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Citroen C5 Aircross review from an ex-Honda City owner

21st December 2021, 11:11 by Rahul Nagaraj

The Volkswagen Tiguan and the Skoda Kodiaq weren't available at the time of purchase.

BHPian the.city recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

I've been procrastinating on making a post for the past few weeks but finally posting my experience.

Deliberations

The new car bug bit me in 2020. However, 2020 and early 2021 was a whitewash. I switched my energies to more theoretical studies. I spent a lot of time on TBHP, YouTube and other vehicle-related websites.

I wanted a mid-size SUV/CSUV. Good ground clearance and good boot space were key factors in mind. Coming from Honda City, I quickly recognized that it's very tough to beat the comfort and ride quality with similar ~1.5L CSUVs in the market. Especially because I had the good luck of landing with a TC auto gearbox of the ANHC back in 2012 - not the CVT of recent Honda cars. CVT was the primary reason I skipped Honda in my considerations -- well, that and the fact that they don't sell CR-V anymore! My original budget was 30-35L range. I was surprised by how few vehicles are available in this range.

Some of my notes about vehicles I considered:

Jeep Compass - Excellent vehicle. Top-end has 4x4 and 360 cam. Unfortunately, it's too small a vehicle for what I wanted. Especially rear seat and boot space. Moreover, the negative feedback of Jeep's auto box in this forum was also in my mind.
Premium brands - I was already crossing my budget upper limit with C5. So I thought maybe cross it a bit further and try out premium brands. I tested BMW X1 and Volvo XC40. Merc GLA and Audi Q2 were too small for my requirements. Both X1 and XC40 were impressive vehicles but rear seats for both are way too small. Unfortunately, neither could match the ride quality of C5. Talking more with dealerships gave me the impression that buying the cheapest premium brand car is not the best idea. The real comfort and ride quality start with the one-step larger vehicles (X3, XC60, GLC, Q5). I spent several weeks looking for pre-owned X3, XC60..etc but no luck. TBHP forum also has great nuanced advice against pre-owned post-warranty premium cars.
Hyundai Tucson - It went down to Tucson vs C5 in the end for me. Tuscon is a great vehicle. It has all the right features but the old styling and the fact that the new Tuscon is around the corner was a major downside. I was really hoping that there will some launch plan announced for 2022 - and I was ready to wait for it too. Unfortunately, no one, including the dealer had any idea of new Tucson launch dates. I had to make a call and decided to stop delaying further.
Not available - VW Tiguan and Skoda Kodiaq were not available at the time I was looking. BS6 had forced both to be discontinued temporarily with the plan to launch with 2L Petrol in future. I believe Tiguan is on its way now. Not sure about Kodiaq. Either way, I was slightly wary of going with 2L Petrol.

After months of deliberations and weekends spent across town in dealerships, I finally took the plunge. Booked in mid-Nov. Received delivery in ~2 weeks to get Citroen Nov sales to triple digits.

Vehicle experience and tidbits

Sharing some detailed objective feedback, trying to keep my new car euphoria aside.

Ride quality: Ride quality is just mind-blowingly good. It's impossible to explain in words. You literally just glide over bad roads. The marketing gimmick of 'flying carpet' and whatnot, is actually .. kind of .. true. (to my own surprise). Yes, the soft suspension adds to the body roll. But honestly, I didn't find it any better in other 'taller' vehicles such as XC40. In fact, my honest suggestion to anyone considering C5 would be to NOT test drive C5 as your first vehicle. That's what happened to me. I booked a few test drives and C5 happened to be the first one. After its test drive, I just couldn't find that level of comfort in others.
Engine/Transmission: I'm extremely impressed with the vehicle power and gearbox. You rarely ever 'feel' the gear shift. Maybe the 1st to 2nd shift, but then everything else is very smooth. This was a big factor in my decision. I don't know if it's me coming from 1.5L naturally aspirated Petrol to 2L Turbocharged Diesel but the raw power really surprised me. You're never short of bhps when overtaking. I don't think the vehicle even downshifts every time I decide to push the accelerator for overtaking. There's just so much power available.
Stability: The composure and stability of the vehicle at high speeds is exceptional. In fact, I need to make a conscious mental shift on how I perceive vehicle speeds. It's so easy to reach the 80s in casual City driving without even realizing it. (This might also be due to my low-to-high sitting position change coming from City). Either way, the build quality and driving experience feel premium.
Seats: The 33-33-33 rear seat configuration is actually good if one of your seats is occupied by a child car seat. Yes, you get less space per person. If you or your family is on the.. well.. heavier side then you may find it uncomfortable. However, at 1970mm the vehicle's wider than Fortuner or Innova or Endeavour or Gloster. That helps with the rear seat - you don't have shoulders rubbing each other with 3 people sitting on the back. It also helps with the front seat experience with wide seats and spacious feeling in the cabin. A friend even joked that C5 front seats help you follow social distancing when outside
Storage: The central armrest storage space is huge. And I mean HUGE. I stored my wife's large handbag, 1L water bottle, phone holder and a variety of other small items in there. The best part is it's cooled. You get nice chilled water during your ride.
Glove box: The opposite sentiment for the glove box. The space is half the size of normal glove boxes. They left the fuse box there when converting the vehicle to right-hand drive.
The electronics: touch screen, centre console, steering wheel buttons, etc - are all good but it's clearly visible that they're cut down versions of the original European vehicles. Ex. There's a button for directly initiating navigation. But that button doesn't work unless you have Android Auto / Apple CarPlay connected. European vehicle has in-built navigation which also shows directions on the driver console behind the steering wheel. The parking camera gives you a 360degree view but with only the rear cam. As you back up, it will stitch the images. Again, the original car has both front and rear cams. I honestly miss the 360 views on this wide vehicle. Thankfully there are proximity sensors. Anyone coming from MGs or XUVs will find the touchscreen small. I feel it's an adequate size but low pixel density.
TPMS: On electronics, I didn't like the fact that they don't have active TPMS. You get a low-pressure warning but it doesn't tell you which tire. From what I read, it's a byproduct of a zillion of transmission sensors and ABS/ESP/<another three-letter acronym> system. The system senses differential rotational tire speeds to warn you of possible pressure loss. (Someone more knowledgeable should correct me if I got that wrong). I don't care how cool it sounds, they should have given in-built TPMS.
Door lock: The weirdest observation for C5 for me was the door lock. Pulling the door handle from inside overrides central locking's LOCK status and simply opens the door. There's a central locking button on the centre dash but there's no dedicated physical lock button/slider/tab on the door itself. I don't know if it's a thing on other cars too. In some way this is good -- I never end up in a situation where I accidentally try to open a locked door then spend the next few seconds trying to figure out which way should I twist the lock switch. On another side, I find it really unsafe. I'm going with the assumption that car electronics won't unlock and open the door when the vehicle is moving but I'm yet to test this out. (To be honest, I don't think I'll test it :/). Of course, this doesn't happen on rear doors with Child Lock <wipes sweat off the head>, phew.
Door design: Another peculiar observation are doors, which go all the way down. I don't know if any other vehicle is designed this way, but C5 doors wrap all the way to the bottom. All cars I could find have a strip of metal at the bottom which is not part of the door. That way you can see the door outline when you see the vehicle from the side. Now, I don't care so much about the design, but C5 doors going all the way down means that they get dirty at the bottom, especially in wet weather. That dirt is visible on the inside when you open the door. I wonder if this will affect the door's paint coating in long term. It also looks a bit shabby when you open the door. It's not a big deal but it's one of those you-cant-unsee-it situations.

Note - Feature removals: Since Nov, there are two features silently removed from the car -- 1) the physical key door lock slot on the outside is removed from the driver side. It's only on the passenger side now. Weird, but okay. 2) Boot open button on the driver console is removed. This one hurt me a bit. It was a slick option to open the boot when you're entering the mall or office for inspection. You could just tap that '2x boot open' button and be done. You can still open the boot with a key or the security person can press the button on the boot door. Still, I feel that the driver console button was nicer.

Overall, I will admit I do get that 'they should have given that feature for this price' thought occasionally. However, every vehicle has some or other small absurdity. The moment I step on the gas, I forget all these minor feature issues and enjoy the wonderful ride. I'd seriously recommend anyone considering entry-level vehicles of premium brands to try out Citroen C5.