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When you about-face up s-u-p-e-r backward to a party, you’d bigger accomplish a admirable entrance. Volkswagen hopes its new Atlas will about-face active at the already long-raging three-row-jumbo-crossover babble with its striking, bold-n-blocky, abnormally VW attending and “whoa, analysis out that caboose!” aback bench package. All-around adults in abundance and accepting them in and out of the additional and third rows with affluence is this rig’s above affair trick. Walk into the way-back seats and look a little, and you can calmly brainstorm you’re benumbed in a minivan that’s able with a cloaking accessory that can argue your neighbors you’re the rugged, outdoorsy type.
Of course, bluffing the neighbors and all-around association in the aback is alone bisected the battle. To acquisition out what affectionate of consequence the 2018 Volkswagen Atlas will accomplish on association beefcake into the larboard advanced seat, we army our cold, artful analysis accessory to a top-shelf V6 SEL 4Motion archetypal and put it through our paces. It seems that, like some backward affair arrivals, this one ability accept rushed out the aperture not absolutely absolutely angry out—trailing toilet cardboard from a shoe and with a bit of her brim tucked into her knickers.
This 3.6-liter adaptation of VW’s admirable narrow-angle VR6, as acquainted for this 4,725-pound agent with bench belts and amplitude abundant to band in addition 1,272 pounds’ account of American couch potatoes and their stuff, churns out 276 hp and 266 lb-ft of torque. With anniversary of those horses tugging 17.1 pounds (empty) and eight manual ratios to assignment with, that yields a class-trailing dispatch of 7.9 abnormal to 60 mph. The division mile passes in 16.0 abnormal at 81.6 mph. The prime cartage a alive client should cross-shop the Atlas adjoin are all quicker, with the Honda Pilot acceptable the stoplight admirable prix (6.2 abnormal to 60), and alike our slowest Pacifica minivan binding the Atlas out (7.7 seconds).
Editor in arch Ed Loh ashen that “The Atlas’ greatest backbone ability additionally be its Achilles’ heel. It is a packaging miracle, but what happens aback you ample this affair up with bodies and cargo? Can the agent handle a absolutely loaded Atlas?” That’s a affair that goes bifold for the abject 235-hp/258-lb-ft 2.0-liter turbo. Super advancing burke mapping ability be congenital in to affectation this ability absence during a abrupt exhibit analysis drive, but it’s abiding to aggravate owners, as appearance editor Seabaugh noted: “Throttle tip in is too advancing for a ancestors agent like this. It makes it difficult to cull abroad calmly from a stop, and it snaps occupants’ active back.” The eight-speed automated could apparently brighten up the dispatch and admiration if it weren’t so active aggravating to bear the 4Motion’s promised 17/23/19-mpg EPA city/highway/combined ammunition economy. “It’s aggravating to get into the ammunition abridgement accessory quickly, and again you accept to action it for downshifts and power,” said accessory editor Scott Evans. Engaging the Sport approach helps but alone a little. Our aboriginal advocacy for an aboriginal archetypal refresh: Offer a 2.5- or 3.0-liter VR6 turbo acceptable for 300-400 hp and acuminate up the sport-mode programming.
Another breadth that could use some burning retuning is the abeyance damping. Volkswagen’s aboriginal able at it seems to affection shocks that somehow feel acrid on babble bumps, washboard, and alluvium surfaces but float over beyond undulations. The abeyance biking could additionally do with addition inch or two and/or savvier countermeasures at the extremes of biking because during some balmy off-roading assorted editors appear activity the abeyance topping and bottoming out. There was additionally praise, however, for the all-embracing anchor and absorption in the Off-road approach and for the able hill-descent ascendancy system.
Our dry-pavement administration tests appearance the Atlas outperforming at atomic one key competitor—the Chevy Traverse—in agreement of crabbed anchor (0.79 against 0.77 g). The two are around angry on the figure-eight achievement at 27.9 abnormal and 0.61 boilerplate g, which added highlights the appreciably slower-accelerating VW’s anchor advantage in the corners. Note that suboptimal apparent altitude area these two cartage were activated accomplish it adamantine to analyze their after-effects with the blow of our database. We charge additionally point out that these numbers don’t acquaint the accomplished story. Many drivers appear that the Traverse acquainted bigger composed and displayed beneath anatomy cycle and annoy bleat than the Atlas.
One final arrangement affair that needs acclamation is the infotainment card hierarchy. As is, it hides assertive analytical functions abaft a settings awning that can’t be accessed aback the agent is in motion. Apparatus console illumination/ambient ablaze concealment and changes to the lane accumulate abetment arrangement are aloof a few we noticed. Every added agent architect we apperceive of allows these ambit to be adapted while driving—often via buttons or knobs on the apparatus console or council wheel—and so should VW.
In the admirable arrangement of things, VW has gotten appropriate the hardest agent attributes like packaging, proportion, stance, etc. Abiding we’d like a added able engine, but best of what bugs us about this able-bodied and ample CUV can be remedied about as calmly as analysis toilet cardboard from a shoe or untucking a skirt. Get them all right, and VW can be assured its late-arriving affair babe will be no wallflower.
Because the analysis apparent we acclimated for this analysis is a bald ages old (and still curing), our braking and administration after-effects appearance best endlessly distances and beneath anchor than we about almanac and report. With that in mind, this vehicle’s numbers are not necessarily commensurable with antecedent or approaching analysis results.
