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My new 2017 Cruze Premier RS Hatchback - first impressions

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#1 · (Edited)
Can't get a decent sized photo to upload so here's the link to Chevy's site with pics. http://www.chevrolet.com/cruze-compact-car/exterior-pictures.html

On January 10, I got a 2017 Cruze Premier RS Hatchback in Orange Burst Metallic. I've had my eye on this car for a few months and the lease offers in January were absolutely incredible so I finally made the move. The car has every option and stickered for $29,860. That's pretty steep but the lease programs made the price a non-issue. I love the look and especially the color! Here are my thoughts so far.

The good:
Quiet, refined and feels like a vault. My previous car was a 2014 Mazda 3 Hatch, which I loved, but the Cruze is definitely quieter and smoother; less engine buzz and less road noise. The handling is a little more relaxed but the difference seems pretty negligible. Despite being down 31 horsepower compared to the 3, the power feels the same and the transmission doesn't seem to get hung up holding onto first gear for the sake of fuel economy.

I love the look. The exterior styling is striking and to my eye, the Hatch totally fixes the frumpy rear styling of the sedan. The orange color stands out too, which I love. The interior styling is mostly good with top notch materials on the upper doors and dash. The leather is also high quality and not as cold as the Mazda's leather.

The features. Wow, this thing has a lot of cool stuff; heated steering wheel, heated rear seats, all of the advanced safety equipment, a fantastic infotainment interface and plenty of storage spaces.

The bad:
The 18" wheels & tires that come with the RS package look great, but offer very little cushion on Michigan's rough roads. My Mazda had the same problem and that car suffered plenty of tire and rim damage while I had it. I'm trying to be more careful with this car but really wish the RS package had a 17" option.

The interior. Like I said, it's mostly good but the lower plastics on the console and doors are too shiny to my eye and are of much lower quality that the upper plastics. The center console also has an economy car appearance to me. The rear door armrests are ridiculously tiny and one's elbow actually falls onto the door pull rather than the armrest itself. GM also placed the power window switches in the door pulls and my kids constantly lower the windows accidentally. The cargo area is higher and narrower than the Mazda. I've had to lower the seats to fit things that the Mazda held without folding the seats.

The features. The car is a bit of a mish-mash of great features and missing features, especially compared to the Mazda. No leather wrapped shifter, has a foot-operated parking brake, only one USB port, no LED tail lamps, no articulating headlamps and tiny sun visors.

There are always trade-offs and overall I'm really happy with it. I'm especially glad GM is finally offering this car as a Hatchback and hope it does well!
 
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#3 ·
Can't get a decent sized photo to upload so here's the link to Chevy's site with pics. http://www.chevrolet.com/cruze-compact-car/exterior-pictures.html

On January 10, I got a 2017 Cruze Premier RS Hatchback in Orange Burst Metallic. I've had my eye on this car for a few months and the lease offers in January were absolutely incredible so I finally made the move. The car has every option and stickered for $29,860. That's pretty steep but the lease programs made the price a non-issue. I love the look and especially the color! Here are my thoughts so far.

The good:
Quiet, refined and feels like a vault. My previous car was a 2014 Mazda 3 Hatch, which I loved, but the Cruze is definitely quieter and smoother; less engine buzz and less road noise. The handling is a little more relaxed but the difference seems pretty negligible. Despite being down 31 horsepower compared to the 3, the power feels the same and the transmission doesn't seem to get hung up holding onto first gear for the sake of fuel economy.

I love the look. The exterior styling is striking and to my eye, the Hatch totally fixes the frumpy rear styling of the sedan. The orange color stands out too, which I love. The interior styling is mostly good with top notch materials on the upper doors and dash. The leather is also high quality and not as cold as the Mazda's leather.

The features. Wow, this thing has a lot of cool stuff; heated steering wheel, heated rear seats, all of the advanced safety equipment, a fantastic infotainment interface and plenty of storage spaces.

The bad:
The 18" wheels & tires that come with the RS package look great, but offer very little cushion on Michigan's rough roads. My Mazda had the same problem and that car suffered plenty of tire and rim damage while I had it. I'm trying to be more careful with this car but really wish the RS package had a 17" option.

The interior. Like I said, it's mostly good but the lower plastics on the console and doors are too shiny to my eye and are of much lower quality that the upper plastics. The center console also has an economy car appearance to me. The rear door armrests are ridiculously tiny and one's elbow actually falls onto the door pull rather than the armrest itself. GM also placed the power window switches in the door pulls and my kids constantly lower the windows accidentally. The cargo area is higher and narrower than the Mazda. I've had to lower the seats to fit things that they Mazda held without folding the seats.

The features. The car is a bit of a mish-mash of great features and missing features, especially compared to the Mazda. No leather wrapped shifter, has a foot-operated parking brake, only one USB port, no LED tail lamps, no articulating headlamps and tiny sun visors.

There's always trade-offs and overall I'm really happy with it. I'm especially glad GM is finally offering this car as a Hatchback and hope it does well!
Regarding the interior plastics. How much can a company spend on such things at this price point? They still need to make a profit.
 
#4 ·
You usually have to go pretty far up the automotive food chain to get away from it.
I've been in $50K+ cars that had hard plastic lower panels.
 
#5 ·
Good to see a regular consumer/purchaser review of the car vs. the typical automotive journalist. We all have our opinions, prejudices, etc. when it comes to these things but good to know anyway. I've been eyeing them over along with the possibility of a small cuv so this is like I said, good to know. One hang up is the lack of a couple of features I want that GM thinks they needed to eliminate though.
 
#6 · (Edited)
I was fortunate to quality for a GM Executive Conquest Rebate for trading in a competitive vehicle (it pays to have connections!), plus a $1000 GM Card Bonus Cash offer. In addition, GM covered my two remaining payments on my Mazda and the first month's payment on the Cruze. I put up less than $500 at signing and ended up with $209/mo. for a 24-mo/15,000 mile lease. I am still stunned by the deal! Even my saleswoman couldn't believe the payment for a nearly $30,000 car. I've never had such a low car payment, even going back to my first new car, a 1996 Cavalier Z24.

As for the plastics, I don't care about them being hard as long as they aren't shiny and at least LOOK high quality. For lower trim level Cruze models, I think they are fine, but on Premier models that are approaching the 30K mark, the cheapness is harder to take. In fact, I don't really get why dashboards are often soft to the touch, but door panels, and especially armrests, are thinly padded or hard. Who spends time groping their dashboards?! If any part of the car should be soft, it's the doors and armrests where there is frequent contact.

Something else that I forgot to mention that has taken some getting used to is the start-top feature. It's a bit erratic in that it's pretty seamless and unnoticeable at times and abrupt/vibratory at others. I wonder how advantageous the feature is.
 
#15 ·
I really like the Cruze in all its forms, but the hatch is great. Great color choice, too. Take good care of it.
 
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#20 ·
For basically 30 large this car should have more than one USB port and a leather wrapped shift handle. I also think it needs a more powerful engine when the RS package is ordered and for god sakes GM will you for the love of god put a stinking defeat switch in your cars with stop/start!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
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