Steering US drivers away from supersize

Will the new breed of small cars curb Americans' appetite for petrol, asks MICHAEL McALEER, Motoring Editor

CAN AMERICAN palates really take to the smaller portions of Europe? Like it or not, Americans are gradually being weaned off a diet of SUVs and pick-ups. A mixture of rising fuel prices, social pressure and the changing menus of their own car firms are starting to take effect. Supersize is giving way to supermini.

The clearest evidence of this was the introduction by Ford of the Fiesta to the US market just before Christmas. This was followed by the unveiling of the new Focus. They may have had the model name before, but that was a family saloon car equivalent to the older versions of the Mondeo. This time they’re getting the European Focus hatchback. Surprisingly, at least for anyone who has spent time driving the highways of Middle America, both cars have been rather warmly received.

Yet this is not just an image-building exercise by Ford. It’s merely putting the metal on the forecourts. Others already signalled their intentions. While Ford avoided the ignominy of seeking US government bailouts, its two fellow American giants – Chrysler and General Motors – both ended up seeking shelter from bankruptcy from US taxpayers last year.

Nearly a year has passed and both are making headway towards recovery. In both instances the strategic plan requires the adoption of European-sized models in their fleets. Chrysler has been rescued by Fiat, the European specialists in small car models. Fiat sees the time has finally come to introduce Americans to its funky 500 and rebadged Lancia Delta, with Chrysler’s network ready to take stock of its wares.

GM, meanwhile, was almost ready to sell off its European badges when a Paulian sea-change occurred. Realising that if it was going to swing its US owners towards smaller cars it would need some European guidance, it quickly reversed out of a decision to offload the Opel brand. While it left some serious ill-will amongst German government officials who had strived so hard to help secure a sale, GM management realised that there was no point re-inventing the small car format when they already had the expertise in the family.

GM has tried to wow US buyers with European-style small cars before, with little success. Its Saturn brand was meant to be the US umbrella for the Astra and similar models, but the plan never really took off. Yet the Asians have achieved success – at least in the urban coastal states – with small car models from Toyota, under its Scion brand. So is this finally the start of a small car revival in the States? The jury is still out.

For a start, big cars carry big profits. For all the marketing hype, the average big cars from US brands were built upon pretty fundamental technology. The development costs were well covered in the early years and so long as they continued to be used, incremental costs were small, profit margins were high, and the discounts could be significant.

The problem with small cars is that customers demand increasingly high standards of safety and equipment but at ultra-competitive prices. Margins are tight so prices aren’t as flexible, and the cost of all that technology raises obvious questions on US forecourts: why pay so much for a small car when a few dollars more gets you a great big motoring feast? It might not be as sophisticated as the European offerings, but it sure does fill you up. In the country that appreciates “all you can eat for $10” and “supersized” value, the idea of paying more for less seems anathema.

In the week that Ford introduced its new Focus to the world – and particularly to US buyers – we got the chance to taste first-hand the changing menu facing American motorists. In many ways it symbolises the striking contrasts on offer on US forecourts as the nation considers the serious leap from mega motors to minis.

First up was the Ford Fusion Hybrid, a car that won this year’s title of North American car of the year. About the size of a Mondeo, it’s a mild hybrid, with a small nickel battery that supports the engine in much the same way that Toyota does in its Prius, only with less intervention.

A symbol of Ford’s rather disparate strategy to date, the brand has been working with hybrids for several years but has never bothered to bring the models to Europe. Since 2003 it has offered a mid-sized SUV hybrid, the Ford Escape, only to US buyers. This at a time when the brand didn’t have a model to rival the likes of the Toyota RAV4 or Honda CR-V in its European showrooms.

Our first task was to coax the best fuel consumption we could from the Fusion. Initial attempts over a five-mile route on public roads were less than stellar. Letting the battery do as much of the hauling as possible, the car’s 2.5-litre petrol engine still motored away for most of the journey, despite the flat terrain. We returned a rather poor 36mpg in imperial measure (7.8l/100km); impressive for a car with this engine, but hardly a Prius-beater on European roads. A second outing got the figure up to 66mpg (4.2l/100km), a dramatic improvement even if it did mean crawling along at 20mph along the perimeter of a US airforce base. Kerb-crawling is inadvisable at the best of times, but doing it outside an airforce base the week after the attempted attack on an airline into Detroit was probably not the most sensible option. On our fourth attempt we had pushed the average fuel consumption to 82.8mpg (3.4l/100km) and at this stage it was time to call it quits before some worried sentry decided he’d seen me once too often and reckoned I needed a holiday in Guantanamo Bay.

Impressive figures, but they required ridiculously slow driving. Surely a quicker way of cutting the fuel consumption would be to simply fit the car with a smaller engine. Ford engineers accept that point in principle, but are not so sure US buyers will. It’s all part of the difficulty of putting Americans on a petrol diet.

After a quick decaffeinated coffee with low-fat sweetener, accompanied by a buffet lunch of burgers, hot dogs and copious amounts of sweet cookies, we’re out in the Raptor, an enormous pick-up built as much for off-road racing as farming assistance. This beast is simply fantastic fun. Its foundations are based on the iconic F150 pick-up, whose front grille stands shoulder tall with a six-foot pedestrian. Beneath the bonnet gurgles either a 5.4-litre or 6.2-litre V8. Both are petrol – there’s not a diesel engine in sight.

On an incredibly challenging sand track, the Raptor proves itself a match for the likes of the Land Rover Defender; only, where the British off-roader climbs embankments with careful consideration, the Raptor devours them at speed. At the instruction of one of Ford’s test drivers we keep the throttle down and hit a sand ramp at 40mph, launching the 5.8 tonne pick-up into the air and off its four-wheels. I brace for the inevitable crash landing, preparing for the splat as my spine gets welded to the top of my skull. And then: nothing. It’s as if we hadn’t left the ground.

The shock absorbers, the secret ingredient on the Raptor developed in conjunction with Ford’s US racing division SVT, soak up the load without a twitch. There’s no bang or rattle, just forward thrust as we hurtle on when the wheels hit terra firma. A touch of the brakes on loose gravel and we come to a halt, or at least the Raptor does as my forward momentum tests the limits of the seat belts. Then it’s up a 35-degree gradient at 20mph and along a straight, all the while the dust kicking up from our enormous tyres. This is where the racing car meets the pick-up, in a way that only Americans would think of.

A quick clean-up and we’re on the racetrack in a collection of Mustangs that gurgle and growl like the best of American muscle cars. They’re rough, grippy, and blue-collar to their core. Can the brand that so proudly builds these cars really hope to park them alongside the likes of the Fiesta? That’s the plan. It’s symbolic of the split personality in the US auto industry as it weighs up high-minded fuel economy with raw motoring fun.

Critics will bemoan the fact that it shows the US brands are slow to change. Yet they are commercial entities that need to respond to customer demand. To lose the Mustang – or pick-ups like the Raptor – overnight would be to disown its heritage.

It’s clear that US consumer tastes in cars are just as complex as their diets. TV ads and fashionable society may push diet plans, but they share primetime TV screens with mega-sized meal deals. The car market reflects the dietary dichotomy.

It’s going to be a painful transition for petrolhead Americans to wean themselves off the intoxicating gurgle and growl of big block petrol engines. A continent that was revolutionised by the car is going on a motoring diet. Whether the mainstream American buyer bites remains to be seen.

If cholesterol and heart disease can’t get them to give up the supersized meals, will fears of global warming wean them off their big petrol engines? In a land that looks to the quick-fix solutions of plastic surgery and liposuction as an alternative to an arduous diet regime, you get the impression they’re hoping for a silver bullet solution to the fuel issue as well.