Radar Love

The Age

Saturday March 8, 2008

Ian Porter

The upgraded Chrysler 300C has more under its bonnet than just brawn, writes Ian Porter.

SHEPHERDING a 5.7-litre V8 around town requires some vigilance, and not just because of the price of petrol.

Chrysler 300C drivers must also be wary of exceeding the speed limit, so effortless is the performance of the Austrian-built limousine, which has just been freshened up.

Cruise control is a natural companion for a large engine like the Hemi. In fact, it is a necessity and this may be why Chrysler engineers have been beavering away to enhance the cruise control system for the 300C.

The 300C has now joined a growing band of cars with adaptive cruise control (ACC), optional on all models except the top-of-the-line SRT8, where it will be standard.

On one level, ACC is a clever, stress-free way of sharing the road with fellow drivers. However, some critics believe ACC could be dangerous and catch the unwary by surprise.

ACC grafts an on-board radar-based sensor to the standard cruise control system. If your car closes in on a slower car, engine power is reduced and your brakes are automatically applied so that your car holds station without you having to do anything.

Your car just follows the slower car at a safe distance, at the slower car's pace.

This can sometimes be frustrating if you are on a long trip and want to travel at the speed limit. The system can be so unobtrusive that you may not even realise your car has been slowed by the car ahead.

There is a little bit of adjustment available to the driver with ACC. It takes a little while and some playing around trying different things to become familiar with it.For instance, these systems are usually adjustable so the driver can choose the distance at which the system will operate.

At highway speeds, the choice is usually about 100 metres, 75 metres or 50 metres to the slower car in front, although the real intervention point is a moving feast determined, in a millisecond, by the algorithm in the Chrysler's computer.

In a sense, ACC can take some of the tension out of driving, but there is some disquiet about the possibility a driver could be caught out if he or she is not paying attention.

For instance, if you leave your cruise control set at a faster speed than the car in front, the driver in the other car can actually end up "driving" your car. It feels uncanny at first, but when the driver in front brakes, your car brakes, too, without you doing anything - except, of course, steer.

When the other driver speeds up, your car does, too, but only back up to the cruise limit you set.

This is fine on straight roads, but you have to be alert on hilly, winding roads if this follow-the-leader situation crops up.

On a winding road, when the car in front brakes to slow down and move around a sharper bend in the road, it may move out of radar range. Initially, your car will brake, but, when the first car turns into the corner, the radar will tell your car the road ahead is clear because it can no longer detect a car in front.

So, naturally enough, your ACC starts to accelerate your car back up to the cruise control speed you have set. Just as you are approaching a corner.

With a 5.7-litre V8 under the bonnet, this can be unsettling. A surge of V8 power when you should be slowing down certainly gets your attention.

What is more common is when a driver in another lane on a highway changes lanes and jumps into the safety gap the ACC leaves between your car and the one in front.

The Chrysler boffins have thought about this and engineered a strong safety margin into the ACC.

When a third car suddenly drops into your ACC gap, the 300C will automatically cancel the cruise control setting and start applying the brakes faster than the driver can, so the car has already begun slowing down by the time the driver hits the brake pedal.

As for the rest of the 300C, Chrysler Australia chief executive Gerry Jenkins says that not a lot of work was required, just a few tweaks to the interior and the exterior and the installation of the 20Gb MyGig touch-screen entertainment system as standard.

"The 300C has been a moneymaker for Chrysler and helped put us on the shopping list for many buyers," Mr Jenkins says. "It has made Chrysler a household name in Australia."

The 300C is not like other Chryslers. Built in Graz, Austria, by Magna Steyr, it has a standard of interior trim not found elsewhere in the range. The newly designed instrument panel is restrained and elegant and now features a data panel between the two major dials, which now lets the driver know when the big Hemi engine has dropped into fuel-saving mode and is running on only four cylinders.

Tailors around Australia will be sad to hear that the aggressive old Chrysler ignition key has finally been flung. The new key is a stubby Mercedes-Benz style unit, extending the 300C's link with the old parent company and eliminating the possibility of keys poking through pants pockets when drivers sit down.

There are two other engines in the range, the 3.5-litre V6 (183 kW and 340 Nm) and the turbo-charged 3.0-litre diesel (160 kW and 510 Nm).

The V6 is the entry level model at an unchanged $53,990 while the diesel starts at $58,390 (up $400).

The 5.7-litre V8 costs $59,990 and the full-house SRT8 $73,990.

© 2008 The Age

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