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Note to Volkswagen marketing: it’s important to know your competition. The Acura RDX is a compact SUV that comes with a standard turbocharged engine, a fact that makes your already-questionable marketing claim look just plain stupid. Alternatively, this is yet more proof that Acura is the most invisible brand in America. [Hat Tip:Alex Rashev]
22 Comments on “What’s Wrong With This Picture: Turbocharging Das Truth Edition...”
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They should amend that to “The only SUV (that anybody cares about) with a turbo engine standard.
What? The 2011 X5 comes standard with a turbo 6?
Where do you live?
Around here Q7/Touareg and Tiguan/Q5 are very popular.
I believe that carguy was stating that the Tiguan is the only compact SUV anyone cares about with a turbo, not the RDX.
-1 for my poor reading comprehension
I rarely see an Acura RDX on the streets. It’s a nice driving vehicle too, just kind of pricey.
I thought the CX-7 came standard with a turbo engine?
It used to but now the 2.5 liter 4 is the base engine.
“Alternatively, this is yet more proof that Acura is the most invisible brand in America.”
I thought Suzuki was the most invisible brand.
Twotone
Actually shopped an RDX last summer. It was OK. At least we’d never have seen ourselves coming and going in one :)
I hear that the RDX’s fuel economy is abysmal. So much for the downsized turbocharged engine. The Tiguan, weird name aside, looks way better than the RDX, has better fuel economy, real interior room, and the engine might be chippable to even better specs than the stock RDX if the current 2.0T tuners have anything to say about it, and you still save $8-10K over the RDX.
Maybe I’ve just imagined it up, but isn’t there something of a rivalry between Honda and VW?
Here in Ottawa ON there is a tonne of RDXs around. Mind you, there are also a lot of MDXs. Definitely see more RDXs then Tiguans. I would be interested in the RDX too if the reviews didn’t call the ride downright harsh.
the Acura isn’t invisible. It is just kept in the kitchen where it can be used to chop vegetables.
+1 I used to like Acura’s styling bland and understated though it was. The current crop is nauseating. Same too for Honda.
The Acura RDX is a compact luxury crossover. VW incorrectly calls its wagon an “SUV”, because SUVs are truck-based and the Tiguan is a Golf underneath the tall body. Still, with a base price of $23K, it isn’t a luxury crossover, at least not to start, whereas the RDX is. Tiguan competes more closely with Honda’s CR-V, which has no turbo. The RDX’s closest VW competitor is the not-yet-on-sale Audi Q3 (The Q5 starts out $5K dearer than the Ac)
It’s not that you forget the buck-toothed girl come the weekend. You’d just rather not remember her.
I guess Deutsch isn’t quite ramped up on product claims yet, or someone at Crispin played a good joke and slipped that one in the transition materials.
Since splitting hairs is what marketing is all about, I suspect that the “compact” qualifier is what counts here. The Acura is not in the class of “compact” SUVs (as defined by whatever industry body decides such things). It’s bigger, and a whole bunch more expensive, and the product of a “luxury brand”.
False advertising pisses me off.
1. Who actually looks at the motor of their SUV / CUV and goes oh look.. its a turbo charger!?
2. Who actually buys these damn things.. cause its got a turbo charger.
3. Who actually puts it together.. that a SUV and a CUV are two different animals.. REGARDLESS of how GM falsely advertises.. EVERYTHING. As Philadlj says..its a jacked GOLF, and as far as Im concerned with the RDX.. its a CRV.
4. BOTH aren’t worth the price of admission, reguardless of the motor in the unit. Its not going to do as designed.. and those who drive it.. drive it because they know no better.
5. Just another piece of stupid marketing from automakers.. who force crap on people who dont know any better.
All valid points, except for number 3 – SUV vs CUV.
If you’re a person to whom the difference matters, then you’re already going in with the knowledge of what you don’t want. Everybody else needs a CUV. If they get the two mixed up, no harm, no foul because they were never going to take it on an axle twister anyway.
“Alternatively, this is yet more proof that Acura is the most invisible brand in America.”
Talk about a missfire. The RDX might be a swell rig but that motor should have been placed in the TSX for a type-s version before they put it into a CUV.
If that were true..
Acura should have kept the car the same size as the first gen.. AND TURBOED THAT!
The CR-V / RDX suffers from ailments that are not of its own design.. but are because of its own design.. and size v weight v cost comparos against the Toyota garbage.
Cant see them being in comparo against a jacked Golf.
Then again..
Id have to be snipped to drive either (so thats neither here or there.)