox not only appear in the brand name and LOGO, but also can be seen in the appearance style of Alfa T.
De Silva, a former designer of Alfa Romeo and Volkswagen Group, manipulated the appearance of Alfa T. The most eye-catching part of the front part was the triangular headlight group, and the charm of Fox immediately appeared. In addition, the "X" shape formed by the combination of the hood projection and the lower envelope line has also become a family element of the polar fox, and will appear in more mass production models in the future.
The Alpha T has a length, width and height of 4788/ 1940/ 1683 mm and a wheelbase of 29 15 mm, respectively, and is positioned in a medium-sized SUV. On its side, you can see the appearance of popular design elements such as hidden door handles, suspended roofs and double waistlines. In order to create some sports atmosphere, the roof began to slide down from behind the B-pillar, but it also had a negative impact on the head space in the back row. It should also be mentioned that the charging port of Alfa T is designed on the front fender, which requires the front of the car to be put into storage for charging, which is still a test technology for parking spaces with small space.
At the position of the C-pillar, the aforementioned "X" family elements reappear, this time consisting of chrome trim, tail wing and rear windshield, and great efforts have been made in details.
Alpha t also considers aerodynamic factors. In addition to the ventilation holes and hidden door handles on both sides of the front wall, it also has a hollow design on the tail wing. A series of efforts have brought the drag coefficient of 0.27 1cd, which is already excellent in SUV models.
A lot of sharp lines are used at the rear of the car, which makes its visual experience more stereoscopic. There is some blackening treatment called horizon around the penetrating taillights, which makes the lighting effect deeper.
I don't know when, the number and size of screens have become an important symbol to measure the sense of science and technology. It seems that using touch is very advanced, and the physical buttons are out of date. I have always wondered, is the full screen really easy to use?
Extreme Focus is a brand positioned in high-end new energy, so the interior of Alfa T is also trying to show technology and luxury. The combination of LCD instrument+central control large screen+functional touch screen +HUD head-up display is not innovative, but the 20.3-inch horizontal 4K fish screen is really rare. The display effect and touch fluency of this screen are good, but its system is not open source and the functions it can provide at present are relatively limited.
Most of the function control of the vehicle is concentrated on the touch screen below the central control, but the basic operation of air conditioning wind direction also needs to be adjusted in the secondary menu, which makes it difficult for me to accept and greatly reduces the convenience of use. Some people may say that voice control is more convenient, but in my one-day test drive, Alfa T's voice recognition was almost unsuccessful.
Alfa T interior materials are worthy of its price of 240.19-365,438+099,900 yuan, but the legendary Magna manufacturing process does not seem to appear on it. The stitching in front of the co-pilot is crooked and the airbag cover is uneven. After repeatedly confirming that this is a production version, I think there is still room for improvement in workmanship.
Alfa T offers five models, and the battery life of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is 480 km, 653 km and 600 km respectively. The driving forms are front-wheel drive and four-wheel drive. The test drive uses a four-wheel drive performance model in the venue, and the front-wheel drive model uses an open road.
The predecessor version has a maximum power of 2 18 horsepower and a peak torque of 360 nm, which is more than enough for daily driving. Thanks to the output characteristics of the motor, there is still a sense of pushing back when accelerating. If there are more requirements for power, the performance version of 435 HP and 720 Nm four-wheel drive can definitely satisfy you, quietly and quickly, even more exciting than super-running.
The carefree feeling of power can be reflected in many electric vehicles, and the chassis skill of Alfa T is what impressed me the most. Before McPherson, the multi-link suspension used a lot of aluminum, and Magna's chassis was adjusted. The chassis of Alfa T has a rare heavy feeling, and the shock absorption setting is just right.
As we all know, in 2020, when the new energy is rising strongly, the sales of new energy of BAIC will drop by more than 70%, which is a bit unbelievable. On the other hand, the elaborately-built polar fox finally released its first production car at the end of the year, with a maximum battery life of 653 kilometers, L2-class assisted driving, smart cars, Magna manufacturing technology, and the blessing of a large number of top global suppliers. Theoretically, this should be a very strong product.
After a day's experience, I think Alpha T can be called excellent in some latitudes, such as chassis texture, interior materials and seat comfort. But to be fair, it is difficult to regain a new energy source of BAIC by Alfa T alone. Its brand awareness is not high, the car machine function is lacking, the voice recognition is poor, the automatic lane change function is tried and tested, and the details are not so good. I hope that BAIC and Magna can go deeper and polish this product carefully. OTA has some defects. Perhaps only in this way can it be called the new force of making a car 2.0.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.