Lexus has waited a relatively long time to release a fully electric car. Now that the time has come, it turns out that it doesn’t get you very far.
Developments are moving at lightning speed in the electrical world. The records for charging speed and range are broken again and again and the price is getting lower. This does mean that as a brand you have to keep up with or lower your price if you want to remain competitive. In any case, you have to make sure that you are a bit on par when you launch your car, otherwise you will already start to lag behind. That seems like a message Lexus didn’t quite get. The brand was relatively late with the release of an all-electric model. Lexus was mainly the brand of the hybrids. Now it must be said that the practical use of those hybrid Lexuses is extremely impressive these days, but you buy little as a buyer if all that tax discount for EVs passes you by.
cramped
Now no manufacturer will develop a car purely for the Dutch market, but the tone has certainly been set in Europe. Electricity is continuing, only the pace of which differs per country. That’s why Lexus launched its first electric car this year. It is an electric version of the UX, the small SUV that came on the market in 2018 as a competitor to models such as the Audi Q3 and the Mercedes-Benz GLA. The UX 300e appeared at the beginning of 2020 as the electric version with 204 hp at the front wheels and a battery of just 55 kWh. good for a WLTP range of 300 kilometers. These are not groundbreaking figures in today’s world, especially because you know that in practice there are still some things to lose. In ideal weather conditions, we managed to drive 265 kilometers far, but then the cake is really gone. A bit small for a car that is not really a city car. Until the disaster is over, the Lexus also lacks a 3-phase charger. A mistake that other EV makers, such as Hyundai and Jaguar, have long since come back from. Fast charging here still takes place via an (now) old-fashioned CHAdeMO plug, which will never exceed 50 kW and is usually even a lot lower. Even the cheapest Hyundai Ioniq 5 comes up to 240 kW and thus charges almost five times faster! The marketing department makes good on the meager specs by emphasizing how short their customers’ ‘average’ journeys are and that the cars are primarily intended for urban areas like London, Tokyo or Manhattan, but those are claims that competitors have long distanced themselves from. And even if that were true, there’s no excuse for just putting a 1-phase charger in a car of this calibre.
Comfort and dynamism
Are there any positive things to mention about the electrical part? Secure! Despite its weight of 1,800 kg, the Lexus is fast, you notice that immediately when you drive away. The UX feels at home with every intermediate sprint. The power delivery is also beautifully linear, so that it feels smooth rather than horny. Something that fits well with his driving style. As we are used to from most Lexuses, the car is extremely comfortable, but that is certainly done in a nice way. It is not soft or overly agile, but offers comfort in a sophisticated way. In addition, the Lexus is very quiet, which makes the total driving experience very soothing. The quality of the cockpit is in line with this. It is a luxurious whole, with beautiful materials and a beautiful finish. The overall design looks typical Japanese with the way in which different beautiful and less attractive materials overlap, but the details are beautiful. Too bad the crappy touchpad is still used; this makes the multimedia system very unpleasant. The screen in front of you looks nice again and we recognize the bull horn with which you choose the driving options from, among other things, the thick Lexus LC. The shock doesn’t come until we move to the back seat. It’s bizarrely cramped here and you can’t ask adults to spend any length of time here. This makes usability much smaller. The trunk is also not overly spacious with 367 liters. And that for a car that looks quite large from the outside. All in all, the Lexus is without a doubt premium, looking at the silence in the interior, the finish and the materials used. Whether you actually have the money for that is of course personal, but it can be seen what the extra money has been spent on. But despite all that luxury, you prefer to stay close to home…
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl