A bit low on personality, but at this price...
by mkaresh - Written: Apr 01 '02 (Updated Jul 21 '05)
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Pros: Engine power at high RPM, balanced chassis, rear seat room, low price
Cons: Styling and chassis could use more personality, rear seats don't fold
The Bottom Line: Peak engine power, chassis stability, and rear seat legroom are strong points. The styling and chassis could possess more character, but at this price it’s hard to recommend a competitor.
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| mkaresh's Full Review: 2003 Infiniti G35 |
Infiniti’s first entry-lux sedan, the G20, never sold well. Though widely recognized as among the best handling front-wheel-drive sedans, it was also widely criticized for a lack of power. For 2003, Infiniti fixes this problem by making a 260-horsepower 3.5-liter V6 standard in the new G, now called the G35 to reflect the larger engine. But far more has changed than the engine. This is an all-new design. Like Lexus and Cadillac, Infiniti now accepts that a rear-wheel-drive chassis is necessary to compete with the BMW 3-Series, and the G35 has one. Not only this, but the same basic chassis will be used in the new Nissan Z, so it’s clearly designed to maximize handling. It does this partly through a “cab rearward” configuration. The engine sits further rearward than in a typical sedan, leading to a nearly balanced weight distribution and a driving position that is well behind the front axle, as in a sports car. Despite the engine placement, the G35’s passenger room remains abundant. Credit goes to a 112.1 inch wheelbase (five inches longer than that of the BMW 330i and seven inches longer than that of the Lexus IS 300) and 57.7 inch height (two inches taller than the BMW and Lexus). (Click on the blue hyperlinks to read my reviews of related vehicles.) Overall length is a substantial ten inches more than the others, nearly matching a BMW 5-Series. Still, this is not simply a larger car. The G35’s width and weight are similar to those of the BMW and Lexus, so in character it remains more compact than mid-sized. Ultimately, the G35 promises the best of both worlds, combining the agility (and price) of a compact with the legroom of a midsize. Does it deliver?
Infiniti G35 Reliability
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Styling
I am baffled by the ads for the G35. They assert that the G35 is the realization of all of the promises auto-makers made through show cars in the 1950s and 1960s. I’m sorry, but the G35 doesn’t look particularly futuristic, or even contain too many futuristic qualities. The Cadillac CTS and even the Lexus IS 300 possess much more futuristic styling, both inside and out. In comparison to those cars, the G35 looks a bit bland and generally lacks presence. Perhaps by intent, it looks much smaller and less substantial than it is. Though ten inches longer, it appears roughly the same size as a 3-Series. This is not necessarily a bad thing. The exterior styling is generally tasteful and attractive in a highly restrained, BMW-ish kind of way. It just doesn’t fit the image projected by the ads.
Infinti asserts that the G35’s styling is unique, calling it “catamaran styling.” This refers to the fact that the fenders rise a bit above the hood. I doubt this does anything for aerodynamics, and it is so subtle that it hardly defines the styling of the car. However, as a result the fenders are much more visible from the driver’s seat, making it easier to place the car in turns. My father, along for the test drive, remarked on this without first seeing it in the brochure. It’s that helpful.
I do have one problem with the exterior styling. The reverse lights partly continue the taillights into the trunk lid. The problem is in the “partly.” Because they are only half the height of the taillights, the overall shape of the taillight-reverse light cluster is strange, awkward, and generally unattractive. The rest of the styling is so restrained, why did they decide to get goofy with just this one element? Beats me.
Ultimately, the exterior’s main claim to fame is that it is extremely aerodynamic, 10-20% more so than the typical sedan these days. Even better, there is zero lift at the front and very little lift at the rear (zero with an optional package), promising a solid feel even at high speeds.
The interior styling is similarly tasteful, at least in the standard car. With the “graphite” leather interior materials look like those in a $30,000 car should. The door panels are largely covered with a rich feeling vinyl—Cadillac could learn something here. In the “willow” interior a few pieces here and there look a bit on the cheap side, but nothing major. To a large extent, the “dark interior effect” is in play here, where a darker color makes the interior look and feel higher in quality and generally richer. Somehow the darker color also seems more suited to the sporting character of the car. A shame, since I personally prefer the lower temps and airier quality of a lighter interior.
“Titanium” trim is standard in the G35 interior. Such metallic trim is increasingly common in this class of car, and this is among the best looking applications I have seen. (Some of the metallic trims in BMWs look quite strange). The look is especially striking with the dark leather. For another $250, real wood trim is offered in place of the metallic stuff. Save your money. It is a light-colored wood, and both looks wrong in this interior and clashes with the car’s character.
The instruments and controls are generally well-designed. Aside from orange lighting at all times (which worked well in the strong sunlight I drove the car in), the gauges are classically styled, with no goofy stylistic advances (i.e. the IS 300’s). The stereo and climate control buttons are large and logically laid out on the center stack--for Japan. The major knobs are on the right side of the stack, where you'd expect them for a right-hand-drive car; Nissan must have decided that the minor ergonomic issue this posed did not justify tooling up a second set of controls with the button locations reversed. To get the car's price so low, some tough choices undoubtedly had to be made, and I suspect this was one of them. Read-outs for the climate controls are located a half foot above the controls themselves. This is both good and bad. They can be reviewed there with a quick glance, but if you cannot find the buttons by feel alone you’ll be looking back and forth between two locations to adjust them.
Accommodations
The driver’s seat is a nice place to be. To begin with, the driving position is excellent. Even with the power seat adjusted to its lowest position you sit high, well over the level of the dash and hood. I personally strongly prefer such a position. The compact width of the cockpit combines with a high and wide center console to lend the interior a sporty character. The steering wheel is nicely shaped and padded. A lightly-padded door armrest is another plus. Too many cars have hard vinyl armrests, leading to a sore elbow for those of us who steer primarily with the left hand. Finally, the instruments adjust up and down with the steering column, so the driver’s view of them is always unobstructed.
The seat itself is comfortable, and provides good support in most driving. In hard turns, however, I slid right over the modest bolsters. The standard seats in the Cadillac CTS and Acura TL-S provide much better lateral support. While the G35’s seats are easily a match for the base seats in a 3-Series or Audi A4, and thus will be fine even for most performance-minded drivers, those cars provide more aggressive sport seats as an option. Perhaps Infiniti could follow BMW and Audi’s lead and make more aggressively bolstered seats part of the sport package?
The grab handles on the doors are perfectly positioned for the front passenger. My father noted their usefulness while I was driving.
In the typical Nissan fashion the front seat tracks are extremely long, such that even those with very long legs should be able to adjust the seat as far rearward as they like. My inseam is only 30”, so even though I like a legs-and-arms outstretched driving position (people a couple inches taller than me tend to like the seat where I put in) I didn’t come close to putting the seat all the way back.
With the front seat where I like it, there was plenty of leg room in the rear seat for the 6ֵ” salesman. The competition, even the larger Cadillac CTS, does not come close in this area. Thank the long wheelbase. Headroom is a bit more restricted—those over 5㤓” or so will have to slide their rear forward a bit. The rear seat is mounted even higher than the front seats. Combined with a good deal of air between the tops of the front seat headrests and the ceiling, this makes for a nice, airy view forward. (In more and more sedans the front seat headrests largely block the rear passengers’ view forward, making them feel a bit closed in.) The beltline is also low enough to provide a good view out the side windows. All in all, the rear seat would be perfect for two passengers if its cushion were better shaped. As it is, it provides too little thigh support for even someone of my height despite its high position. As in more cramped rear seats, I had to cross my legs to feel comfortable. A bit of a tilt or a raised forward edge would help here.
The interior possesses a large number of modestly-sized storage areas, including one over the glove box.
As in other rear-wheel-drive compact sedans, trunk space is on the tight side. (The brochure says there are over 14 cubic feet, but it doesn't look that spacious.) What’s more, the rear wheels and suspension intrude quite a bit, so the shape is not the best. As in the IS 300, the rear seats do not fold down. A small pass-through is standard, but this does no good with larger objects. I have used the fold-down rear seats often in my own car. BMW offers this as an option. Infiniti should as well. In the fall a G35 coupe will be introduced, and it will have this feature. Why not the sedan?
One possible reason: On the sedan, rear seatbacks that manually recline are available as part of a $2,200 “premium package.” While these would allow rear passengers to nap better on long trips, they appear to slightly reduce space in the trunk.
On the Road
With 260 horsepower pushing 3,300 lbs., the G35 promises to be a strong performer. It largely lives up to its promise. At higher RPM the 3.5 liter six provides a great deal of thrust, and makes very nice baritone noises while doing so. The voice is not so raw as that of a BMW six, but this is perhaps better suited for a luxury car. The Lexus V8 sounds similar when pushed.
It’s a different story at lower RPM. Below 3,500 RPM, the G35’s engine can even feel soft. When floored from a dead stop it takes a moment to build up steam. When I told my father that (based on the specs) this car should feel as strong as his Lexus GS 400, he was dubious. It simply did not. A closer look at the specs bear this out. Although the Infiniti 3.5 liter makes 50 lb.-ft. less torque than the 4.0 liter in my father’s car, this isn’t the problem—the substantially lower weight of the G35 should compensate for this deficit. The real problem is that the 3.5’s torque peak is at a lofty 4,800 RPM. My father’s engine’s torque peak is at a much lower 4,000 RPM, and the 4.3 liter in newer GSs peaks at 3,400 RPM.
Of course, the Lexus GS is not a direct competitor of the G35. However, both the BMW 330 and Lexus IS feel stronger at low RPMs despite their large disadvantage on paper, and their torque peaks bear this out. The BMW 3.0 six peaks at 3,500 RPM, and the Lexus’s at 3,800. A few years ago BMW realized that its engines would be better suited to American driving conditions if they produced their peak torque at lower RPM. It enlarged its sixes and eights, yet kept their peak power constant. The additional displacement was entirely channeled toward a lower torque peak. Infiniti might also benefit from this realization.
The shape of the entire torque curve would tell the real story, but in the absence of the curve itself the peak gives the best indication. Combining this stat with my driving experience, it seems clear that this is a peaky motor.
This would matter less with a manual transmission, where keeping an engine in its power band is a large part of the fun. With an automatic, however, low-end torque is much more important. With an automatic, you want the grunt to be there as soon as you tip into the throttle. This said, I personally prefer a manual, and look forward to driving a G35 again when the manual becomes available late in 2002.
Before moving on, a word on the manu-matic feature. Like that in many performance-sedans, the G35’s standard automatic can be manually shifted, in this case by sliding the shifter into a short back-and-forth slot to the right of D. Although this set-up is as easy to use as any I’ve driven, it’s still no substitute for a true manual. For one thing, too much thinking is involved. With a manual, I intuitively know where to move the lever to get second gear. With a manu-matic, I have to count clicks. It will simply never be second-nature, no matter how familiar it gets. A manual takes advantage of body memory in a way that a manu-matic cannot. Second, with a manual you can precisely adjust when and how quickly gears are engaged with the clutch. Devoid of a similar control, a manu-matic simply cannot provide nearly the same feeling of connection to what is going on. For me, the manual cannot become available too soon.
The G35’s handling might be too perfect. The chassis always feels very balanced, with hardly a hint of understeer. Even with the standard suspension, roll is minimal, and the tires grip the road strongly. Still, I didn’t find the car terribly exciting to drive. It just didn’t engage me like a BMW 3-Series or even the new Cadillac CTS does. I gave this issue a great deal of thought during the test drive, and came up with two contributing factors.
First, although the level of effort through the wheel is just high enough to feel sporty, the steering could provide better feedback. I felt I could precisely place the car in turns, but I didn’t feel as connected to what was going on where the rubber meets the road as I would like to be. Since the optional sport suspension does not affect the steering, I wouldn't expect it to change my evaluation of the G35's handling.
Second, and most important, it was virtually impossible for me to provoke any oversteer with this chassis. Yes, this makes the car’s handling very safe; but oversteer, especially in moderate amounts, can be fun. One of the major advantages of a rear-wheel-drive chassis is oversteer-on-demand. Unfortunately, even flooring the G35’s throttle in fairly tight turns (with the skid control turned off) only made the rear end step out a little. As a result, forget about steering this car with the throttle. You’re stuck with the steering wheel here. A less stable chassis might be less “perfect,” but I tend to find chassis that react more sharply to throttle changes more fun. The dealer did not have a car with the sport suspension, but I would expect this suspension to be even more stable than the one I drove.
Update: Both Car & Driver and Edmunds have recently complained about excessive oversteer in the G35 when the stability control is turned off. They tested cars equipped with the optional sport suspension, but I doubt this was a contributing factor. Instead, I seem to have spent too little time exploring the G35's handling with the stability control turned off. Although I turned this system off for a small stretch, I drove most of the time with the system on. I certainly didn't realize how much it must have been working, so it is commendably unobtrusive. As for the oversteer, these magazines seem to be describing rather sudden, extreme, entirely unsought behavior, while I sought the sort of mild, driver-induced linearly progressive oversteer that allows you to precisely balance the chassis with the throttle. I'll sort through this issue more in a second test drive once the manual becomes available.
These days it is not acceptable to kill a car’s ride in the pursuit of good handling, and the G35 matches the competition here. At least with the standard suspension, even medium-sized potholes tend to be absorbed with little fuss. (I test drove this car on the fairly smooth roads of South Carolina, so I wasn't able to test the ride over some of Michigan's finest.) In contrast to many competitors, you do not even hear the bumps much. Overall, noise levels while cruising are luxury-car low, if not quite Lexus silent.
The only minor blemish on the G35’s ride might be a by-product of its relatively light weight. It’s ten inches longer than the 3-Series and IS 300, yet weighs about the same. It’s as quiet as they are, so it does not seem weight was saved by skimping on sound absorbing materials. And Lexus is well-known for weight-saving techniques. So it is likely that Infiniti saved weight in the typical Nissan fashion, through a less stiff body structure. I detected some evidence of this: I felt the steering column shake a little over road imperfections. I almost had to be seeking it, but it was there. In cars with very stiff structures such shake is absent.
The brakes were powerful, but not very progressive. At low speeds they were quite touchy, making smooth stops difficult. Additional miles might help here, as it is possible that the pads were not quite broken in on the car I tested.
Pricing
For quick, up-to-date pricing, and especially user-specified price comparisons, check out the website I created: www.truedelta.com. Why yet another vehicle pricing website? Well, I personally lacked the patience to keep using the others. They were too slow and required too much effort, especially when trying to compare prices. So I taught myself some programming and created a site where there is no need to dig through option packages, prerequisites, and the like one by one -- the TrueDelta algorithm figures these out for you in one swift pass.
The following is from when the review was originally written:
Options can substantially increase the G35’s price. If this is a problem, avoid them. The standard “luxury leather model” includes nearly everything most people need: power driver’s seat, in-dash six-disk changer, 17” wheels, and the usual slew of power accessories. Even with the $1,000 sunroof, the price is just $30,495. A similarly equipped BMW 330i costs $8,000 more. Even the smaller Lexus IS 300 runs nearly $3,000 more. In this class, the front-wheel-drive Acura TL-S comes closest in price, at $31,810. Although the Acura possesses as much power as the Infiniti, its rear seat is not as roomy and its larger, front-wheel-drive chassis does not handle as well while being equally devoid of personality.
The slightly larger, better handling Cadillac CTS would be priced in the same range if it's option packages were not outrageously expensive, and if you did not require one of them to order individual options like a sunroof. As it is, you can get a base CTS with automatic for $30,903, but to get 17" wheels, skid control, and a sunroof (all on the $30,495 G35 I tested) you're forced into a $3,500 package, pushing the price all the way to $35,420.
Since the G35's price is so low, expect to pay at least sticker for the next few months. Later demand should cool and supply should catch up.
A couple of Swedes with less punch and rear seat room but more, well, Swedishness: Saab 9-3 and Volvo S40.
Last words
For most people interested in a near-luxury performance sedan, the G35 is hard to beat given its price. It’s basic engineering is excellent. Peak engine power, an extremely stable chassis, and generous rear seat room are strong points. The car’s styling and chassis dynamics could possess more character to be truly exciting, but at this price it’s hard to recommend a competitor.
Counterpoint: My father was along for my test drives of both the G35 and CTS. I was surprised that this long-time Lexus owner actually preferred the CTS for its more distinctive styling, more dynamic chassis, and an overall sense that it was "more car."
To learn more about my reliability research and sign up to participate in it, or to perform thorough, up-to-date new car price comparisons, visit www.truedelta.com. A link to this website and alphabetized links to my other vehicle reviews can be found on my profile page.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 30,495
Model and Options: G35 with leather, sunroof, standard suspension
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