Review and test Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV Intense+

Success – its causes and effects are sometimes difficult to fathom. If there’s one brand that can talk about that, it’s Mitsubishi. You undoubtedly know what we are talking about. In 2013, the Japanese proposed the Outlander PHEV, just at the time when the Dutch government was going to give substantial subsidies for fuel-efficient cars to make the Dutch vehicle fleet greener. A coincidental coincidence that turned out fantastic and dramatic. Fantastic for the Japanese, who hurriedly put the entire production on ships to the Netherlands and sold 13,000 cars to people who had only seen the Outlander in a photo. Dramatic for the Dutch government, which suddenly found itself compelled to spend extra money, because much more claims were made on the subsidies than foreseen.

However, it remains to be seen whether Mitsubishi has had a lot of fun with the record sales. The Outlander was quickly given the stigma of ‘subsidy guzzler’ (and the nickname Foutlander), and the fresh clientele was not always happy with the choice. The latter is mostly due to a mix of greed, laziness and stupidity; a large part didn’t even know that you had to regularly connect an Outlander to a plug to use it optimally, or were simply too bad for that. Result: sky-high consumption figures because they always more or less unnecessarily dragged a few hundred kilos of batteries with them. Guess who was to blame for that? Exactly: that poor Outlander.

But now about the Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV

Well, this story isn’t really about the Outlander, but it is. In 2017, the Eclipse Cross was Mitsubishi’s answer to the demand for ‘coupé-like SUVs’. He did take a number of styling cues from the Outlander (they looked exactly alike right down to the rear doors), but miraculously not its powertrain – it just had a petrol engine. And at the height of those rear doors everything changed rigorously: especially the huge light bar that split the rear window horizontally in two, caught the eye. Almost literally, because the view to the rear was severely limited and it led to ‘corners’ that you could rightly call dead.

It goes without saying that that was the first thing that had to disappear on the new model. The new Eclipse Cross also has a regular rear window, which finally takes its main function – you have to be able to see through it – seriously. And so it is now also available, and in the Netherlands even alone, as a Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV – a plug-in hybrid. The entire powertrain is exactly the same as that of the Outlander: a 2.4-litre turbocharged four-cylinder engine that runs on the Atkinson principle (shorter compression stroke, longer power stroke, making it more economical – google it) and two electric motors of 82 and 95 horsepower on the front and rear axles. Together, the stuff produces about 188 hp and a pulling power of about 300 Nm, although Mitsubishi thinks that you can’t really put it that way because all power sources permanently do different things from each other – so there is no one average.

No full fuel drive

Mitsubishi has a very different vision than other hybrid manufacturers. The petrol engine is actually only used to charge the batteries, so that the electric motors can continue to do their job. Only if you really want high performance, the petrol engine can step in to power the wheels, but it keeps it to the absolute minimum. Rather, if you’re draining the batteries faster than the petrol engine can recharge them, it’ll warn you to slow down rather than switch to full fuel drive – the latter it simply refuses. You will first see a turtle in your meters, then your power will be gradually reduced. In the worst case, the Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV just stops.

That sounds ominous, but in practice such a thing will (almost) never occur. Or you have to climb Mont Blanc with a caravan behind your Eclipse Cross at an emergency pace and constantly give it full throttle. Which is also not recommended for reasons other than an exhausted battery. Towing a sleurhut is indeed one of the possibilities; the Eclipse Cross can tow up to 1,500 kilos, which not every semi-electric car can do.

A nice thing, that Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV

Behind the wheel we especially noticed what we always notice when we end up in an Outlander (which doesn’t happen every month, shall we say): what a nice car it really is. Above all, the chassis is super comfortable and everything does exactly what it’s supposed to do without you having to put in a lot of effort or even notice it. All the technology takes care of that quite complicated drive without bothering you. The seats are comfortable, steering and brakes feel confident and after all the ultramodern stuff we’ve driven in recent months, it’s almost a relief to see some normal buttons on a dashboard again. The world is almost the other way around here: only that which cannot be controlled with buttons has ended up in the otherwise well-functioning touch screen.

Furthermore, it is bursting with space in the Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV, both for people and for large luggage and smaller items. Well, the materials used are not all of the most beautiful, but it all looks pretty indestructible and that’s how it feels. So it comes across as another car that pushes you with the nose on the well-known fact: after a nuclear war, only cockroaches remain – and Japanese cars.

It is not a car in which sportiness reigns supreme, neither in performance nor in handling, but thanks to the smart four-wheel drive you always have grip and you will also be able to keep up with it for a long time on unpaved roads. For example, the Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross PHEV will certainly not appeal to everyone, but people who fall for it will certainly not be disappointed.

Will Mitsubishi stay on the market here?

Last year suddenly reports came along: Mitsubishi would withdraw from Europe and focus on other markets. To be honest, that didn’t really surprise us. The brand has never really been a big player here, and especially very good at big off-road vehicles (think Pajero and such) and really small stuff (Japanese Kei cars), neither of which are runners in our region. Yet the soup turns out not to be eaten as hot when it was served: it has been thought about again and Mitsubishi will remain.

In fact, two new models are coming in the short term. Mitsubishi has become more and more integrated in the ‘alliance’ of Renault and Nissan in recent years, and that of course offers advantages. For example, based on Renault hardware, we can expect new Mitsubishis in the b and c segment, the segments where they are now (the ASX has not been there since last year either). The exact how, what and when will be kept to themselves for a while, but think of a Captur-like and something Mégane-based, which we wouldn’t be surprised if it also becomes a crossover. We will see!