What is it?
Named after the 1934 monoplane made by the Caudron-Renault aviation company, the Rafale is Renault’s flagship SUV that features the firm’s E-Tech hybrid powertrain and has a sporty coupe-derived bodystyle.
Built to rival cars like the Peugeot 408, Audi Q5 and BMW X4, this big Renault focuses on offering sporty looking characteristics while offering low CO2 emissions from its petrol-electric powertrain and comes with a host of standard features.
What’s new?
Even though the nameplate has been around for almost a century in the aviation industry, the Rafale is a completely new SUV that completes Renault’s rather large variety of jacked-up vehicles, sitting above the Symbioz, Austral, Arkana and Captur in the range.
There will also be a performance-oriented plug-in hybrid model that will launch later this year, to give the Rafale range a greater choice for those looking for a coupe-derived SUV and mid to high specified cars come with Renault’s new 4Control four-wheel steering. But, is it any good? We’ve been finding out.
What’s under the bonnet?
The standard Rafale only comes with the choice of one powertrain, which is a 1.2-litre three-cylinder turbocharged petrol engine mated to an electric motor that produces a total of 202bhp and 205Nm of torque. As it’s a large car, it’s also rather heavy, meaning that its powertrain takes the car from 0-60mph in 8.7 seconds and the Rafale is out of steam at 111mph.
Performance in the Rafale isn’t its forte with the engine feeling too small and underpowered to be in such a large bulbous vehicle.
What’s it like to drive?
When driving the Rafale you start to notice some of its weaknesses. For starters the visibility out of the back is poor with a very shallow rear window, tall rear headrests and thick C-pillars making reversing difficult.
To drive, the hybrid powertrain feels unpolished in a lot of places with the engine and electric motor transition feeling rather clumsy and jerky. The automatic gearbox is also hesitant under acceleration and its performance aforementioned is rather sluggish. Wind and road noise are also rather intrusive with a lot of tyre roar entering the cabin. The steering is vague and uncommunicative even with the 4Control four-wheel steering and the overall experience is dull and disappointing. But, the most frustrating thing is the car’s ride which has a tendency to be very harsh over all surfaces making the whole experience rather uncomfortable.
Around town, the Rafale makes up for its shortcomings with its four-wheel steering as it enables this large SUV to have an excellent turning circle, which makes low-speed town driving a breeze.
How does it look?
Our test car’s bright Summit blue paint with the Diamond black roof make the Rafale really stand out from the crowd.
At the front, the Nouvel’R logo is housed by a diamond effect front grille along with boomerang style LED daytime running lights. The gloss black wheel arches and lower body mouldings dominate the side profile and at the back, the swooping roofline finishes with a kick-up boot lid along with more diamond-effect-styled rear tail lights.
All this gives the Rafale a unique presence on the road, with a lot of people taking a second glance at it as you drive past.
What’s it like inside?
The Rafale is a nice place to sit in and that’s because of the soft plastics used throughout making it feel high quality. All cars come equipped with a portrait 12.9-inch infotainment screen with Google Built-in, as well as there being physical climate control buttons which helps with user-friendliness.
Our test car is the Techno Esprit Alpine that features blue floor mats, blue carpeted door bins and illuminated Alpine logos on the front seats which adds to the sportier nature of the car. With the exception of a rather small glovebox, storage is rather impressive with a large centre armrest with storage located underneath, as well as additional space under the front hand rest on the centre console. The door bins are large and there are two cup holders along with a wireless smartphone charger.
In the back, space is normally at a premium with coupe-derived vehicles, but that’s not the case with the Rafale. Despite the sloping roofline, there is more than enough head and legroom for average sized adult, plus our test car is fitted with Renault’s ingenious centre armrest that doubles up with an additional two cup holders, portrait and landscape mobile phone holders and there are two USB-Cs hidden in there, too.
Boot space stands at 647 litres with the seats in place – which is 120 litres more than something like a BMW X4. Fold the 40:20:40 seat configuration down, and although the seats do not lie flat, it does give you a total of 1,600 litres of space – which is almost class leading.
What’s the spec like?
There’s only three different varieties of Rafale, but no matter which version you choose, Renault has made sure that all models are very well equipped.
The entry-level Techno comes in at £38,195 and includes an abundance of features including 20-inch alloy wheels, DAB radio, Google Built-in, a 12.9-inch touchscreen, keyless entry and dual-zone climate control.
We’re driving the mid-range Techno Esprit Alpine which with the addition of the Summit Blue paint and Diamond black roof option comes in at £43,445 and boasts features such as 4Control four-wheel steering, a 9.3-inch head-up display, the ingenious rear armrest, an electric tailgate and massaging front seats.
The flagship Iconic Esprit Alpine comes in at £44,695 and boasts Renault’s Solarbary panoramic sunroof, a premium 12-speaker Harman Kardon audio system, hands free parking and a 360-degree around view 3D camera.
Verdict
Renault’s Rafale is a tricky one to pin-point because it comes with plenty of standard equipment and is very spacious and comes with one of the largest boot capacities in this segment. But, its driving characteristics are let down by a firm ride, a clumsy powertrain and for the money there are better alternatives out there that still offer plenty of toys for the same money that also drive better, too.
- Model as tested: Renault Rafale Techno Esprit Alpine
- Price as tested: £43,445
- Engine: 1.2-litre turbocharged petrol with electric motor
- Power: 202bhp
- Torque: 205Nm
- Top speed: 111mph
- 0-60mph: 8.7 seconds
- MPG: 60.1mpg
- CO2 emissions: 105g/km
